A Little Romance (Season 1, Episode 13)
01:39:02 Share

This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Whether you love true crime or comedy, celebrity interviews or news, you call the shots on what's in your podcast queue. And guess what? Now you can call them on your auto insurance too, with the Name Your Price tool from Progressive. It works just the way it sounds. You tell Progressive how much you want to pay for car insurance, and they'll show you coverage options that fit your budget.

Get your quote today at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. Did you know Tide has been upgraded to provide an even better clean in cold water? Tide is specifically designed to fight any stain you throw at it, even in cold. Butter? Yep. Chocolate ice cream? Sure thing. Barbecue sauce? Tide's got you covered. You

You don't need to use warm water. Additionally, Tide Pods let you confidently fight tough stains with new cold-zyme technology. Just remember, if it's got to be clean, it's got to be Tide. Hi, Jennifer Simard. Hi, Patrick Heinzer. Hi, Star.

How are you? I'm so great. You know, I'm not wearing any makeup today. You look incredible. I feel good about it. Cheesecakes, welcome back. Welcome to episode 13. In case you're new here, let us remind you, we are a little podcast called The Golden Girls Deep Dive, which means we do recaps of the episodes. We're starting with episode 13.

one going straight through the series. Throughout each recap, we do little deep dives because we've got a full-time researcher. And so we're like giving you all the tidbits and like the hot gossip, all of the good news. And then at the end, we do a fully researched deep dive from something from the Golden Girls universe. Patrick, you're doing the deep dive today and it's something very near and dear to your heart. So I'm going to ask you to give the cheesecakes a preview. All right, cheesecakes. Today, I'm doing the deep dive on the play Torch Song Trilogy, which of course we know is the play that Estelle Getty was in that was such a huge hit on Broadway, but it came from like

off-off-Broadway to off-Broadway to Broadway. She was doing it on tour in L.A. Yeah, and then she took it on tour in L.A., which is how the producers saw it, which is literally how she got the job on The Golden Girls. So, you know, Torch on Trilogy is really an incredible, important, groundbreaking gay play by Harvey Fierstein with a really incredible backstory, and I cannot wait to share it with you all. Stay tuned for this one. Steve listened to it. He started crying when he listened to it. Our editor, Jennifer, made a note that she really enjoyed this deep dive. Like,

I really went down a rabbit hole with this show. It means a lot to me. So that is our big deep dive at the end of this episode. It's so good. So what episode are we talking about today, girl? Well, I believe it's your favorite episode. It's also Betty White's favorite episode and so many people's favorite. It's episode 13, A Little Romance. So this is like the iconic episode with Dr. Jonathan Newman. We're going to get into all of it.

All of it in just a second. Like, I'm so thrilled to be talking about this episode. Yeah. For so many reasons. It's so funny, but it's also very poignant. The writer, Barry Fennaro, I've got a really fun quote from him about this episode. Oh, cool. It's also his favorite episode. So it was directed by Terry Hughes, written by Barry Fennaro and Mort Nathan. It originally aired December 14th, 1985. Yeah. And you know that the writing team won an Emmy for this episode. Yeah. I wonder if that would happen today. I doubt it.

I wonder if this episode will get made today. Because, I mean, let's just talk about the pink elephant in the room. It's like there's words we don't use anymore. Yes. I don't know that these jokes would fly anymore. No. And it's one of those tricky things, you know, where inevitably so much stuff is funny, but is it appropriate or not? We're going to get into that, right? We absolutely are going to get into it. And it's such a classic episode. There's so much to get into here. There's a psychic. I can't. There's so much.

I love it. Well, this was, I just have to remind you that our first coffee date in January, where we decided to do this and we secretly wrote down our favorite episode. This was yours. This was my favorite episode. So I defer. I defer to you. But there's lots of fun things that were happening in the world around this time. Do you want to talk about that? Please. So it originally aired December 14th, 1985. What was going on that week? Well, I happen to like this. The number one song on the Billboard charts was Mr. Mister's Broken Wings. Do you remember that? Take these broken wings.

Yes! Oh my God! Yes! Yes!

