Golden Girls Forever

by Jim Colucci

  And finally, this episode features cameos from not just one but two TV giants associated with the game show Jeopardy! The show’s host Alex Trebek appears here, as he had on Cheers; but the Girls up the ante with an appearance by the game show’s executive producer Merv Griffin (1925–2007), himself a small-screen legend.

  JERRY PERZIGIAN: I was always jealous of writers who could take an incident from their own lives and make a sitcom episode out of it. Never in my life was I writing “the truth.” Instead of “What do I care about?” it was always, “We have a half hour of airtime to fill this Saturday, and what can I pretend to care about?”

  But this one time, on The Golden Girls, we were up against the wall looking for a story, and I told this story about how, when I first moved to Hollywood, I didn’t have a job and was painting houses and moving furniture. My writing partner said, “Let’s go on a game show,” and so we did go to audition for the show Knockout, hosted by Arte Johnson.

  My partner flunked the written test, but I passed. The second thing was an interview, and I passed. Then a run-through for the producer and Arte Johnson, not on the set but in a rehearsal hall with a wooden podium and hotel bell. The producer told us, “To get on the show, you must get the answers right, make the host laugh, and charm the old ladies in the audience.” And so that’s exactly what I did.

  By the end, there were about twenty people left. At that point the producer said, “Lisa, the production assistant, will be passing out an information sheet that will tell you to report on Monday. Those of you who are going to be here Monday, thank you very much, and those of you who are not, we’re very sorry.” And then everybody got the sheet but me.

  It didn’t sink in what had happened. So I went up to the producer and said, “I don’t want to make any trouble for Lisa, but she forgot to give me the sheet.” To which he replied, “No, she didn’t forget.” Still not getting it, I said, “But you don’t understand. I don’t know where to report on Monday.” And so finally, he spelled it out: “She did not make a mistake. You’re not on the show.” I couldn’t believe it. I pointed out to him: “But I got the answers right. I made them laugh. How am I not on the show?”

  The producer looked me in the eye and asked, “Do you really want to know? On any game show, any guest celebrity is not the star. You the contestant are the celebrity, the person the audience has to root for and like. And we don’t think people would root for you.”

  BLANCHE:

  “No, but I do care for Alex Trebek. You see, I’ve never had a Canadian who wasn’t on skates.”

  It ended up being the only time in my life where I didn’t have to make up anything. Because we had our game show producer say that to Dorothy, word for fucking word.

  ALEX TREBEK: It pays to be a friend of Betty White’s. I think that’s why they invited me to be on The Golden Girls, and it’s why later I got to be a guest star on Hot in Cleveland, too. I did watch The Golden Girls at the time, so I was thrilled to be asked to appear. I didn’t get to have much to do with Rue or Estelle on the set. But not only did I get to work with Betty, but also Bea was a lot of fun, and we got along well.

  EPISODE 173

  JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF ATTENTION

  Written by: MARC CHERRY & JAMIE WOOTEN Directed by: LEX PASSARIS Original airdate: FEBRUARY 22, 1992

  Blanche coerces a lonely Dorothy into joining her for a night of excitement and nickel beer at her favorite bar hangout. Once there, Blanche is soon dethroned as the queen of the Rusty Anchor when the patrons take an instant liking to Dorothy, whose singing makes her the new center of attention. To regain her stature, Blanche plans to beat Dorothy at her own game, with a sexy number sung atop the bar’s piano. But her rendition of “I Wanna Be Loved by You” goes clumsily and hilariously wrong, sending Blanche running in tears for the ladies’ room. Dorothy follows after her, and the two Girls admit to times when they are jealous of each other. And although neither is willing to give up her night of adoration at the Rusty Anchor, they come to an amicable settlement: they’ll split up the nights of the week.

  Meanwhile, after she and Rose have a grand time at Doug Kirkpatrick’s Irish wake, Sophia decides to throw her own memorial to keep the party going. But after absentminded Rose neglects to inform the congregants in the Girls’ living room that Sophia’s not actually deceased, the honoree inadvertently gives Myrtle (Jane Dulo, 1917–94), Eva (Ann Nelson, 1916–92), and her other dearest friends the shock of their lives.

