Danny Puff

LONDON (AP) Nautical sailor tops and Madonna's conical bra are coming to London next year in an exhibition of the work of fashion designer Jean Paul Gaultier.

"The Fashion World Of Jean Paul Gaultier" will open at the Barbican Centre in April 2014.

It features more than 140 outfits by the cutting-edge French couturier, including the bra-and-corset costume from Madonna's 1990 Blonde Ambition tour and outfits for singers Kylie Minogue and Bjork. There are also pieces from Gaultier's couture collections, which often feature sailor stripes.

The show comes from the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts and is currently running at Rotterdam's Kunsthal gallery.

Gaultier said Wednesday that London held a special place in his heart, because "the English were the first ones to come to my shows and appreciate my fashion."

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MOSCOW (AP) A Russian ballet star who has danced the roles of violent and powerful historical figures at the Bolshoi Theater has confessed to organizing the acid attack on the theater's ballet chief, Moscow police said Wednesday.

A masked man threw a jar of sulfuric acid in the face of artistic director Sergei Filin as he returned home late on Jan. 17, severely burning his eyes. The 42-year-old former dancer is undergoing treatment in Germany.

Bolshoi soloist Pavel Dmitrichenko, 29, confessed to masterminding the attack, and two other men confessed to being the perpetrator and the driver of the getaway car, police said in a statement. All three were to appear in court on Thursday, when prosecutors were to move for criminal charges to be filed against them.

"I organized that attack but not to the extent that it occurred," a bleary-eyed Dmitrichenko said in footage released by Russian police.

Moscow police said in a statement that investigators believe that Dmitrichenko harbored "personal enmity" against Filin.

The attack threw light on a culture of deep intrigue and infighting at the famed Moscow theater. Within hours of the attack, Bolshoi managers were speculating that the attack could have been in retaliation for Filin's selection of certain dancers over others for prized roles.

Dmitrichenko, who joined the Bolshoi in 2002, has not suffered for starring roles. Most recently, he danced the title role in "Ivan the Terrible," a ballet based on the life of the ruthless 16th-century czar who killed his son in a rage. He also has danced Spartacus in the ballet of the same name. Dmitrichenko's page on the social networking site VKontakte includes a photograph of him as the leader of the slave uprising dancing with a dagger in each hand.

Dmitrichenko's girlfriend, who also is a Bolshoi soloist, is reported to have had a troubled relationship with Filin and felt she was unfairly denied major parts, an angle to the case that has been played up by Russian state television.

Filin's lawyer and wife, however, both cautioned that the ballerina is unlikely to have been the only cause of the conflict.

"Sergei thinks the motives of the crime are somewhat different," Filin's wife, Maria Prorvich, was quoted as saying in an interview to the newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda. "The girl is only a pretext, but certainly not the main cause of the crime."

She said Filin had suspected Dmitrichenko's involvement in the attack, but is certain that the circle goes beyond the three men arrested on Tuesday.

Filin's lawyer agreed. "We believe that investigators still have a lot of work to do to establish all of the facts," Tatyana Stukalova said in an interview on Rossiya state television.

Investigators became suspicious of Dmitrichenko when they found out that he had recently been in a close contact with an unemployed man with a prison record. The suspects were making inquiries about Filin's schedule and whereabouts, and bought SIM cards for mobile phones registered under fake names, police said.

Police determined that the acid that the alleged attacker, 35-year-old Yuri Zarutsky, splashed on Filin's face had been purchased at an auto shop. Police said Zarutsky is believed to have heated it to evaporate the water to make the acid stronger. On the night of the attack Dmitrichenko tipped off Zarutsky when Filin left the theater, police said.

Bolshoi spokeswoman Katerina Novikova told The Associated Press that Filin had been informed about Dmitrichenko's detention, but said the theater would not comment until after the trial.

