Designing Women - General Discussion

[annzeepark914]

3 hours ago, mmecorday said:

If there's one thing I don't like about Charlene, it's her sentimental fantasies about World War II.

I watched that episode. Oy.  Didn't Julia get to sing? ~shudder~

[Bastet]

3 hours ago, mmecorday said:

If there's one thing I don't like about Charlene, it's her sentimental fantasies about World War II.

And "the old South".

[bluegirl147]

16 hours ago, Bastet said:

And "the old South".

Wasn't there an episode they dressed like Gone with the Wind characters? With the big hoop skirts?

[Lois Sandborne]

Well ... there was a pretty good episode in Season 5 ("A Blast from the Past") featuring Sugarbaker's on the Tour of Homes, and Julia getting righteously angry at the "Bored Housewife" curator for making up lies about her home and ancestors for all of the tourists and their "babies who sneeze fudgesicle juice!" while she and Mary Jo wore ridiculous hoopskirts.

Then there was the ... unfortunate hour-long series finale in which Sugarbaker's is hired to decorate an antebellum mansion where the hideous new owners plan to rip out a staircase just like the one at Tara, and they each have extended fantasy sequences where they imagine themselves as Scarlett O'Hara.

Edited July 16, 2022 by Lois Sandborne

[Cetacean]

While not in hoop skirts, there was the great episode where it ends with words by Dash Goff about the Women of Atlanda.  They all looked just stunning.

[HyeChaps]

IIRC, Anthony was not fond of those antebellum days. 

[annzeepark914]

42 minutes ago, HyeChaps said:

IIRC, Anthony was not fond of those antebellum days. 

One can't blame him. Those were not happy times for a lot of folks living in the south back then. I remember being surprised that the show's creator did those stories. 

[Bastet]

1 minute ago, annzeepark914 said:

I remember being surprised that the show's creator did those stories. 

White privilege.  They always gave Anthony a good zinger, and it made sense for Suzanne to remain oblivious, but that Charlene was just always "Oh, I know, but ..." and back to her romanticizing was frustrating because she was a rather empathetic person.

[bluegirl147]

On 7/16/2022 at 5:51 AM, Lois Sandborne said:

Then there was the ... unfortunate hour-long series finale in which Sugarbaker's is hired to decorate an antebellum mansion where the hideous new owners plan to rip out a staircase just like the one at Tara, and they each have extended fantasy sequences where they imagine themselves as Scarlett O'Hara.

That is episode I was thinking of. If I do rewatch I'm going to skip that one.

[ljenkins782]

On 7/16/2022 at 8:01 PM, Bastet said:

White privilege.  They always gave Anthony a good zinger, and it made sense for Suzanne to remain oblivious, but that Charlene was just always "Oh, I know, but ..." and back to her romanticizing was frustrating because she was a rather empathetic person.

Yes, that always drove me nuts too. As if the enslavement of an entire race was incidental to story of the Old South and she could handwave it away and go back to thinking about the pretty dresses and big houses.

She was the same way about WWII, the actual war part seemed like a sidenote and her main focus was the "romantic" farewells of men going off to war. 

The part about the historic homes tour episode that always seemed weird to me was that Julia's house was simply built on the foundations of another house. So the present house wasn't historically significant in any way, it's no wonder the tour wasn't very interesting. 

I mean, I wouldn't trade the episode because the 'babies who sneeze fudgsicle juice' rant is a classic, but I didn't understand why the house would have ever been included on that tour.

[mmecorday]

Quote

She was the same way about WWII, the actual war part seemed like a sidenote and her main focus was the "romantic" farewells of men going off to war. 

I think Bill actually going to war slapped the sentimental out of Charlene maybe just a little.

[Hiyo]

Quote

White privilege.  They always gave Anthony a good zinger, and it made sense for Suzanne to remain oblivious, but that Charlene was just always "Oh, I know, but ..." and back to her romanticizing was frustrating because she was a rather empathetic person.

I mean, was it that uncommon for quite a few people back in the mid to late 80s in the south to feel that way?

[FormerMod-a1]

37 minutes ago, mmecorday said:

I think Bill actually going to war slapped the sentimental out of Charlene maybe just a little.

Yes, it did.  But even at the time, when I watched this as a kid, I wondered how she could have thought it would have been easy or romantic to "keep the home fires burning".  How she didn't know people would worry about their loved ones fighting in a war.  Even with the romanticism of Hollywood movies, there was still movies like The Fighting O'Sullivans about a family that lost all 6 of their children in the war, and many other examples.  Didn't she learn death counts and all that in history classes?  I couldn't buy that even Charlene would be that naïve.  I could see it still being harder than she expected, but maybe play it out differently. 

