Valerie Perrine

Valerie Ritchie Perrine (born September 3, 1943) is an American actress and model.

Life and career

Perrine was born in Galveston, Texas, the daughter of Winifred "Renee" (née McGinley), a dancer who appeared in Earl Carroll's Vanities, and Kenneth Perrine, a Lieutenant Colonel in the U.S. Army. Owing to her father's career, Perrine lived in many locations as the family moved to different posts.

She began her career as a Las Vegas showgirl. Some believe she made her film debut with an uncredited part in Diamonds Are Forever (1971), but this is not true. She played soft-core pornography actress Montana Wildhack in Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five (1972). Perrine was photographed for a pictorial layout in the May 1972 issue of Playboy, later appearing on the cover in August 1981. She then became the first actress to purposely display herself nude on American television by completely baring her breasts during the May 4, 1973, PBS broadcast of Bruce Jay Friedman's Steambath on Hollywood Television Theater. (She was seen taking a shower from the side totally undressed.) Only a few PBS stations nationwide were adventurous enough to carry the program. Later in 1973, she appeared in the episode "When the Girls Came Out to Play" of the romantic anthology television series Love Story (1973).