The Bolshoi's general director, Anatoly Iksanov, has accused veteran principal dancer Nikolai Tsiskaridze of inspiring the attack. Tsiskaridze, a long-time critic of the theater's management, has denied the allegation.

Dmitrichenko's girlfriend, Anzhelina Vorontsova, was coached by Tsiskaridze.

When contacted Wednesday by the AP, Tsiskaridze texted back: "I have nothing to say..."

Izvestia, a Kremlin-friendly daily, on Wednesday quoted ballet teacher Marina Kondratyeva as saying that Vorontsova had not been given leading parts lately but for a good reason: "How could Filin 'elbow her out'? Tsiskaridze is mentoring and coaching her but she was just plain fat."

Filin was instrumental in bringing Vorontsova to Moscow to study and had hoped she would stay to dance for him at the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Theater, Moscow's second ballet company, where he was artistic director before taking up the Bolshoi post in March 2011. Instead she joined the Bolshoi.

Russian newspapers quoted unidentified ballet dancers as saying that Dmitrichenko had a fiery temper.

In a rare public outburst, Dmitrichenko posted an angry comment in November responding to a newspaper review that said his "artistic scope is limited not to mention his physical potential."

On the website of the Kommersant daily, Dmitrichenko accused the ballet critic of bias, calling the writer "a failed performer." Kommersant later took down his comment. One of the screenshots of the detailed remarks read: "I'm happy, I'm accomplished, I work with the genius of a teacher, I work with a genius, Grigorovich himself!!! What about you??"

Yuri Grigorovich led the dance company for three decades, resigning in 1995, after losing a protracted dispute with theater management, but he remains on the Bolshoi staff. Dancers and teachers still loyal to Grigorovich have resisted efforts by a series of successive artistic directors to bring a more modern repertoire to the theater, still celebrated mainly for the classical ballets that grace its stage. Filin, who danced for the Bolshoi from 1989 until 2007, was seen as capable of bridging that gap.

Both of Dmitrichenko's main starring roles were in ballets choreographed by Grigorovich. He was next due to appear at the Bolshoi on March 16, in "Sleeping Beauty, dancing the part of Bluebird.

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AP writers Lynn Berry, Varya Kudryavtseva, Sasha Merkushev and Yelena Yegorova contributed to this report.

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PARIS (AP) The classic Hollywood scene of a mysterious and glamorous woman leaving an anonymous hotel room inspired Louis Vuitton's ready-to-wear show, moving the house in a more sensual, feminine direction.

A carpeted hotel corridor with a series of numbered doors was recreated inside the Louvre for the fall-winter 2013-14 show, to the sound of nostalgic piano.

Suddenly the doors opened, out of which slinked models in '50s wigs wearing satin dresses resembling slips. A bathrobe made from a man's coat followed a crepe dress made with motifs of an undergarment.

"It was about intimacy, the mystery of what's going on behind the door," said creative director Marc Jacobs. "It's Hollywood mixed with rive gauche."

The Hollywood-factor was certainly there in the roll call of top actresses lining the front row including Jessica Chastain, Madmen's January Jones and Naomi Watts, who's in Paris promoting her new film "The Grandmothers."

The numerous long fur coats some of the most luxurious seen this season also provided a glam-factor. Mink coats dyed in two tones and murky-colored astrakhan were stand outs as well as crocodile bags lined with sheared mink, lashings of marabou feathers and hand-curled goose feathers.

"All sorts of creatures were lying around in embroidered form," joked Jacobs, who may indeed be responsible for emptying a local zoo.

Menswear touches like a button-less tailored jacket or the pajama print reined in the more overtly feminine lingerie looks, ensuring a nice overall balance.

But the show was also about Kate Moss.

The 39-year-old, possibly the most famous model in the world, strutted the catwalk sporting a sheer organza slip, with dense floral embroideries, to rapturous applause.

Jacobs, who conducted interviews backstage in red pajamas, said the show grew from his relationship with Moss.