  COMMENTARY: The Golden Girls had found a few earlier excuses to get Bea Arthur singing: she belted “Miami, You’ve Got Style” as the Girls entered a song-writing contest, impersonated Cher on “I’ve Got You Babe,” and added a basso profundo “Yessss . . . ?” to the Girls’ cribside lullaby of “Mr. Sandman.” But this episode gives us Bea performing two classic tunes—“Hardhearted Hannah” and “What’ll I Do”—leaving the patrons of the Rusty Anchor, undoubtedly the gayest dockside straight bar in all of Miami, calling out for an encore.

  “Journey to the Center of Attention” provides a second treat with Rue’s musical number, as she attempts to writhe sexily on the bar’s piano like an older Michelle Pfeiffer in The Fabulous Baker Boys. But unlike Michelle, when Blanche kicks up her heel, she loses a shoe. When she plays with the microphone cord, she nearly strangles a customer. And when she slides up to the pianist, she falls right on her eighty-eights. It’s one of the series’ best bits of physical comedy.

  One of the series’ most beloved locations, Blanche’s favorite dockside bar, the Rusty Anchor.

  Photo courtesy of the EDWARD S. STEPHENSON ARCHIVE at the ART DIRECTORS GUILD.

  RUE McCLANAHAN: I loved the choice of song for Blanche to do atop the piano, “I Wanna Be Loved by You.” Marilyn Monroe had done it, and Blanche wanted to be Marilyn Monroe, after all. I also liked the song because it is something that can easily fall apart, and be made fun of. If you sing it too slowly and seriously, it doesn’t work. It’s supposed to be an upbeat number—“boop boop be doop!” But Blanche decided to sing it sexy. And then it just goes to hell in a handbasket.

  I like doing physical comedy, and I like to sing. And I knew that the bit on the piano would have to be choreographed precisely for it to look that sloppy and in the moment. I had recently co-written the book for a musical farce at the Golden Theater in Burbank called Oedipus, Shmoedipus, As Long As You Love Your Mother, and worked with a choreographer named Gregory Scott Young. So I asked him to come in to The Golden Girls and help me work out Blanche’s moves for that scene. I told him I wanted Blanche to just make a shambles of the song, and he came up with some very funny stuff, like the shoe flying off. We did it by the numbers, and I learned it meticulously. And then I had to do it like it was happening spontaneously and surprising Blanche. I was so relieved when I got through it without mishap and had to do it only once at each taping of the show. But I can’t think of anything I enjoyed doing more as Blanche.

  MARC CHERRY: This was the most glorious episode to work on, because we got to choose the material the ladies would sing. For Bea, we wanted something ballsy and classic, and that led us to pick “Hardhearted Hannah.” And for her second number, Bea asked, “Give me something that’s pretty.” So we ended up with “What’ll I Do.”

  For Blanche’s bit where she gets the microphone cord wrapped around a guy’s neck, she rehearsed with our producer Kent Zbornak all week long. So when it came time to do it with someone else, because it would be tricky timing, someone suggested, “Don’t trust an extra—we’ve got to use Kent.” So when you see this episode, and see the guy being choked by the mic cord, that’s our beloved Kent Zbornak, for whom Dorothy was named.

  For the B plot of the episode, I remember writing Sophia’s wake scene at one o’clock in the morning in my condo, when I was really tired and just throwing down some jokes. And then the scene ended up being shot very much like I wrote it, which almost never happened. Sophia’s friend Myrtle [Jane Dulo] comes into the house, and to lighten the mood and ch
ange the subject, Blanche says Myrtle will do some of her impressions. Myrtle, grieving Sophia, says, “Oh God, oh God!” and Blanche guesses, “Jimmy Swaggart, right?” And Myrtle says, “What happened? I didn’t even know she was sick!” And Blanche guesses, “Claus von Bülow?” Typically, my writing style is that I tend to write a gentler kind of comedy, coming from characters’ attitudes. But the great thing about The Golden Girls for me was that I started learning how to write hard jokes.

  At this point during the final season, we had been going through a stretch where we were a little short on Rose stories, and I remember counting that Rose had only thirteen lines in this episode. Other actors would have complained, but Betty never did. We did give Betty the moment at the Rusty Anchor where, after Blanche throws down the mic, Rose devilishly picks it up, and Betty played that so beautifully.

