Valene "Val" Ewing (maiden name Clements, formerly Gibson, Waleska), portrayed by Joan Van Ark, is a fictional character in the CBS primetime soap opera Knots Landing, a spin-off from the long-running series Dallas, in which she also appeared.

Van Ark played Valene in Knots Landing for thirteen of its fourteen seasons, which made her one of the show's longest running stars.

She had her husband, Gary, stolen by another woman, then got pregnant by him, her twin babies were kidnapped by a crooked doctor, she was given a drug overdose at gunpoint by her ex-husband's fiancee, and she racked up enough marriages to give Elizabeth Taylor a run for her money.

But she and Gary Ewing (Ted Shackelford) made for one of television's most beloved couples and the audience never stopped rooting for them to get back together.

He wanted to create a television show based on "family issues and examining relationships at the middle class level".

[5] The production company, CBS, turned down this idea, as they wanted something more "glitzy" to put on the air, with wealthier characters, which would become Dallas.

[5] After the success of Dallas, Jacobs' presented his initial idea again and created Knots Landing, with some alterations of his original script.

[7] Initially, it was presumed that Charlene Tilton would be joining Knots Landing as Gary and Val's daughter, but the network decided to keep her on Dallas in order to keep the two shows separate.

[8] Van Ark appeared in Knots Landing for thirteen seasons of its fourteen-season run before she left to pursue other interests.

[9] According to co-star Michele Lee, Van Ark was apparently offered a role on an NBC sitcom after she left the show.

[10] The actress reprised her role for the series finale of Knots Landing, where Val is revealed to have been alive the whole time.

But three years ago I did Night of the Iguana in Williamstown [Massachusetts], and I had a quote from Tennessee Williams taped on my mirror, taken from an essay he'd written on success.

The Gary/Abby/Valene love triangle, which involved Gary cheating on Valene with Abby Cunningham – the show's main villain – was a monumental storyline for all three characters.

Van Ark described the storyline:"There wasn't really anything I could think of, but I will mention that Ted and I went in way early, whenever Donna Mills came on the show, and told David Jacobs that it made total sense that Gary would fall for Abby.

[18] On October 17, 2012, TV Guide reported that Van Ark and Ted Shackelford were set to appear in Dallas, reprising their characters in the show's second season, which aired in 2013.

With Gary gone, Valene is then driven off Southfork by J.R., but she soon returns to get baby Lucy and flees to Virginia, and later to her home state of Tennessee, where she tries to get help from her mother, Lilimae Clements (Julie Harris), to take them in, but they are turned away.

Valene's bitterness over her mother's indifference, and the subsequent loss of Lucy is not resolved until 1980, shortly after she and Gary had moved to Knots Landing, when Lilimae shows up unannounced.

Much of Valene's early backstory is told through flashbacks in episodes of Knots Landing, and is only briefly referenced in Dallas.

Jock and Miss Ellie attend the wedding, as do Gary's brother Bobby (Patrick Duffy) and sister-in-law Pamela Barnes Ewing (Victoria Principal).

Val becomes involved in John B. Anderson's Independent 1980 presidential election effort, joining the local chapter of the Anderson-Lucey '80 campaign.

Gary and Val's daughter, Lucy, visits her parents in Knots Landing and appears in one episode in the show's first season.

Val is subsequently married to Ben Gibson (Doug Sheehan) (1985–1987), and later briefly to Danny Waleska (Sam Behrens) (1990).

She suffers a nervous breakdown and disappears from Knots Landing for several months, and is later reunited with her babies, thanks largely to the investigations secretly undertaken by her neighbors Mack and Karen MacKenzie.

During this storyline, Valene's home town is revealed as Shula, Tennessee (a fictional community in real-life Johnson County).

Valene is seen once again in the 1997 reunion mini-series Knots Landing: Back to the Cul-de-Sac where she begins a new career as a screenwriter and adapts her best-selling novel "Hostage", which tells the story of her kidnapping five years earlier, into a film.

Val realizes she has returned to Dallas under false pretences and confronts Sue Ellen, who tells her to work things out with Gary while she still has the chance.

For her portrayal of Valene, Van Ark received two Soap Opera Digest awards in the category "Outstanding Actress in a Leading Role on a Prime Time Serial".

[2] Greg Hernandez said, "Before I go on, I have to confess that I was a die-hard fan of Knots Landing, the series on which Joan played sweet Valene Ewing for 14 years.

She had her husband, Gary, stolen by another woman then got pregnant by him, her twin babies were kidnapped by a crooked doctor, she was given a drug overdose at gunpoint by her ex-husband's fiancee, and she racked up enough marriages to give Elizabeth Taylor a run for her money.

But she and Gary Ewing (Ted Shackelford) made for one of television's most beloved couples and the audience never stopped rooting for them to get back together.