Holliday began her show Business career in 1938, under her original name, as part of a nightclub act called The Revuers. The other members of the group were Betty Comden, Adolph Green, Alvin Hammer, John Frank and Esther Cohen. The Revuers played engagements in New York night clubs including the Village Vanguard, Spivy's Roof, Blue Angel, Rainbow Room, and Trocadero in Hollywood, California. Leonard Bernstein, a friend of the group who shared an apartment with Green at the time, sometimes provided piano accompaniment for the group's performances. The Revuers filmed a scene for the 1944 Carmen Miranda film Greenwich Village, but the scene was cut, although Holliday can be seen as an unbilled extra in another scene. The group disbanded in early 1944.