Latest news with #BeaArthur
Yahoo
21-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘Golden Girls' Writers Felt the Need to Stay in the Closet, Despite Show's Massive Gay Following
While the classic '80s sitcom 'The Golden Girls' has amassed a large gay following, former writer Stan Zimmerman said that the set itself was not as open as some might assume. One co-worker even told Zimmerman to burn thrifted sweaters from a garage sale because they had probably belonged to 'somebody that died of AIDS.' But the writer — who later worked on 'Gilmore Girls' — said that was just 'the climate then.' 'I know you see all these progressive scenes and you think, 'Oh, it was one big gay party there,' but we couldn't be who we really were,' Zimmerman explained during a Pride LIVE! Hollywood panel (via The Hollywood Reporter). He said that their representatives even advised them to stay in the closet. But he added there was one titular 'Golden Girls' gay crew members couldn't fool. More from IndieWire 'Abbott Elementary' Star William Stanford Davis Wants More Actors to Say 'No' | 'What No One Tells You' Behind the Deep, Dark Meaning of 'We Were Liars' - from Author E. Lockhart Herself 'Our first day on the set, we noticed Estelle [Getty] come running toward us, and she's like … 'I know. Your secret's safe with me. You're one of us.' I thought she meant Jewish,' he laughed. 'But she meant gay. She wasn't gay, but she was probably the first ally ever.' Getty was already deeply entrenched in the queer community, having played Harvey Fierstein's mother in Broadway's 'Torch Song Trilogy,' the landmark play (and later film) about a gay, Jewish drag performer. Bea Arthur, too, seemed to have a finely tuned queer radar. Script supervisor Isabel Omero would later come out as transgender decades later, and at one point during the show's long run Arthur offered Omero a sari she had received on a trip to India. 'In my closeted, panicked, paranoid brain, all I knew is that at that moment Bea Arthur was offering me a dress to wear around the house, and I wish I had been in a place where I could have said something, to even accept the gift without ever using it, just so I could express something to someone,' Omero said during the panel. 'But fear and shame is a big thing.' Despite the secrecy of the era, co-producer Jim Vallely said that the series' production team was aware of its large gay following. Several episodes addressed queer issues, including a two-episode arc where Blanche's (Rue McClanahan) brother came out and — in an especially progressive moment — married his partner. 'I think [we did the episodes] because we knew… we had a gay audience,' Vallely said. 'They would play [the show] in [gay] bars across the country.' 'The Golden Girls' is currently streaming on Hulu and Disney+. Best of IndieWire Guillermo del Toro's Favorite Movies: 56 Films the Director Wants You to See 'Song of the South': 14 Things to Know About Disney's Most Controversial Movie Nicolas Winding Refn's Favorite Films: 37 Movies the Director Wants You to See
News.com.au
21-06-2025
- Entertainment
- News.com.au
Golden Girls producer claims Bea Arthur called Betty White a ‘c**t' and never ‘warmed up' to her on set
Bea Arthur and Betty White allegedly did not get along during their Golden Girls era. Co-producer Marsha Posner Williams addressed the long-rumoured, frosty relationship between the two during a Pride LIVE! Hollywood panel in Los Angeles on Thursday night. 'When that red light was on [and the show was filming], there were no more professional people than those women, but when the red light was off, those two couldn't warm up to each other if they were cremated together,' Williams shared, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Williams claimed that Arthur (who portrayed Dorothy Zbornak on the hit show) even called her up at home one time to complain about running into that 'c**t' [White] at the grocery store and wanting to 'write her a letter.' 'I said, 'Bea, just get over it for crying out loud. Just get past it,'' she recalled. Apparently, Arthur referred to White (who played Rose Nylund) by the c-word on multiple occasions. The producer remembered being invited to Arthur's home for dinner and 'within 30 seconds of walking in the door, the c-word came out.' Williams also noted that White — who died in December 2021 at the age of 99 — would often break character in the middle of the show and talk to the live audience, which 'Bea hated.' Another co-producer, Jim Vallely, theorised that the enmity was due to White getting more applause during cast introductions ahead of tapings. Williams disagreed, however, noting that Arthur — who died in 2009 at the age of 86 — despised doing publicity and came from a theatrical background while White was from the world of television. Back in 2023, former casting director Joel Thurm exclusively told Page Six that Arthur had called White a 'c**t' on set — but theorised that it was because Arthur and castmate Rue McClanahan (who portrayed Blanche Devereaux) disliked White's behaviour toward the fourth member of the cast, Estelle Getty (who played Sophia Petrillo). 'When Estelle would forget her lines, Betty would go out of character and keep the audience laughing by making a gesture with her thumb to her mouth and pointing to Estelle as if she had been drinking,' Thurm wrote in his memoir, Sex, Drugs & Pilot Season. The gesture seemed particularly cruel as Getty was beginning to show signs of dementia and struggled to remember her lines, which were hidden on cue cards. Thurm told Page Six he didn't believe White intended to be harsh, however, and was just trying to entertain the audience. The Golden Girls, which ran from 1985 to 1992, ended after seven seasons allegedly because of Arthur, Williams claimed. 'Their contracts were up and … the executives went to the ladies, and Estelle said, 'Yes, let's keep going,' and Rue said, 'Yes, let's keep going,' and Betty said, 'Yes, let's keep going.' And Bea said, 'No f***ing way,' and that's why that show didn't continue,' she alleged.