[Bastet]

The actor who played Monette died (at 78, of natural causes).

As I said in the Celebrity Deaths thread, she went on to appear in Linda and Harry's other shows, too, but I don't know whether one of them knew her back in the day, or whether she met them in Hollywood and they bonded over the Arkansas connection.

[lurkerbee]

2 hours ago, Bastet said:

The actor who played Monette died (at 78, of natural causes).

As I said in the Celebrity Deaths thread, she went on to appear in Linda and Harry's other shows, too, but I don't know whether one of them knew her back in the day, or whether she met them in Hollywood and they bonded over the Arkansas connection.

Her son, Jay R. Ferguson, was a regular on Evening Shade, playing the son of Burt Reynolds’s and Marilu Henner’s characters.

[Egg McMuffin]

Jay Ferguson went on to appear on Mad Men and currently plays Darlene’s fiancé on The Conners. I can certainly see the resemblance between him and his mother.

[qtpye]

16 hours ago, Egg McMuffin said:

Jay Ferguson went on to appear on Mad Men and currently plays Darlene’s fiancé on The Conners. I can certainly see the resemblance between him and his mother.

He's definitely a nice looking man.

[Rebky]

On 7/14/2022 at 11:29 AM, chessiegal said:

He said when he was in high school, he would have paid $1,000 to see her do that. Then she promptly bit the popsicle in half. Hee!

I LOVED Jean Smart's guest role on Frasier!!! She would start out so sweet, and then turn into a fierce ball buster. Like when she spent the night with Frasier, and they woke up all lovey dovey, and then one of her kids call her. The next thing you know she is yelling into the phone and Frasier is in the background freaking out. "Put your brother on the phone. PUT YOUR BROTHER ON.THE.PHONE!!!!!!!" 😆

[Keywestclubkid]

just watched the 2nd season episode Stranded .. God I forgot how much I really do enjoy watching Suzanne and Anthony centric episodes.. 

[ButterQueen]

Just a heads up.  Antenna TV is showing Designing Women starting with the pilot episode on 9/19 at 11 pm.

[Egg McMuffin]

I wish someone would show the original versions, unedited, with the correct intros. Even Hulu doesn’t have that. The show was really butchered for syndication, with commercial breaks in odd places.

[chessiegal]

In my experience, the only way to watch unedited versions of a show is to buy the DVDs, if available. Networks air syndicated shows to make money on commercials, the more they can jam in, the better.

[annzeepark914]

3 hours ago, Egg McMuffin said:

I wish someone would show the original versions, unedited, with the correct intros. Even Hulu doesn’t have that. The show was really butchered for syndication, with commercial breaks in odd places.

And a lot of times, what they leave out is an important part of the show. Whenever they show reruns of the Seinfeld finale, they leave out the best part: the series' oddball character actors, sitting at home, enjoying watching the 4 main characters getting their comeuppance.

[Giuseppe]

9 hours ago, chessiegal said:

In my experience, the only way to watch unedited versions of a show is to buy the DVDs, if available. Networks air syndicated shows to make money on commercials, the more they can jam in, the better.

I have all the DVDs except the last season, and they contain some of the same edits that the networks run. I know in season one, in one of the episodes where Charlene is dating Mason, they cut out the line where she's on the phone with him with an annoyed Julia listening to their sweet talk, and Charlene says "you big cookie, you" before Julia snaps at her. That always made me laugh before it got edited out of all the syndicated episodes and I was disappointed it wasn't back in the DVDs.

[chessiegal]

5 minutes ago, Giuseppe said:

That always made me laugh before it got edited out of all the syndicated episodes and I was disappointed it wasn't back in the DVDs.

Well, that is disappointing. Why would they do that? There's no need to shorten an episode on a DVD, because they don't have commercials. I can see editing something out if they determined something wasn't appropriate, but, really, DVD viewing isn't over the air, so I see no reason at all.

[Giuseppe]

3 minutes ago, chessiegal said:

Why would they do that? There's no need to shorten an episode on a DVD, because they don't have commercials.

I don't know how plausible this is or if it could even work like this, but I've always thought maybe the DVD company essentially just bought the syndicated episodes and put them on DVD without bothering to acquire the unedited versions. Maybe the unedited eps don't even exist anymore.