  But the thing I remember most about the taping of the episode is that when it came time to do the scene where Dorothy comforts Blanche in the ladies’ room, it was at the end of the night and we were running late. Rue felt that we didn’t do enough takes, and was upset because she didn’t feel she had given her best possible performance. And on top of that, this episode was going to be her Emmy submission. And so she made her case to the producers, and they ended up reshooting that scene again the next week—one of the very few times that ever happened.

  EPISODE 177 & 178

  HOME AGAIN, ROSE

  (PARTS 1 & 2)

  Written by: GAIL PARENT (PART 1), JIM VALLELY (PART 2) Directed by: PETER D. BEYT Original airdate: APRIL 25, 1992 & MAY 2, 1992

  Ballroom locale for the East Miami High Class of ’52 reunion.

  Photo courtesy of the EDWARD S. STEPHENSON ARCHIVE at the ART DIRECTORS GUILD.

  In her never-ending quest for fresh men, Blanche convinces the Girls to crash the reunion of the East Miami High Class of ’52. The scheme initially goes well—especially for Sophia, who finds a dance partner in an attendee who mistakes her for Spanish 101 teacher Mrs. Gonzales, and Dorothy, who as “Cindy Lou Peeples” gets to live out her lifelong dream of being prom queen. Rose, upset that she had to miss her own recent reunion in St. Olaf because she hadn’t been feeling well, is happy to play along, too—even though she’s hardly convincing as Korean exchange student Kim Fung Toy. So perhaps it’s partly due to the stress from telling such an outrageous lie that Rose eventually collapses to the floor, just as the foursome is exposed as impostors.

  Later, at the hospital, the Girls pace the waiting room anxiously, with Blanche going as far as to promise God she won’t have sex anymore—unless the man “really, really needs it.” Just then, a doctor emerges to let them know that Rose’s heart attack was mild; at her bedside, they all vow to change their lives for the better. Sophia considers law school, Dorothy decides to go out more—and Rose makes her friends swear that like her they too will sign up to have their heads cryogenically frozen upon their deaths. After humoring their friend’s strange request, the Girls go home relieved; but when they return to the hospital the next morning, they learn that Rose has gone into cardiac arrest, and is being prepped for surgery.

  In part two, as Rose undergoes a triple bypass, the Girls grapple with the fact that they may lose their ditzy roommate forever—and worse yet, the hospital staff won’t permit them, as non-family members, to see her. When Rose’s blood relative, her daughter Kirsten (Lee Garlington) does arrive, she lashes out, blaming the Girls’ fun lifestyle together for her mother’s cardiac problems. But in the end, as Kirsten hears that the Girls are willing to go as far as mortgaging Blanche’s house in order to pay for physical therapy, she relents and allows a recovering Rose to return to her true home.

  COMMENTARY: Although it may seem odd for the show’s writers to give Rose a heart attack just weeks before concluding the series for good, these two episodes perfectly underscored for the penultimate time the Golden Girls theme: the power of the surrogate family. Kirsten, who has witnessed some strange goings-on on Richmond Street, may at first not understand, but she is soon won over—first by Rose’s request to care for the Girls after she’s gone, and then by the Girls’ “extra insurance policy,” as Dorothy puts it. As Kirsten hears about their pact to take care of each other in times of trouble, we viewers, too, are moved by the love to be found among this very special foursome.

  The episodes contain some moments noteworthy for other reasons as well—particularly, in part two, the now-famous dream visual of Rose, Dorothy, and Blanche as mere heads, sitting atop ice-ringed platters on their kitchen table. These episodes also mark the first and only time we’ll meet Blanche’s oft-referenced daughter Janet (Jessica Lundy). Two of the names from the reunion are of special note as well; prom king and queen Danny Farrell and Cindy Lou Peeples are named for two of Marc Cherry’s fellow cast mates from his days in the choral group the Young Americans. In fact, Cindy Lou’s seems to be a go-to name for Cherry, popping up again in 2006 in an episode of his series Desperate Housewives.