Yahoo
20-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘Golden Girls' Creatives Spill the Tea on Bitter Feud Between Betty White and Bea Arthur — and Making a Classic Anyway
Creatives behind The Golden Girls shared funny and, at times, very candid behind-the-scenes stories — namely, among the long-rumored feud between stars Betty White and Bea Arthur — during a 40th-anniversary celebration of the long-running hit show on Wednesday night. The sold-out event, held at NeueHouse Hollywood as part of the monthlong Pride LIVE! Hollywood festival, featured a panel of writers, producers and others who worked on the show, which ran for seven seasons on NBC, from 1985-92. The series, created by Susan Harris, starred Bea Arthur as Dorothy Zbornak, Betty White as Rose Nylund, Rue McClanahan as Blanche Devereaux and Estelle Getty as Sophia Petrillo. (The Hollywood Reporter is the presenting media sponsor of Pride LIVE! Hollywood.) More from The Hollywood Reporter K-pop Star Bain is Ready to Open a New Chapter Following Historic Coming Out: "I Can Finally Be Free" The 'Wizard of Oz' of Gay Erotica OUTtv: They're Here, They're Queer, They're Canadian! Co-producer Marsha Posner Williams brought up a topic that has been much-discussed and speculated on: whether Arthur and White got along in real life. 'When that red light was on [and the show was filming], there were no more professional people than those women, but when the red light was off, those two couldn't warm up to each other if they were cremated together,' she quipped. Arthur 'used to call me at home and say, 'I just ran into that c' — meaning White, using the c-word — 'at the grocery store. I'm gonna write her a letter,' and I said, 'Bea, just get over it for crying out loud. Just get past it.'' In fact, the panelists shared that Arthur called White the c-word more than once. 'I remember, my husband and I went over to Bea's house a couple of times for dinner. Within 30 seconds of walking in the door, the c-word came out,' Williams said, and Thurm noted that he heard Arthur call White that word as well while sitting next to her on a flight. It's a story he shared a few years ago on a podcast and then got surprised at the internet's response over his revelation. The panelists differed on their theories about why the two didn't get along. Co-producer Jim Vallely thought it was because White got a lot more applause during cast introductions ahead of tapings, but Williams shot that down, noting that Arthur hated doing publicity and came from a different background (theatrical) than White (television). 'The show would have continued after seven years,' she shared. 'Their contracts were up and … the executives went to the ladies, and Estelle said, 'Yes, let's keep going,' and Rue said, 'Yes let's keep going,' and Betty said, 'Yes, let's keep going.' And Bea said 'no fucking way,' and that's why that show didn't continue. … And Betty would break character in the middle of the show [and talk to the live audience], and Bea hated that.' Script supervisor Isabel Omero remembered it differently, noting that the two used to walk 'arm in arm' to get notes together after the first of two tapings. Williams joked that was in case they were walking across the lot and a golf cart got out of control, suggesting that one of them might push the other in front of it. Casting director Joel Thurm was there from the beginning for the casting of all four leading ladies. He shared that Brandon Tartikoff, then-head of NBC Entertainment, originally did not want Arthur in the show, but Harris was dead set on her, having previously worked with the actress on Maude (she wrote several episodes, including the legendary abortion episode). Thurm said Tartikoff's resistance to casting Arthur had to do with her low Q scores in likability. '[This] created a big problem, but I never knew how dug in Susan was, because I just wasn't in the room where those kind of discussions happened,' he shared. 'So my job, according to Brandon, was to find someone that Susan would be happy with instead of Bea Arthur. I should have realized that she wouldn't have been happy with anybody besides Bea, but I was too naive, and I thought, 'Oh, I have someone. Her name is Elaine Stritch. She has the same acidic quality, you know, stare at you and give you the same thing that Bea does.'' Thurm shared that when Stritch came in for her audition, 'None of the people associated with Golden Girls wanted her. So this woman had to walk into a freezer of an office and try to make it funny. Stritch asked Susan one thing, it was something like, 'Is it OK if I change something?' And Susan said, 'Yes, only the punctuation.' There was no love in that room. I felt so sorry for poor Stritch because it wasn't her fault. She didn't do anything. And had I known that, that Susan was immovable on this, I wouldn't have done what I did and then try to find somebody else.' Williams, however, shared a different view of Stritch. 'I want to just say that I worked on a pilot, and Elaine Stritch was a guest star for one day,' she chimed in. 