[GHScorpiosRule]

48 minutes ago, Giuseppe said:

I have all the DVDs except the last season, and they contain some of the same edits that the networks run. I know in season one, in one of the episodes where Charlene is dating Mason, they cut out the line where she's on the phone with him with an annoyed Julia listening to their sweet talk, and Charlene says "you big cookie, you" before Julia snaps at her. That always made me laugh before it got edited out of all the syndicated episodes and I was disappointed it wasn't back in the DVDs.

40 minutes ago, chessiegal said:

Well, that is disappointing. Why would they do that? There's no need to shorten an episode on a DVD, because they don't have commercials. I can see editing something out if they determined something wasn't appropriate, but, really, DVD viewing isn't over the air, so I see no reason at all.

32 minutes ago, Giuseppe said:

I don't know how plausible this is or if it could even work like this, but I've always thought maybe the DVD company essentially just bought the syndicated episodes and put them on DVD without bothering to acquire the unedited versions. Maybe the unedited eps don't even exist anymore.

No. The point of the DVDS is so you have the full, unedited, original airings of the episodes/movies.

Something sounds hinkey here.

[tessaray]

Sometimes bootlegs make it onto places like Amazon. 

[sugarbaker design]

There is something hinkey going on.  A friend of mine has a set of DVD's and she has commented on how the reruns cut out lines from everyone, especially Charlene.  

[Bastet]

18 hours ago, Giuseppe said:

I know in season one, in one of the episodes where Charlene is dating Mason, they cut out the line where she's on the phone with him with an annoyed Julia listening to their sweet talk, and Charlene says "you big cookie, you" before Julia snaps at her. That always made me laugh before it got edited out of all the syndicated episodes and I was disappointed it wasn't back in the DVDs.

I'll have to pull out my season one DVDs and watch, because I could have sworn that line was included.  Maybe I just fill it in in my head?  The DVDs are how I watch the show, which I do once a year or two, and I haven't noticed anything missing.

When an edited-for-syndication version winds up on a DVD release, it's usually a mistake, someone grabbing the wrong master off a shelf, but on rare occasions it's that the original is no longer available.

[Giuseppe]

You know, you guys may be right. I might be thinking about the episodes on Hulu, not the DVDs. I'll have to pull mine out as well (and re-hook up my blu-ray player) to double-check, but I still could swear it was the DVD that I noticed the missing lines.

[annzeepark914]

Julia *hated* hearing Charlene call Mason her "big cookie" 😄. 

Edited September 19, 2022 by annzeepark914

[Cetacean]

16 minutes ago, annzeepark914 said:

Julia *hated* hearing Charlene call Mason her *big cookie" 😄. 

I don't recall her ever saying why. There's a lot worse things you could call somebody!

[Bastet]

1 hour ago, annzeepark914 said:

Julia *hated* hearing Charlene call Mason her *big cookie" 😄. 

I love her delivery on "Don't say that.  I hate it when you say that"

47 minutes ago, Cetacean said:

I don't recall her ever saying why. There's a lot worse things you could call somebody!

It was just so juvenile and schmoopy.

[ljenkins782]

4 hours ago, annzeepark914 said:

Julia *hated* hearing Charlene call Mason her *big cookie" 😄. 

I was on Julia’s side on this one, it made me gag. And you’re on the phone at work, leave your schmoopy nonsense at home. 

[Cetacean]

4 hours ago, Bastet said:

It was just so juvenile and schmoopy.

Charlene was the poster child for schmoopy!

[annzeepark914]

Sad news. Leslie Jordan died today in a car crash in LA. Good God almighty, he was funny. My favorite memory of Jordan was of him, dressed in a bellboy uniform (but, of course!), singing & playing the piano, when Suzanne charged into the hotel dining room. As soon as he saw her he broke out singing "Delta Dawn". One of my all time favorite scenes in all the great comedy shows.

[Bastet]

16 minutes ago, annzeepark914 said:

Sad news. Leslie Jordan died today in a car crash in LA. Good God almighty, he was funny. My favorite memory of Jordan was of him, dressed in a bellboy uniform (but, of course!), singing & playing the piano, when Suzanne charged into the hotel dining room. As soon as he saw her he broke out singing "Delta Dawn". One of my all time favorite scenes in all the great comedy shows.

That's not Leslie Jordan playing Reggie Mac Dawson; it's some relative of Harry's.

I love when Reggie Mac says he has to go to his boss's office to ask if he can take his break, because he only gets one a week -- Suzanne tells him he's not leaving this room, grabs the microphone and announces, "Mr. [Boss Name]!  This is Suzanne Sugarbaker.  Reggie Mac's taking his break now, thank you."  As with so many things on this show, it's all in the fantastic delivery.