"I've spent many, many, many nights over many, many years in hotel rooms with Kate, and we've always had a very nice time," Jacobs said. "And I'm sure many wondered what we were doing. I'm sure we showed off a lot (here) what we were doing."

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Thomas Adamson can be followed at http://Twitter.com/ThomasAdamsonAP

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NORMAN, Okla. (AP) Event organizers have learned the hard way that the usual half-hour warning of severe weather might be enough for people in their homes, but it's not enough to clear people from big venues where concerts and football games are held.

Seven people died and more than 40 were injured at the Indiana State Fair in 2011 when a sudden 60 mph gust knocked a stage onto a crowd waiting to see the band Sugarland perform. In 2009, high wind toppled a canopy at a Dallas Cowboys practice facility, leaving one person paralyzed and 11 others less seriously hurt.

"Like 9-11, it takes a really bad thing to get our attention," said Harold Hansen, the life, safety and security director for the International Association of Venue Managers. "The rules changed."

The incidents prompted venue managers to move their annual storm-preparedness meeting to the National Weather Center in Norman, Okla. the heart of Tornado Alley and the forecast centers that watch it.

"Now some of the heavy hitters are getting involved," said David VandenHeuvel, a senior vice president with Weather Decision Technologies, which has provided forecasts to about 150 events in the past 1 years.

The conference had about a dozen participants when it started five years ago. This year, more than 40 emergency managers and event operators came, including the NFL and the Country Music Association.

Through lectures about weather watches, lightning, crowd dynamics and shelter readiness, the experts repeatedly stressed the need to have a plan before the weather turns bad.

"They're waiting for a warning to be issued," said Kevin Kloesel, associate dean of the University of Oklahoma's College of Atmospheric and Geographic Sciences. "The message over the two days here is: if you wait until that point, you are not going to have the time. If you wait for the warning, it's too late."

The list of close calls is chilling. A 2010 tornado shredded the roof of a Montana sports arena packed with thousands of people the day before. A lightning bolt struck 500 feet from the Texas Rangers pitcher's mound during a game in July 2012. Pennsylvania's Pocono Raceway was struck by lightning the next month, three minutes after a race was canceled.

Jim Digby, who managed world tours for the rock band Linkin Park, attended last year's conference and has since formed the Event Safety Alliance. That group has suggested adopting procedures based on specific weather conditions, such as wind speed.

Digby told The Associated Press he is working on expanding its guidelines to Australia, with international music tours in mind.

"Last year, when I first announced this initiative, I thought I was throwing a hand grenade in the room," he said with a laugh. "The entire industry once they figured out what we were trying to do, they have embraced the project."

Event organizers and managers said they're taking Digby's advice to heart.

"We're going to go back and adapt the trigger plan," said Vilma Salinas, the Country Music Association's senior manager of projects. The CMA Music Festival at Nashville, Tenn., which draws 200,000 fans, has emergency plans in place, but could benefit from more precision on when people need to move, she said.

"The biggest thing is who gets to make the call," she said. "Country music fans are die-hard fans. We need to be as clear as possible."

As tornado expert Chuck Doswell told the conference, severe weather is relatively rare but inevitable.

"Imagine the Indianapolis 500 ... with those hundreds and hundreds of RVs with nowhere to go," Doswell said. If a tornado such as one that killed 158 in Missouri two years struck an event that did not have a severe weather plan in place, "it would make Joplin look like a Saturday afternoon picnic."

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William Moody, better known to pro wrestling fans as Paul Bearer, the pasty-faced, urn-carrying manager for performers The Undertaker and Kane, has died, the WWE said. He was 58.

A spokesman for the wrestling company said Moody's family contacted the WWE to report the death on Tuesday. No cause was released.

After stints in various independent wrestling promotions, Moody joined the WWE in 1990 and quickly became associated with The Undertaker, a character who claimed he was undead and boasted of mystical powers.