  JIM VALLELY: In my second year on the show, which was season six, the producers teamed Gail Parent and me together, because she was so great with story, and I was known for jokes. At this point in the series, we’d started to experiment a little bit with jokes that were a little more out there. And so we came up with the frozen heads scene. I couldn’t believe we did it. Of course, the ladies hated it; they were all so uncomfortable.

  The crew sets up a complicated shot depicting Blanche, Rose, and Dorothy as frozen heads.

  Photo courtesy of the EDWARD S. STEPHENSON ARCHIVE at the ART DIRECTORS GUILD.

  GAIL PARENT: I was married to a man who was really into cryogenics and wanted to be frozen, so that’s where that idea came from. Even funnier, I read up on it and found out that for a certain amount of money you could get your whole body frozen—but for a little less, you could have done just your head. The moment I read that I thought, “This is great!”

  RICHARD VACZY: Shortly before this episode, my hometown of Sayville, Long Island, had experienced a series of arson fires that had burned down half of Main Street. So to help the town rebuild, we auctioned off a walk-on part on The Golden Girls, with airfare and hotel. And in the end, the man who played the prom king paid twenty-four thousand dollars for that experience.

  LEE GARLINGTON: Along with Tom Hanks and Oprah Winfrey, Betty White is one of our national treasures. She’s always been so sweet, and funny, and refined. And to this day, if and when I run into her, she’ll say something like, “My daughter!” because of this episode.

  JESSICA LUNDY: There’s so much stunt casting in sitcoms now, where guest stars on the most popular shows are already really well known. But one of the wonderful things about The Golden Girls was that because the show had four topnotch, well-known stars, for the guest roles the producers could cast anyone they wanted. They didn’t need to bring in “names.”

  When this episode aired, it was still at a time where if, as an actor, you appeared on a top-ten network show, everyone would see you. In fact, years later, when I went on an audition for a role in a pilot, one of the first things the pilot’s producer said was, “That’s the lipstick you wore on The Golden Girls!” And she was right.

  PETER D. BEYT: The famous scene in the second episode, where the Girls are nothing but cryogenically preserved heads on their kitchen table—“We’re heads! We’re heads!”—did present a big challenge for filming. Not for the prop guys, who designed a table with cutouts for the ladies to stick their heads through, and molded gelatin to look like fake ice. The bigger problem was Bea was claustrophobic. So she immediately let us know she didn’t want to be in some little box, or crouched under a table with her head sticking out.

  I had done some effects work before, so I had an idea. We raised the table, so that we could put Bea, Rue, and Betty in office chairs, and then roll them right into place. Then, I had to also put platforms behind the table, to bring Estelle up to the proper relative height. Finally, I cheated the perspective with the cameras, so that the cabinets
and the rest of the kitchen look in the right heights and proportions. So the scene looks like it was shot with the regular kitchen table, but underneath it, Bea is sitting in an office chair, completely upright. The other women even tucked in their knees, to give Bea more legroom. She still had a brief moment of angst and panic, but nothing big. And we got the shot, for a scene that so many people remember.

  NINA FEINBERG WASS (producer): The scene with the Girls’ heads cryogenically frozen was hilarious, and one of my favorites of all time. But when the writers were originally working on it, they were stuck on one particular joke for what seemed like forever. As Rose, Blanche, and Dorothy’s heads are all frozen on the table, Sophia walks in. We’d stuffed Estelle’s bra and put lipstick on her, and her body looked amazing. The setup is Dorothy asking something like, “Ma, where did you get that body of a twenty-five-year-old woman?” The writers were pitching punch lines for hours, until finally Jim Vallely said that the joke should be Sophia replying, “You didn’t tip the guy?” It was genius.

  EPISODE 179 & 180

  ONE FLEW OUT OF THE CUCKOO’S NEST

  (PARTS 1 & 2)

  Written by: DON SEIGEL, JERRY PERZIGIAN, & MITCHELL HURWTZ Directed by: LEX PASSARIS Original airdate: MAY 9, 1992

  Busy with a rendezvous of her own, Blanche persuades typically dateless Dorothy to entertain her visiting uncle, Lucas (Leslie Nielsen, 1926–2010). On their “date,” the duo cooks up a scheme to get revenge on Blanche, by pretending to fall madly in love. But soon, it becomes clear that their phony love is all too real, and Lucas pops the question in earnest.