Helena Kallianiotes

Helena Kallianiotes is an American actress of Greek birth who started out as a resident belly dancer in Los Angeles during the late 1960s, performing at a members-only folk dance club called The Intersection. That job led to her first screen appearance, an uncredited belly dancing bit in Head, the 1968 movie Bob Rafelson directed. Rafelson then cast her in Five Easy Pieces (1970), where she played Palm Apodaca, a hitch-hiker obsessed with cleanliness. Her most celebrated role came in 1972 as the fiercely aggressive roller derby competitor Jackie Burdette in Kansas City Bomber (1972), and it brought a Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actress in 1973. Later films included Shanks (1974), The Drowning Pool (1975), Stay Hungry (1976), The Passover Plot (1976), and Nicolas Roeg's Eureka (1983). She also appeared on the cover of Art Garfunkel's 1975 album Breakaway.