'Before the day was half over, we were calling her 'Elaine Bitch.'' Meanwhile, Getty, who was then an unknown actress, came in to her audition and nailed it: 'She did her homework and prepared for the part,' Thurm said, noting she was the first one of the four leads to be cast. Incidentally, Cher was supposed to guest star in the episode focusing on the death of Sophia's son, playing his wife, but she never replied to the offer, and Brenda Vaccaro was cast instead. The event kicked off with a highlights reel of some of the show's LGBTQ moments, including Blanche's brother coming out as gay, Sophia's coming to terms with her cross-dressing son and a politician's revelation that he was transgender. But behind the scenes, things weren't so progressive, shared writer Stan Zimmerman. 'People have to remember back then, we were told by a representatives to stay in the closet, so nobody knew we were gay,' he shared. 'Our first day on the set, we noticed Estelle come running toward us, and she's like … 'I know. Your secret's safe with me. You're one of us.' I thought she meant Jewish,' he quipped. 'But she meant gay. She wasn't gay, but she was probably the first ally ever.' Zimmerman added that he was telling his co-workers how he had bought some vintage sweaters at a garage sale one day, and they told him to 'go home and burn those sweaters because it was probably somebody that died of AIDS. … That was the climate then.' I know you see all these progressive scenes and you think, 'Oh, it was one big gay party there,' but we couldn't be who we really were.' Omero, who came out as transgender in 2019, shared that she was in the closet for all seven seasons of the show. She said that one day, Arthur offered to give her an Indian sari that she had picked up on a trip. 'In my closeted, panicked, paranoid brain, all I knew is that at that moment Bea Arthur was offering me a dress to wear around the house, and I wish I had been in a place where I could have said something, to even accept the gift without ever using it, just so I could express something to someone. But fear and shame is a big thing,' Omero said. Asked why The Golden Girls tackled so many different LGBTQ issues, Vallely replied: 'I think it's because we knew … we had a gay audience. They would play [the show] in [gay] bars across the country. … It was a big deal for middle America to see these women embrace the gay culture.' The panel, which also featured story editor Rick Copp and was moderated by New York Times best-selling author Jim Colucci (Golden Girls Forever), ended with a highlights package of cut scenes from the pilot, which originally featured a live-in gay housekeeper and cook named Coco, who was played by Charles Levin. The character was cut from the show because Sophia — initially meant to be a recurring character — was so popular that they made Getty a regular; unfortunately for Levin, that meant another character had to be cut. Among those in the audience were actress Deena Freeman, who played Dorothy's daughter Kate in an episode of the show, and production designer Michael Hynes. Best of The Hollywood Reporter 'The Studio': 30 Famous Faces Who Play (a Version of) Themselves in the Hollywood-Based Series 22 of the Most Shocking Character Deaths in Television History A 'Star Wars' Timeline: All the Movies and TV Shows in the Franchise
CNN
20-06-2025
- Entertainment
- CNN
Betty White and Bea Arthur apparently had an ongoing feud on ‘Golden Girls,' says producer
Thank you Betty White and Bea Arthur for being a friend on 'The Golden Girls,' even though those behind the show now say it was all an act. The tea was spilled during a panel of writers, producers and others who worked on the show held at NeueHouse Hollywood on Wednesday evening as part of the monthlong Pride LIVE! Hollywood festival, according to The Hollywood Reporter. 'When that red light was on (and the show was filming), there were no more professional people than those women,' said co-producer Marsha Posner Williams of Arthur and White – who played Dorothy Zbornak and Rose Nylund, respectively – 'but when the red light was off, those two couldn't warm up to each other if they were cremated together.' Williams also said Arthur 'used to call me at home and say, 'I just ran into that c—' – referring to White, using the c-word – 'at the grocery store. I'm gonna write her a letter,' and I said, 'Bea, just get over it for crying out loud. Just get past it.'' And it happened more than once. 'I remember, my husband and I went over to Bea's house a couple of times for dinner. Within 30 seconds of walking in the door, the c-word came out,' Williams said of Arthur's continued off-color references to White. 'The Golden Girls' ran from 1985 to 1992 on NBC, and is now celebrating its 40th anniversary. In addition to White and Arthur, Rue McClanahan starred as Blanche Devereaux and Estelle Getty as Sophia Petrillo. The show revolved around a quartet of female retirees in Florida and explored their friendships with one another. Williams added at the event this week that the hit series 'would have continued after seven years,' but didn't, most likely due to the feud between the two actresses. 