‘Valley of the Dolls’ still gives folks a kick

The campy 1967 film adaptation of Jacqueline Susann’s bestselling novel “Valley of the Dolls” has had great legs.

Though critics lambasted it, the melodrama about three young performers spiraling out of control on booze and drugs (a.k.a. dolls) grossed a then-hefty $44 million at the box office and has been widely embraced by film fans because it is so outlandish and absurd.

Directed by Mark Robson and starring Barbara Parkins, Patty Duke and Sharon Tate, the movie arrives June 13 from Fox in a two-disc DVD. And on Friday and Saturday, at the Renberg Theater in Hollywood, there will be a reading of the script, with all proceeds benefiting the L.A.-based Gay & Lesbian Adolescent Social Services.

Melissa Joan Hart, Ted Casablanca, Gordon Thomson, Donna Mills, Mindy Cohn, Laraine Newman, Douglas Sills and Alec Mapa will be among those uttering such deliciously atrocious lines as, “I’ve got to get up at 5 o’clock in the morning and sparkle, Neely, sparkle.”

Also on hand will be Parkins, who played Anne Welles, the small-town girl who becomes a top model.

“I am enjoying the journey of this film,” Parkins reports. “If I had known [how successful it would be], I would have asked for 100% residuals, plus bonuses along the way!”

Parkins was starring with Ryan O’Neal on the ABC series “Peyton Place” when she made an appointment to see 20th Century Fox head Richard Zanuck about doing the film. She was eager to play Neely O’Hara, a young woman who can’t adjust to stardom and becomes an alcoholic and drug addict.

“It was the meaty role, but it ended up that I got Anne,” she says. The Neely part went to Duke.

But Parkins did get to work, briefly, with Judy Garland, who was cast as the diva Broadway star.

“Everyone was so excited and over the moon,” Parkins says. “My first scenes were done with her. The night before, I was so nervous. No one spoke much to the director -- he wasn’t terribly approachable. Not knowing what to do, I called up Jackie [Susann] and said, ‘What do I do? I am with this woman who is a huge star.’ She said, ‘Honey, you just go in and enjoy her.’

“And for two days I got to do that. Then she locked herself in her dressing room. They fired her, and she walked off with all the Travilla gowns.

“Susan Hayward came in and was professional, but she was not Judy, who would have devoured this role and bounced off the screen with it.”

Tickets for the benefit are available for $160. Information: (323) 467-2002.

-- Susan King