Letter perfect

Modesto Bee - Modesto, CA, USA - When "I Dream of Jeannie" star Barbara Eden comes to the Gallo Center for the Arts, it won't be her first time in Modesto.

The perky San Francisco-bred actress had cousins in our city when she was still known as Barbara Huffman (Eden is her stage name). She isn't sure if any of her relatives still live here, but if they do, she hopes they will come see her show.

She and longtime friend Hal Linden of "Barney Miller" are performing the two-person play "Love Letters" for one night only next Friday.

"It's a wonderfully constructed play," Eden said in a phone interview. "It's beautiful, it has everything, it has pathos, it has comedy, it has tragedy."

Written by A.R. Gurney, the 1990 Pulitzer Prize nominee follows the relationship between dutiful lawyer Andrew Makepeace Ladd and unstable artist Melissa Gardner from their childhood through middle age. The story is told solely through their correspondence, with the performers reading the letters and acting out some scenes.

Eden, 73, and Linden, 76, have performed the show together all over the country for the past two years.

"Hal Linden is wonderful," she said. "I love working with Hal."

While both actors are best known from their TV shows, they have extensive stage experience. Eden starred in national tours of such musicals as "South Pacific" and "Best Little Whorehouse in Texas." Linden has appeared in 15 Broadway shows and won the 1971 Tony Award for best actor in a musical for "The Rothschilds."

The two met when they filmed the 1976 TV movie "How to Break up a Happy Divorce."

While Linden hails from New York, Eden has spent most of her life in California. Eden's grandfather sang opera in San Francisco as a hobby in the 1800s, and the whole family enjoyed singing.