Did you know that Valerie Bertinelli has been acting professionally for half a century now?
So how did this one-time teen star go from sitcoms to the host of her very own acclaimed
cooking show?
Keep watching to find out.
As an admittedly "shy" kid, Valerie Bertinelli's mother had her take some acting classes to
help bolster her confidence — and by the time she was 11 years old, the future star
began scoring commercials.
However, the actor's fans were really introduced to Bertinelli on a much larger scale when
she was a teenager.
She first landed a televised guest role on Apple's Way, and at just 15 years old, the
actor was cast as Barbara Cooper on the hit sitcom One Day at a Time.
"I'm Carbie Booper.
I mean, I'm Barbie Cooper."
With that longtime acting job, Bertinelli grew up on camera, staying with the show for
its full 209 episodes until it ended in 1984.
She told Entertainment Weekly in 2020:
"It was wonderful to grow up on that set.
I learned so much [...] I knew at the time, before I made my entrance [in the pilot episode
taping], as a young 15-year-old girl I was thinking, 'This is going to change my life.
This is real.'"
But One Day at a Time wasn't her only gig at the time.
Bertinelli's other acting credits while filming the show also included roles on other television
series, as well as several made-for-TV movies.
And although she was one of the most famous teenagers in 1970s America, Bertinelli still
managed to maintain a normal childhood — at least by Hollywood standards.
She would spend her time off-set in high school, with friends, or helping out with chores.
Valerie Bertinelli didn't just grow up in front of America's eyes, she also got married
while appearing on One Day at a Time.
She met Eddie Van Halen, guitarist and songwriter for rock band Van Halen, at one of the group's
concerts after her brothers took advantage of her star-power to gain backstage access.
Bertinelli recalled in an interview with Oprah.com:
"I saw a picture of Ed, and I went, 'Oh yeah, I'll be going.
He's a cutie.'"
The guitarist was clearly taken with Bertinelli, too, but seemingly followed the popular three-day
dating rule before calling her up.
As the actor put it in her interview,
"We never separated from then on."
Indeed, less than a year later, the pair wed in April 1981, just days before her 21st birthday.
The beginning of Bertinelli and Van Halen's marriage was seemingly idyllic.
When discussing his marriage, he told People:
"I love it.
Best thing I've ever done."
Bertinelli's marriage to Eddie Van Halen may have seemed perfect on the outside, but the
two were unfortunately struggling internally.
They were both using drugs, and each cheated on the other at different times while they
were together.
As Bertinelli told the Today show,
"I did, four years into our marriage, cheat, and it was a shame and it was a guilt that
I carried with me for a very long time."
Despite their marital issues, the two stayed together for two decades.
In 1991, after 10 years of marriage, Bertinelli gave birth to their son, Wolfgang "Wolfie"
Van Halen.
At that point, her main focus quickly became less about her Hollywood prospects and more
about raising her child.
As she later told Good Housekeeping,
"When he was little [...] I would hate to put him down — my whole world was him."
Throughout the 1990s, Valerie Bertinelli was busy with motherhood.
As she told the Toronto Star,
"I pretty much took myself out of the business to raise Wolfie, with the odd job here and
there."
Some of those odd jobs included multiple made-for-TV movies.
Bertinelli also starred in the short-lived television show Cafe Americain, on which Eddie
Van Halen once guest-starred.
At the time of filming his episode, their marriage was still intact, with Bertinelli
telling the Chicago Tribune,
"We laugh because we're always hearing we're unhappy [...] every six months, some tabloid
comes out and says we're breaking up."
Unfortunately, about eight years after sharing that insight with the paper, rumors of Bertinelli
and Van Halen's marital demise were more than just tabloid fodder.
In 2001, the two separated, however, the former couple's divorce was not finalized until 2007.
During that time, Bertinelli kept working, even playing a role in the later seasons of
popular television drama Touched by an Angel.
After her separation from Eddie Van Halen, Valerie Bertinelli struggled with weight gain.
Having used food as a way to cope with the emotions stemming from their divorce, she
shared with Oprah.com,
"Those were some of the darkest days of my life, and I was eating my way through them.
I became a hermit."
Bertinelli wasn't a total hermit, though, as she kept working post-separation.
But after seeing herself in the Hallmark Channel's 2007 film Claire, the actor felt embarrassed
by her appearance.
Her change in weight affected more than just her looks, though.
Opening up to the Toronto Star, Bertinelli revealed,
"My knees were hurting.
I couldn't run.
I couldn't play football, which we love to do.