In the WWE plotline, Paul Bearer later managed Undertaker's on-screen half brother Kane. He also managed the bad-guy character Mick "Mankind" Foley.

His shrill catchphrase, "Ooohhh yeeesss!" and contorted facial expressions made him one of the sports-entertainment company's more popular personalities for more than a decade.

In the outlandish world of pro wrestling, Paul Bearer was once placed in a glass casket and buried in concrete. In his final WWE appearance last year, Paul Bearer was locked in a freezer by Randy Orton and left there tied up even after he was found by Kane.

That was Moody's life in the WWE. And it was a business he loved for nearly 40 years. Many of his colleagues paid tribute to him on Wednesday on Twitter.

"Rest in peace, Paul Bearer. You will never be forgotten. There will never be another," wrote wrestler Triple H.

Moody was a perfect fit as a macabre mortician. When he joined the WWE, he ditched the blond hair and Percy Pringle name he forged in the 1980s for jet black locks complete with powdered white face. In the act, Paul Bearer's urn had some unexplained power that protected the Undertaker, allowing his protege to escape unscathed from every leg drop and big boot to the face. Paul Bearer also hosted the WWE segment, "The Funeral Parlor."

Moody, an Alabama native, told the pro wrestling website PWTorch.com last year that had a degree in mortuary science. He said he was a licensed funeral director and embalmer. He was called to WWE chairman Vince McMahon's office about taking the job as Undertaker's manager without the company knowing his true background.

"It was one those had-to-be-there moments when Vince realized I was the real thing, the real deal," Moody told the website. "I was the real Undertaker."

Moody battled health and weight problems and worked on and off for the company after 2002.

Foley said he babysat Moody's children and called him "Uncle Paul." The Paul Bearer character will be remembered most for the soap opera twists in his relationship with The Undertaker, still one of the premier stars of the company.

"It just seemed so bizarre," Foley said in a telephone interview. "But at the same time, he was a perfect fit for The Undertaker. They went on to become iconic figures in our profession."

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Dan Gelston can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/APGelston

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LOS ANGELES (AP) Nothing's certain in network television, but things have been especially uncertain on the set of "Community," the quirky college sitcom that's been a cult favorite, but never a mainstream hit.

"Near cancellation," actress Gillian Jacobs said before a PaleyFest tribute to the series Tuesday night. "On the schedule, off the schedule. Tell us one night. We never air on that night. We lose a creator of our show. Reduced episodes. Everything that can happen has happened to us."

Cast member Chevy Chase left the series without even finishing up the current season, months after the show creator Dan Harmon was fired by "Community" distributor Sony Pictures Television. (Chase bolted with two episodes unfinished and according to cast members, doesn't appear at all in one of them.)

"It's always tough to lose people," said actress Alison Brie. "It's very strange and weird. So I can only imagine that coming back for a fifth season without Chevy would also be weird. But, luckily, it didn't affect us too much this season."

"Community" returned as a mid-season replacement in February for the first time without any involvement from creator Harmon.

"I think, as far as season four as a whole, I think the heart is still there," said actress Yvette Nicole Brown. "There's a lot of really great adventures to come. You guys haven't seen the best that this season has to offer yet, so I'm excited for you to see it."

This week's episode, airing Thursday, marks star Joel McHale's character, Jeff, meeting up with his long-lost father, played by actor James Brolin. Perhaps Brolin's real-life wife Barbra Streisand could play Jeff's mom?

"I don't think we could afford Babs," McHale replied. "I would love it. It was interesting listening to Jim say, 'My wife ...' (And McHale would say) 'Yeah, your wife is Barbra Streisand!' And he was just getting ready to go on tour with her. So, yeah, that would be pretty extraordinary. And what if Justin Bieber were my brother, and the cast of 'Twilight' were my cousins. Explosion!"

As usual, the future of "Community" is in question. Brie said a fifth season is by no means a given. The series' latest episodes have been clobbered in the ratings by its powerhouse competition, "The Big Bang Theory."

