STEFANIE POWERS Love, Loss What I've Learned

THE HART TO HART ALUM ON HER CAREER, RELATIONSHIPS AND THE WORK SHE'S DOING TO HELP SAVE THE PLANET

- LOUISE A. BARILE

Stefanie Powers admits she's had some fortunate luck. In the late 1970s, she was committed to a production of Cyrano de Bergerac that was headed to Broadway when New York's news- papers went on strike - freeing her up to star in the TV pilot of Hart to Hart. “When newspaper strikes would happen, no play would come from out of town because there was no way to publicize them,” she explains to Closer. “I will be forever grateful to whichever union caused the strike and allowed me to work on the pilot.”

From 1979 to 1984, Stefanie and Robert Wagner played Jennifer and Jonathan Hart, a glamorous couple who solved mysteries among the world's jet set. “I had worked with Robert before,” says Stefanie, who describes their relationship as like siblings. “When we were working together, some- times we would get into laughing fits and they'd have to send us home.”

Stefanie's friendship with Robert began in her starlet days. She knew both his late wife, Nata- lie Wood, and Jill St. John, his spouse of the past 34 years, even longer. In adolescence, the wom- en all took ballet class together. “Los Angeles in the 1950s was like growing up in a small town,” Stefanie, 82, explains. “It was an industry town, and everybody knew everybody. There wasn't a set I walked on as a teenager where I didn't know someone.”

After many small roles in films, Stefanie's big break occurred when she was cast as a secret agent on TV's The Girl from U.N.C.L.E. “We made 29 episodes a year, which is almost unheard of in today's world,” she says. Although the show wasn't picked up for a second season, it was a great expe- rience. “It was an incredible training ground. We had Boris Karloff playing in drag in ‘The Mother Muffin Affair’ [episode],” she says. “It was such a treat to work with him.”

A BIGGER WORLD