Celebrate National Cheesecake Day with the Girls in Miami

For those of us who can't get enough of the Golden Girls -- including enjoying on Hulu, where they will soon be joined by their sisters, the Designing Women -- tomorrow (Tuesday, July 30) is your chance to celebrate in Miami, where ABC Studios and PopSugar are marking National Cheesecake Day with a Golden Girls pop-up event at Vicky's House restaurant in Coconut Grove.

Check out the special, limited-edition cheesecake milkshake, and snap up something from the ever-growing line of official, licensed Golden Girls merchandise (see photos below).  And of course, to get your copy of Golden Girls Forever, my book which spurred the studio to create official merch, check it out here.

ABC's press release below.  I can't be in Miami tomorrow, but have a cheesecake milkshake for me!

In honor of the ladies who define the term “Squad Goals,” ABC Studios and PopSugar are celebrating national Golden Girls Day and National Cheesecake Day with an exclusive one-day-only “The Golden Girls” pop-up event at Vicky’s House in Coconut Grove, Florida, on Tuesday, July 30, from 12:00 – 10:00 p.m.

  Fans and their friends are invited to stop by for a limited edition cheesecake milkshake inspired by “The Golden Girls,” pose for themed photo ops – including a scenic recreation of the ladies’ iconic lanai – and shop ‘til they drop on new and unique branded merchandise at the retail pop-up store!

  The pop-up store will offer fans the opportunity to purchase “The Golden Girls”-themed merchandise. Among the unique merchandise are books, party supplies, pins, dolls, tees, car sunshade, shower curtain and poster. All items can be purchased at https://www.toynk.com/collections/golden-girls.

THURSDAY, JULY 30

Location:                                Vicky’s House

                                                3190 Commodore Plaza

                                                Coconut Grove, FL 33133

Maurice Made "Golden" Magic

Recently, I learned of the passing of makeup artist and inventor, Maurice Stein.  I had the pleasure of interviewing Maurice in 2006, inside Cinema Secrets, the Toluca Lake, California store which sells not just cinema-quality makeup, but also many of his ingenious innovations.

Talking with Maurice was one of the most memorable experiences I had in researching Golden Girls Forever -- and that's really saying something, because I also got to sit for a day each with Bea Arthur, Rue McClanahan and Betty White!  But for one thing, makeup artists are often privy to the most intimate details of stars' personal lives, spending so much time with them each day.  And Maurice's memories of the groundbreaking show, and his storytelling skills, were both superb. 

But the most interesting thing I learned that day was about how, out of Golden Girls necessity, Maurice ended up inventing a brand new cinema technique that is still used to this day.  Below, a featurette that didn't make it into Golden Girls Forever, due to space constraints.  (Hopefully it will someday, in some kind of expanded edition.)  I think it's a proper tribute to a funny, warm guy whom I had the pleasure of meeting, and who helped bring the world laughter via Sophia Petrillo.

As The Golden Girls progressed, the series’ hair and makeup crew would be tasked with some very specific challenges, such as turning Estelle Getty and Bea Arthur into a convincing Sonny and Cher. But by then, such sartorial switchups were old hat for costume designer Judy Evans, hair stylist Joyce Melton and makeup artist Maurice Stein.  After all, they’d already been convincingly transforming Estelle – actually a tiny bit younger than her co-stars Betty and Bea – into an old lady for years. 

For the earliest episodes in season one, Estelle's hair was merely sprayed gray, as the actress herself had done to perform her shtick for producer after producer during her many auditions.  But very soon, as it became clear that The Golden Girls would be an enduring hit, it also became obvious that some things had to change.

And so, not far into the first season, the show's producers commissioned Sophia's trademark -- and expensive -- curly white human-hair wig.  But the larger problem was, the prevailing old-age makeup technique at the time, a process called “stretch and stipple,” took over four hours to apply, and as Maurice remembers Estelle saying, “an hour and a half, and a couple of vodkas, to take off.”  Each week, that added up to five or six hours of expensive production time – and an extra headache for an already nervous Estelle.

And so, Golden Girls producer Marsha Posner Williams had made a call to Maurice, luring him out of his early retirement; as luck would have it, Maurice had spent his newfound spare time inventing a new waterproof, oil-free foundation.  Now, instead of putting his star through the time-consuming application, blow-drying and powdering of layers and layers of latex, Maurice was able to cover Estelle’s face with several strata of the fast-drying foundation, and followed by accentuating her natural wrinkles with a makeup pencil (and, after Estelle’s facelift between seasons one and two, creating those lines anew.)

Today, Maurice still sells his Cinema Secrets Ultimate Foundation to the public; and because it's one of the only products medically approved to cover radiation burns, he donates his time and product to kids in burn units and to women with cancer.  As Maurice jokes, his products “aren't tested on animals…but on actors.”  So really, he adds, in the end, it was partly Estelle's ambition to play Sophia that has resulted not only in an innovative new product, but also in charitable work that has benefitted people around the world.

Jim Colucci, Golden Girls Forever, copyright 2016 HarperCollins Inc. 

The Girls Head to Hulu

Big news this morning out of the Television Critics of America (TCA) convention in Pasadena:  Hulu has announced the exclusive acquisition of streaming rights to The Golden Girls.  Starting February 13, all seven seasons/180 episodes of the show will be available for on-demand viewing anytime.

Now if only we can get them to throw in Golden Palace.  Stay tuned!

Happy Anniversary, Golden Girls!

Bea Arthur, Estelle Getty, Betty White and Rue McClanahan
in the Girls' kitchen -- which had been recycled from a failed
ABC sitcom a year earlier, Richard Crenna and Patty Duke's
It Takes Two.  Problem is, as newly reconfigured, it had no
oven. 