As for a possible series finale?

"If I had a super-wish list, it would be the biggest paintball (fight)," answered actor Jim Rash "like the world needs to be saved and only 'Community' can do it. That would be a good way to end."

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Online: www.paleycenter.org

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Follow Michael Cidoni Lennox on Twitter at http://twitter.com/MikeCLennox

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NEW YORK (AP) -- A new TV commercial features a good-looking young woman on a beach vacation lounging next to a good-looking young man. He bemoans the glare on his iPad and she fills him in on the Kindle Paperwhite's sun-friendly screen.

He clicks to buy one himself and suggests they celebrate with a drink.

"My husband's bringing me a drink right now," chirps she.

"So is mine," smiles he as they turn and wave at their male loved ones sitting together at a tiki bar.

Welcome to the latest in gay imagery in mainstream advertising, where LGBT people have been waiting for a larger helping of fairness, or at least something other than punchlines and cliches.

While there are still plenty of those, something has happened in advertising over the last two or three years, nearly two decades after Ikea broke ground in the U.S. with a TV spot featuring a gay couple shopping for a dining room table a spot that ran only once in New York and Washington, D.C., and was pulled after bomb threats to Ikea stores.

Today, gay and lesbian parents and their kids are featured along with pitchwoman Ellen DeGeneres in J.C. Penney ads. Same-sex couples have their own, advertised wedding registries at Macy's and elsewhere and President Barack Obama offered his seal of approval by evolving into a supporter of gay marriage.

Two happy young men sit together eating at a dining table, with wine and romantic candlelight, in a section of a Crate & Barrel catalog marked "Us & Always." And we made it through a Super Bowl without any gay jokes at commercial breaks like the Snickers ad of several years ago featuring two men freaking out after kissing by accident while eating one of the candy bars.

Traditionally lagging behind TV and film content in terms of LGBT inclusion, advertisers in this country are facing considerably less trouble than they used to when taking on gay themes, observers said. Penney's rebuffed critics and launched a lesbian-focused catalog ad for Mother's Day that the company followed with a two-dads family a real family for Father's Day.

DeGeneres, who married Portia de Rossi in 2008, continues as a CoverGirl in magazines. Also recently? A lesbian couple was treated to fireworks in a commercial real ones flash on screen for K-Y Intense, a personal lubricant that makes their moment or two more memorable. They're shown spent and satisfied in bed, hair tussled. "Good purchase," one says to the other.

Though Crate & Barrel declined comment for this story and Amazon didn't respond to email requests for the same about the Kindle ad, LGBT-focused marketers and monitors think the Mad Men and Women of today's Madison Avenue and the companies that employ them might finally be getting it. Now, they hope, a greater degree of diversity in skin tone and ethnicity will follow.

"They're no longer just targeting gay and lesbian people. They're targeting people like my mom, who want to know that a company embraces and accepts their gay and lesbian family members, friends and neighbors," said Rich Ferraro, a spokesman for the media watchdog group the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD).

Others, too, are celebrating the newfound bump in ad visibility, a mirror of cultural gains overall. It's a boost that comes as the U.S. Supreme Court takes up oral arguments later this month in key challenges that could lead to further recognition of same-sex marriage and spousal benefits.

Bob Witeck, who consults for Fortune 100 companies on LGBT marketing and communications strategies, put the buying power of U.S. lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender adults at $790 billion last year. He estimated, roughly, the U.S. LGBT adult population at 16 million, though others say their ranks could be as many as 25 million.

There's no demographic evidence or social science that points to the LGBT segment as notably higher earning or wealthier than anybody else, though they're often louder in protesting offensive ad messaging and loyal to brands and companies that support them.

"Things have changed significantly in terms of risk and reward," Witeck said. "Businesses don't view this as a risk model any longer."

Particularly, he said, when it comes to portraying marriage.

