More sad news this morning…the passing of actress Elaine Ballace who, I believe I read on Facebook, had been battling pancreatic cancer in recent months. Elaine was not only an actress but also a model and a writer and a producer and a director and an activist for various worthy causes and, much earlier in her life, a championship ice skater — one of those gifted folks who could do anything and everything.
I don’t know her age but she was at least 18 in October of 1976 when I went to work on the TV series, Welcome Back, Kotter. On the first Tuesday after my then-partner Dennis Palumbo and I were hired, they taped an episode called “Sadie Hawkins Day” in which Elaine had a bit part. She had already been on the show several times as a classroom extra with no lines and in this one, she was given something to say. (This was the infamous episode for which Groucho Marx came to the set to tape a cameo guest spot but once he arrived, it was decided that he was in no shape to perform. He just had some photos taken with the cast and then departed.)
Elaine’s role on Kotter was as Juanita Levine and she was more or less the girl friend of Juan Epstein, the “Sweathog” played by Robert Hegyes. After the main taping was done that Tuesday evening and the audience had been discharged, they were taping pick-ups and I was sitting in the bleachers watching when Elaine came up and introduced herself. She was friendly and funny and cute and before long, we were dating. Here’s a photo I took of her in my old apartment next to some badly-painted statues of Laurel and Hardy…
We stayed friends after the dating part of our relationship fell away…but she was still intermittently in my life. I was always running into her at some show biz event or spotting her on some TV show or movie. Mel Brooks used her in some of his films and she always seemed to have about eleven projects going. The last time I ran into her was at the funeral of Marty Krofft last December.
I said a few paragraphs back that she was friendly and funny and cute. I could have added “industrious,” “stellar, “full of energy” and other positive adjectives. Just a lovely lady…
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