Edited October 24, 2022 by Bastet

[annzeepark914]

Whoever that character was, he sure looked & sounded like Leslie Jordan 😄.

[annzeepark914]

17 hours ago, annzeepark914 said:

Whoever that character was, he sure looked & sounded like Leslie Jordan 😄.

It's Danny Thomason and he sounded just like Leslie Jordan. A lot of people got the two mixed up (like me).

[Lois Sandborne]

On 10/24/2022 at 6:17 PM, Bastet said:

I love when Reggie Mac says he has to go to his boss's office to ask if he can take his break, because he only gets one a week -- Suzanne tells him he's not leaving this room, grabs the microphone and announces, "Mr. [Boss Name]!  This is Suzanne Sugarbaker.  Reggie Mac's taking his break now, thank you."  As with so many things on this show, it's all in the fantastic delivery.

It's Mr. Flagbeau, and I agree that the delivery is unforgettable. A ton of lines are memorable not (just) because they're funny, but because of how they landed.

Case in point, I've just started my seasonal viewing, and I watched the Thanksgiving episode from the first season. There are quite a few lines just lodged in my brain, like Suzanne asking, "Anyone care for a homemade roll?" and wailing, "My pie burned up!" And especially Anthony leaving after dinner, saying, "Happy Thanksgiving; thanks again for turning me in for murder."

[Taryn74]

15 hours ago, Lois Sandborne said:

"Happy Thanksgiving; thanks again for turning me in for murder."

I miss this show so much. 😂

[sugarbaker design]

15 hours ago, Lois Sandborne said:

And especially Anthony leaving after dinner, saying, "Happy Thanksgiving; thanks again for turning me in for murder."

I must rewatch that episode!

[ButterQueen]

On 2/24/2021 at 10:01 PM, GHScorpiosRule said:

Aaand Suzanne’s Southern accent makes an appearance by Episode Three! 😄😄

I’m doing a rewatch (again 😂) and Suzanne’s high pitched voice in season 1 bothers me.  
I much prefer her deeper voice.  I cannot imagine enjoying Suzanne’s “Oh Big Woo” comments in the higher voice.  She really perfected her character by season 2.  I also don’t care for Charlene as much in season 1.  Usually I rewatch from season 2, but I started with season 1 today.  This show is gold…..good sitcoms are so rare anymore.  Sigh.

[ButterQueen]

On 11/10/2022 at 11:22 AM, sugarbaker design said:

I must rewatch that episode!

I’m watching it right now.  I love Anthony so much.

Also, I can’t believe Suzanne is cooking that huge turkey in the tiny kitchenette.  Actually, her cooking at all, is odd.

Edited December 3, 2022 by ButterQueen

[ButterQueen]

On 7/7/2022 at 10:49 PM, qtpye said:

Still watching on Hulu.

Even though it looks dated now, I have to say that I loved the way Julia dressed. She always looked so stylish and classy.

Before Sex and the City was known for giving the four main characters very distinctive looks, this show was doing it. It was a another way the characters were defined.

Julia was classy and sophisticated.

Mary Joe went from mousy to funky/contemporary.

Charlene was flirty with the shoulder pads.

Suzanne was classic beauty queen.

I don't like fur but look how gorgeous Suzanne looks here.

I am so glad they progressed Mary Jo’s wardrobe.  I’m not completely through season 1 and Mary Jo has worn a drop waist, ruffled dress three time….just in different fabric.

[Bastet]

6 hours ago, ButterQueen said:

I also don’t care for Charlene as much in season 1.

She's painfully stupid in season one; I'm glad they course corrected and made her naive and gullible, but not stupid, going forward.

[annzeepark914]

I never cared for Charlene and her gullibility. Loved Anthony, especially when he had to deal with Suzanne. And, of course, all those hilarious character actors who appeared in various episodes. I'm thinking right now of that wealthy, ditsy, old customer who had a crush on Julia. He kept calling her "my sugar", or something like that. In one episode, Julia talked about how southerners don't hide their crazy relatives; they put them right out on the front porch.

[qtpye]

8 hours ago, ButterQueen said:

I am so glad they progressed Mary Jo’s wardrobe.  I’m not completely through season 1 and Mary Jo has worn a drop waist, ruffled dress three time….just in different fabric.

Mary Jo's wardrobe went from 80's frumpy to 80's fabulous. 

[qtpye]

On 7/16/2022 at 7:16 AM, Cetacean said:

While not in hoop skirts, there was the great episode where it ends with words by Dash Goff about the Women of Atlanda.  They all looked just stunning.

Suzanne and Mary Joe look like dolls.