"Marriage, at one time, was the third rail," Witeck said. "That terrified companies. Most of this happened when the president said he supported marriage equality."

A consumer lust for "truth-telling" isn't lost on major advertisers, including those that once restricted themselves to trotting out gay-friendly fodder as one-offs when Pride Month and its multicolored flag flies freely each June. One recent pride standout in advertising, restricted to digital markets, is an Oreo cookie with a mountain of multicolored filling.

The company fielded queries from consumers who thought it was available for purchase in stores. It wasn't.

American Airlines, in 2010, ran outdoor advertising at bus stops and subway stations in New York showing two men on a beach with the slogan: "Here's to his and his beach towels.Proud to support the community that supports us."

Generally, Witeck said, putting a human face on gay couples and families in advertising is where much of the effort lands today.

"For the gay consumer and their families and friends, and lots and lots and lots of Americans, they expect to see those couples appear everywhere, but they don't want them trotted out with a pride flag," Witeck said. "Amazon didn't ballyhoo the message. They just landed it."

Mark Elderkin, CEO of the Gay Ad Network, which focuses on the LGBT niche market, said mainstream gay messaging has "passed the tipping point, where there's more to gain than there is to lose" for advertisers.

While there are groups of "vocal antagonists," he said more advertisers bolstered by broader media exposure for gay characters and storylines in non-ad content "The New Normal," ''Modern Family," ''The Ellen DeGeneres Show," CNN's out-of-the-closet anchor Anderson Cooper have explored non-traditional families and included LGBT imagery in "normal" settings.

"It seems to be moving quickly forward. It's companies that want to be more on the leading edge, more for the next generation of this country," Elderkin said. "It's not your parents' brand anymore. It's your brand and your kids' brand."

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Follow Leanne Italie on Twitter at http://twitter.com/litalie

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HANOI (Reuters) - Pot-bellied, short, or abusive traffic policemen will be barred from working on the streets of Vietnam's capital and assigned desk jobs instead as Hanoi police try to clean up their unsavoury image, a newspaper reported on Wednesday.

The city's traffic police are following the worst offenders closely and compiling lists of those to be reassigned. All police on traffic duty will be made to carry a book on the code of conduct to remind them how to behave, the official Tien Phong (Vanguard) newspaper said.

"Little officers, or those with too big a belly will be moved to work in offices instead of guiding traffic and settling violations," Colonel Dao Vinh Thang, head of the Hanoi Traffic Police Department, was quoted by Tien Phong as saying.

He said five teams of inspectors had been sent to monitor the behaviour of police on the street. Thang could not be reached for additional comment.

Tempers often flare in the city of 7 million famous for constant streams of motorcycles and sometimes haphazard driving. Complaints have mounted about the conduct of traffic police, including allegations of corruption and abusive behaviour.

The latest initiative follows the deployment in January of female traffic police, all part of a campaign to improve the image of the security forces.

Crackdowns on overweight policemen have taken place in Thailand, Pakistan, Britain, Indonesia and the Philippines in recent years. Several of those countries ordered officers to get fit and lose weight before they could return to work.

(Reporting by Hanoi Newsroom; Editing by Martin Petty and Ron Popeski)

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SHANGHAI (Reuters) - At Shanghai's Zhabei District marriage registration center, officials divorced a record 53 couples in a single day this week - that's about one every five minutes - as couples rushed to untie the knot to avoid tougher tax laws on home sales.

There were similar scenes in Wuhan, Nanjing and Ningbo as married couples opted for 'quickie', uncontested divorces - costing just a few yuan - that would allow them to split ownership of their properties and sell without having to pay capital gains tax of as much as 20 percent.

Beijing last week signaled it wanted local governments to be tougher in implementing rules to curb property speculation - the tax on gains from selling second homes has been in place for almost two decades but never strictly enforced. Chinese tend to park much of their wealth in real estate as they have few other alternative investment options, and home prices in the biggest cities have risen for 9 straight months.