[...] I wasn't comfortable in my skin."
After seeing herself on television and losing the ability to participate in a favorite activity,
Bertinelli set out to lose weight, and she eventually shed 40 pounds.
The actor even detailed her weight loss in her 2008 memoir Losing It: And Gaining My
Life Back One Pound at a Time.
While her headline-making divorce exacerbated her weight struggles, the star revealed that
her body image issues actually stemmed from childhood.
Having grown up in an industry hyper-focused on looking a certain way, she noted to Forbes
in January 2022 that if she could tell her younger self anything, it would be this:
"You're not fat.
You're beautiful, just as you are."
Valerie Bertinelli did what all good celebrities do: She capitalized on a major life event.
For the former child actor, that meant becoming a spokesperson for Jenny Craig.
Bertinelli appeared in several commercials while performing her spokesperson duties,
often noting how much she enjoyed the food.
Her weight loss journey led to an appearance on the cover of People magazine wearing a
bikini in 2009.
She shared how it took her two years of dieting and exercise to reach her new weight.
Sadly, it seems her physical transformation at the time ultimately did little to help
her work through her longtime body-image issues.
Bertinelli admitted to Forbes in January 2022:
"I bought into [...] the diet industry and all of it.
I was on the cover of a magazine in a bikini, and it still didn't make me happy."
After debuting her new body, it was announced that Valerie Bertinelli would be returning
to the sitcom world with Hot in Cleveland.
She starred alongside Jane Leeves, Wendie Malick, and the late Betty White in the series
from 2010 to 2015, though she only had one other acting gig while shooting the show.
However, Bertinelli didn't just get a new job in 2010 — she got a fiancé, too.
After separating from ex-husband Eddie Van Halen, Bertinelli began dating Tom Vitale
in 2004.
The two had an instant connection, with the businessmen later telling AARP,
"We just understood each other completely.
[...] It wasn't love at first sight; it was family at first sight."
With the early days of their relationship falling smack-dab in the middle of Bertinelli's
weight loss journey, she told the outlet,
"He loved me no matter what.
In his way, he's teaching me to love myself just as I am."
However, she still didn't see their engagement coming, even six years after their initial
meeting, admitting,
"We'd talked about getting married, but I was still shocked."
Months after Vitale popped the question, 2011 saw the two marry in an intimate ceremony
at Bertinelli's home in Malibu, California, with both her son, Wolfie, and her musician
ex-husband in attendance.
After wrapping Hot in Cleveland, Valerie Bertinelli took on a new career venture.
In 2015, the actor landed her own show on Food Network called Valerie's Home Cooking,
in which the star shares what she makes for her friends and family.
Since Bertinelli had been very open about her love for food in the past, the transition
seemed natural.
Fans may have been a bit surprised to learn, though, that the longtime actor felt more
at home showing off her culinary skills.
At the TCA Winter Press Tour in 2019, Bertinelli opened up about her shift from acting to cooking,
saying,
"I was never quite comfortable acting.
Now, I'm just able to be me and cook."
The actor-turned-chef has since established a good relationship with her new home network,
starring on additional shows like Kids Baking Championship.
And according to the entertainment news business website Deadline.com, Bertinelli signed a
new deal in 2021 extending her contract with Food Network.
As of early 2022, Valerie Bertinelli is as busy as ever.
Not only did she re-up her contract with Food Network, but she's also slated to return to
acting and star in another sitcom called Hungry alongside Demi Lovato.
The TV chef also released a third memoir, Enough Already: Learning to Love the Way I
Am Today, in 2022, and she's collaborated with the Today show to share healthy recipes
while working to change her own relationship with food.
Unfortunately, Bertinelli has also experienced more heartache in recent years.
In 2021, she filed for separation from her second husband, Tom Vitale, and in 2020, she
lost her first husband, Eddie Van Halen, after his throat cancer diagnosis.
Bertinelli has since opened up about her relationship with Van Halen following their divorce, sharing
on the Today show,
"I'm so happy that we were able to come to a beautiful place by the end of his life,
and, um I just, I wish he was still here."
Although she's suffered loss, Bertinelli has maintained a strong relationship with son
Wolfie, whose 30th birthday she celebrated in May 2021.
The doting mother gushed on Instagram:
"I'm so ridiculously proud of the man you are."
Meanwhile, the star celebrated her own milestone birthday the previous year.
Upon turning 60, Bertinelli opened up about the "gratitude" she feels for her life, telling
Hoda Kotb,
"I want to bring happiness to this world."
She certainly does.
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