It was thirty-one years ago tonight, on September 14, 1985, that four older ladies called "The Golden Girls" first came into our living rooms.

If you were like me, a teenager in the pre-Internet era who diligently followed all buzz about the new fall season as doled out in the entertainment press, you knew this new show was going to be something special.  After all, it hailed from Susan Harris, the brilliant creator of Soap, and starred TV icons Bea Arthur, Betty White and Rue McClanahan.  And yet, the buzz also said, this newcomer Estelle Getty just might steal the show.

As I've said many times in promoting my book Golden Girls Forever, The Golden Girls was just as unlikely a network product back then as it would be now -- in fact, maybe even more so.  After all, advertisers were then, too, chasing a younger age demographic -- and why, conventional wisdom would say, would those young viewers want to watch four old ladies in Miami?

Before even Susan Harris' involvement, it had been the foresight of NBC head Brandon Tartikoff that had brought these Girls to life (even if the network honchos were afraid, deferring to political correctness, of calling these four ladies "Girls" until Susan Harris reassured them).  Tartikoff had been gestating the idea for a while, having watched the movie How to Marry a Millionaire with his nieces, and having observed the interplay among his crotchety elder relatives in Florida.  So when, at an otherwise boring NBC fall preview event, Night Court's Selma Diamond and Remington Steele's Doris Roberts enlivened the proceedings with their scripted shtik mistaking the title of network's big hope Miami Vice for "Miami Nice," Tartikoff realized the idea was worth pursuing.

It's only through the miracles of great writing and great casting that the fleshed-out concept made it not just to the national airwaves, but into the pop culture pantheon, celebrated as it is more than three decades later.  At 63, Betty White was the eldest of the four women (older by only four months than Bea Arthur, though); today at 94 she's still a national treasure and inspiration.

And so I was honored to get the chance to sit with Betty, as well as Bea and Rue, in their living rooms, and hear their stories about their experiences on the show firsthand.  In all, over 250 guest stars, writers, producers and crew members were happy to share their memories -- and in some cases, rare artifacts -- with me for the book, eager to ensure that such a rare show should enjoy the legacy it deserves.  So to Susan Harris, to Betty, and to the three other Golden ladies we've lost but will never forget, I'd like to take the occasion of this 31st anniversary again to say thank you for the years and years of not just laughs but thought-provoking takes on issues that still concern us.  And above all else, of course, Thank You For Being a Friend!

RIP Ken Howard, 1944-2016

I was saddened today to hear about the death of Ken Howard, who began his career in 1968 with a role in Broadway's Promises, Promises, and the following year, created the role of Thomas Jefferson in the Tony-winning musical 1776.  Ken himself received a Tony for his role of a young gym coach at a Catholic boys' school in the 1970 stage drama Child's Play; interestingly, it would later be the 6'6" actor's starring role as a former NBA pro-turned-inner city basketball coach in CBS' The White Shadow (1978-81) that would make him a household name for TV audiences.  In 1974-75, Ken had his first TV starring role as bounty hunter Dave Barrett on CBS' The Manhunter, and he would continue to pop up in later years in recurring roles on such shows as Dynasty and its spinoff The Colbys, Fame, Murder, She Wrote, Melrose Place, Crossing Jordan and, most recently, in the hilarious recurring role of Kabletown CEO Hank Hooper on NBC's 30 Rock.  Elected president of the Screen Actors' Guild in 2009, Ken continued to juggle his SAG-AFTRA duties with performing, such as in HBO's adaptation of Grey Gardens, for which he received his second Emmy Award in 2009.

And apart from all that, Golden Girls fans will of course forever remember Ken as Jerry, the gentlemanly gentleman caller of Blanche's who preferred old-fashioned romance to bed-hopping, and who ultimately left Blanche speechless with their first kiss, which made her feel "like a lady."



A few years ago, I happened to have been seated next to Ken's lovely wife Linda at the taping of the pilot for CBS' sitcom The McCarthys, in which he was appearing, and soon thereafter in February of 2014, I had the pleasure of interviewing them both by phone, as they drove up the coast, about Ken's work on The Golden Girls.  A shorter version of that interview is included in my book Golden Girls Forever, which hits stores on April 5.  But in light of the news today of Ken's passing, I'd like to share his full recollection about working on the show, with its brief glimpse into the life of this beloved actor.

The opportunity to guest star on The Golden Girls came out of the blue, in December of 1991, as my then-fiancée Linda and I were planning our upcoming wedding in February. It was a busy time, but I was excited to do the show because I was a fan. I knew Bea Arthur a little through Broadway circles, and Betty White a bit, too – and now that Linda and I are on the board of directors for the animal charity the Onyx and Breezy Foundation, we’ve gotten to know Betty much more dearly. And I’d just worked with Rue McClanahan on a TV movie, The Man in the Brown Suit, which had filmed on location in Spain in the summer of 1988. We’d had a lot of opportunity on the set to chat, and so when I heard I’d be working with Rue again, I knew it would be great to see her again. 

Working on The Golden Girls was a wonderful experience, although it goes by so fast. I had a few loving scenes with Rue, which is what I remember most. But I also remember how I enjoyed watching those women work, as they rehearsed their scenes together. That week, I even developed the impression to imitate Bea Arthur -- the trick was to let all the air out of my lungs before I would talk.

When the week was over, Linda had the idea to send each of the ladies flowers. So we sent each a bouquet, a dozen roses. And they were all so touched – but the way Bea Arthur expressed how touched she was, she got mad at me. She said, “You mustn’t spend your money that way, and don’t you ever do that again. Do you hear me?!” And she read me out, which was so her. Her way of saying “Thank you” was to say, “That’s excessive, and don’t ever do it again!” --Ken Howard