Reckoning that primary residences owned for more than five years will remain tax exempt, some couples hope that divorcing and dividing up real estate assets will allow them to sell properties as individuals, and not pay tax. Once the sale is complete, they can remarry.

"It's a practical attitude," said Li Li, managing director of International Strategic Group, a real estate consultancy in Shanghai. "It's strange, but policy forces people to do it."

While homeowners and prospective buyers await details on how the tightened property rules will be implemented, the official Shanghai Daily quoted one unnamed official at the Yangpu District registration office as saying the rise in divorces was driven by unapologetic tax evaders, including a pregnant woman.

"I told all of them to come here again for remarriage registration as soon as their transaction is finished," the official told the newspaper.

Requests for city-wide data from the Shanghai civil affairs bureau were not immediately answered. The Shanghai Daily quoted Lin Kewu, deputy director of the bureau's marriage administration, saying the government did not want to release statistics for fear of encouraging the tactic.

The phenomenon is not new. In 2010 and 2011, state media reported that couples resorted to forging divorce certificates so they could skirt restrictions and buy more property.

"I know people who have divorced to evade taxes," said one man who asked not to be named as he waited outside a real estate trade center in Pudong on Wednesday. "But I think marriage is more important than property."

(Additional reporting by Anita Li and Reuters Shanghai bureau; Editing by Ian Geoghegan)

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NEW YORK (AP) Valerie Harper, who played Rhoda Morgenstern on television's "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" and its spinoff, "Rhoda," has been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer.

People magazine reported on its website Wednesday that the 73-year-old actress received the news on Jan. 15. Tests revealed she has leptomeningeal carcinomatosis, a rare condition that occurs when cancer cells spread into the fluid-filled membrane surrounding the brain. The report says Harper's doctors have said she has as little as three months to live.

"I don't think of dying," Harper told the magazine in a cover interview. "I think of being here now."

Harper's character, Rhoda, was one of television's most beloved characters during the 1970s, and the tart-tongued, self-deprecating Rhoda made Harper a star. She won three consecutive Emmys (1971-73) as supporting actress on "Mary" plus another for outstanding lead actress for "Rhoda," which ran from 1974-78.

Harper began show business as a dancer in several Broadway musicals, and worked in summer stock and with the Second City improv group.

"I was a dancer but I was always a little overweight," she once told The Associated Press. "I'd say, 'Hello, I'm Valerie Harper and I'm overweight.' I'd say it quickly before they could. ... I always got called chubby, my nose was too wide, my hair was too kinky."

Accordingly, she played Rhoda at first as a plump, wisecracking contrast to slender, winsome Mary Richards. But as "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" evolved, Rhoda trimmed down and her own brand of beauty was acknowledged.

The character was wildly popular and soon inspired her own CBS sitcom, which saw Rhoda moving back home to New York City and even getting married.

After her success on TV, she returned to theater. Several TV movie and feature films followed, including "Chapter Two" and "Blame It on Rio."

In 2000, she reunited with Moore in a TV film, "Mary and Rhoda."

"Rhoda Morgenstern gave a wonderful impetus and propulsion to my career," she told the AP in 2001.

At the time, she had stepped into the role originated by former "Alice" star Linda Lavin in the Broadway comedy "The Tale of the Allergist's Wife."

Harper played what she described as "an angst-ridden Woman of a Certain Age," and she likened that character to Rhoda, whose shared creed, she said, is "Get into life, and enjoy it. Just stop with the white knuckles and relax. Be OK with yourself."

In recent years, Harper had guest roles on several TV series, and in 2010 was back on Broadway playing Tallulah Bankhead, a flamboyant star from Hollywood's Golden Age.

AP Drama Critic Michael Kuchwara wrote that "Harper submerges the iconic Rhoda Morgenstern" and "has a ferocious sense of comic timing."

In January, Harper published a new memoir, "I, Rhoda."

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Online:

http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20679402,00.html

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