Inside Rhoda’s place (1975)
“Hello, my name is Rhoda – this is where I live”
Finding a great apartment in Manhattan isn’t exactly easy, but Joe and I just couldn’t live in his old bachelor apartment — I mean there were too many of his old loves turning up and none of mine. So my sister Brenda and I found this terrific place, right in her building. It had a terrace and a large living room and, well, I just loved it.
The only thing was, though, before we moved in, the couple who lived there split up and his wife took custody of everything – including the fireplace and the plaster. So then I got to work. The style is sort of New York eclectic — you know, chic-on-a-budget. We have two 6-foot sofas, butter-yellow with the little white polka dots, and a drop-leaf oak desk that I picked up for $45. Our new fireplace is porcelain, and the honey-colored campaign chest blends with our rust-colored draperies… It’s terrific!
Charley, Joe’s friend, played by Richard Schall (who’s married to Valerie Harper), is one aspect of matrimony that doesn’t thrill Rhoda: “I tried for Joe’s sake to be friends with Charley when he first came over, but he just looked at our lovely bamboo dining chairs and said, ‘I hate ‘em.’”
Three’s a crowd in a small kitchen, especially when the crowd is Rhoda and Joe and “friend” Charley (left). The kitchen is done to Rhoda’s liking with a cast-iron rack over the stove, lots of copper pots and colanders. In fact, the whole apartment would be practically ideal, if only, as Rhoda puts is, “Charley would just stay home with his Valerie!”
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Publication: American Home
Publication date: May 1975