'Their contracts were up and … the executives went to the ladies, and Estelle said, 'Yes, let's keep going,' and Rue said, 'Yes let's keep going,' and Betty said, 'Yes, let's keep going,'' Williams recalled. 'And Bea said 'no f–king way,' and that's why that show didn't continue. … And Betty would break character in the middle of the show (and talk to the live audience), and Bea hated that.' Theories as to why the women didn't like each other ranged from White getting more applause from the audience during the cast introductions, to Arthur coming from a more theatrical background than White, who found fame on TV. Panelist and series writer Stan Zimmerman also discussed how despite there being LGBTQ+ storylines – including a quickly-scrubbed gay housekeeper character in the pilot, and Blanche's brother coming out as gay – he felt he had to remain closeted during those times, and received support behind the scenes. 'Our first day on the set, we noticed Estelle come running towards us, and she's like … 'I know. Your secret's safe with me. You're one of us,'' Zimmerman sad. 'I thought she meant Jewish. But she meant gay. She wasn't gay, but she was probably the first ally ever.' In addition to being a huge mainstream hit, 'The Golden Girls' has a special place in LGBTQ+ culture thanks, in part, to the ladies' biting humor and retro styling. The show racked up 11 Primetime Emmys over the course of its run. Getty died in 2008, Arthur in 2009, McClanahan in 2010 and White in 2021.
CNN
20-06-2025
- Entertainment
- CNN
Betty White and Bea Arthur apparently had an ongoing feud on ‘Golden Girls,' says producer
Thank you Betty White and Bea Arthur for being a friend on 'The Golden Girls,' even though those behind the show now say it was all an act. The tea was spilled during a panel of writers, producers and others who worked on the show held at NeueHouse Hollywood on Wednesday evening as part of the monthlong Pride LIVE! Hollywood festival, according to The Hollywood Reporter. 'When that red light was on (and the show was filming), there were no more professional people than those women,' said co-producer Marsha Posner Williams of Arthur and White – who played Dorothy Zbornak and Rose Nylund, respectively – 'but when the red light was off, those two couldn't warm up to each other if they were cremated together.' Williams also said Arthur 'used to call me at home and say, 'I just ran into that c—' – referring to White, using the c-word – 'at the grocery store. I'm gonna write her a letter,' and I said, 'Bea, just get over it for crying out loud. Just get past it.'' And it happened more than once. 'I remember, my husband and I went over to Bea's house a couple of times for dinner. Within 30 seconds of walking in the door, the c-word came out,' Williams said of Arthur's continued off-color references to White. 'The Golden Girls' ran from 1985 to 1992 on NBC, and is now celebrating its 40th anniversary. In addition to White and Arthur, Rue McClanahan starred as Blanche Devereaux and Estelle Getty as Sophia Petrillo. The show revolved around a quartet of female retirees in Florida and explored their friendships with one another. Williams added at the event this week that the hit series 'would have continued after seven years,' but didn't, most likely due to the feud between the two actresses. 'Their contracts were up and … the executives went to the ladies, and Estelle said, 'Yes, let's keep going,' and Rue said, 'Yes let's keep going,' and Betty said, 'Yes, let's keep going,'' Williams recalled. 'And Bea said 'no f–king way,' and that's why that show didn't continue. … And Betty would break character in the middle of the show (and talk to the live audience), and Bea hated that.' Theories as to why the women didn't like each other ranged from White getting more applause from the audience during the cast introductions, to Arthur coming from a more theatrical background than White, who found fame on TV. Panelist and series writer Stan Zimmerman also discussed how despite there being LGBTQ+ storylines – including a quickly-scrubbed gay housekeeper character in the pilot, and Blanche's brother coming out as gay – he felt he had to remain closeted during those times, and received support behind the scenes. 'Our first day on the set, we noticed Estelle come running towards us, and she's like … 'I know. Your secret's safe with me. You're one of us,'' Zimmerman sad. 'I thought she meant Jewish. But she meant gay. She wasn't gay, but she was probably the first ally ever.' In addition to being a huge mainstream hit, 'The Golden Girls' has a special place in LGBTQ+ culture thanks, in part, to the ladies' biting humor and retro styling. The show racked up 11 Primetime Emmys over the course of its run. Getty died in 2008, Arthur in 2009, McClanahan in 2010 and White in 2021.