Broken wings. Two-time Tony nominee Jennifer Samara in Cheesecakes. You get that one for free. I was number one. I've got something that's going on this week. Can I tell you? Yeah, tell me. So the number one movie at the box office this week was called The Jewel of the Nile. Do you remember this movie? Okay, I loved the whole series. Me too. Romancing the Stone. Yes. I mean, just loved it. So The Jewel of the Nile is the secret.

equal to romancing this. These are those adventure movies starring Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, and Danny DeVito where she plays like a romance writer and like she gets a map in real life. It's a treasure map and Michael Douglas is her like reluctant tour guide and they hate each other but they fall in love. It's just like a big adventure movie and I was obsessed. It's like real life starts to mimic the stories that she writes about. Exactly.

She lives it, basically. So this one is the sequel. Jewel of the Nile is the sequel to Romancing the Stone. And I did a little mini deep dive because I watched this movie 800 times when I was a kid. So Romancing the Stone, the first one was a huge hit. And so, of course, they wanted to make a sequel. Kathleen Turner absolutely did not want to make the sequel and only did it because she was contractually obligated. She spent the entire shoot threatening to quit because she just thought it was stupid. And the reason for that was because Michael Douglas, who was producing the movie, refused

to rehire the writer who wrote the original Romancing the Stone because she was too expensive. So Kathleen Turner in a 2018 interview described arriving on set, reading what was being like the shooting script, refusing to shoot the script because she found it quote, terrible, formulaic and sentimental. And she says that she and Michael Douglas locked themselves in his hotel room where they sat down on the floor with three versions of the script and just began trading pages until they landed on some combination that they could both live with. All right. And

The shoot was dogged with tragedy. Get this. Two weeks before they began shooting, while out location hunting, an airplane carrying both the production designer and the production manager crashed

Oh, gosh. Oh, my gosh.

Wow. And despite all of this, the movie was a big hit financially, but the critics hated it. Well, Cheesecakes, I hope you've liked the Jewel of the Nile deep dive podcast. You can find it everywhere you listen to your podcast. Don't forget to leave a review. That's fascinating. Isn't that wild? You know, and it wasn't as well written, if you'll forgive me, as Romancing the Stone. I know. You want to get to the up? Let's dive in. Oh, oh.

All right, so we open on Sophia looking so cute. She's humming, and I was like, the suit that she's dressed in looks like it costs $8,000. Seriously, have we ever seen her look so fancy? Never. With a leg-lengthening tan pump. Yes, and somebody in the Facebook group actually put a picture of this outfit and was like, this does not feel Sophia to me. It's really quite fancy. Yeah, I was like, this looks very expensive. She looks like a Mary Kay consultant, you know? Can you imagine Sophia going door-to-door selling makeup? No. No. No.

She's like, take it. You need it. Totally. The suit looks really expensive. The suitcase, on the other hand, that she's carrying looks like it's from the 1800s. We all do that. We always keep your luggage until it's broken. Exactly. She places it on the kitchen table and she starts putting mystery jars into her suitcase on top of her clothes.

So Dorothy enters wearing a periwinkle sweater that yet again covers up her slim figure. I mean, she is always in a trash bag, but she's always in purple. And she looks really cute again this week. Like, I like the purple sweater. Purple is her power color. It is. But she asks her mom, you know, what are you doing? And Sophia, we find out, is putting clam sauce in her suitcase. Yes. What are you doing? What does it look like? I'm putting clam sauce in my suitcase. Ma, I think they serve a snack on the flight.

You kill me. Mom, why are you taking all this food to Phil's? Because the only time your brother's wife goes into the kitchen is to get a cold beer. Honestly, my kind of broad. That's right. You know what I mean? My hat's off to Estelle Getty for her delivery on one of these lines she has coming up. No, she has no time to cook. She works all day. Welding. My son married a welder. Too bad she didn't weld his zipper shut. They got 10 kids they can't have.

If she hadn't connected the they got 10 kids to the zipper shut, the audience would have laughed in between. They would have laughed after zipper shut, you know? And so she's so smart. She does that somewhere else in this episode, too. And it's just experience. You just know she has to do it really, real fast. Yeah. But I do also love that Sophia's got to eat well wherever she's going. You know those jars are filled with clam sauce she made herself.

Oh, yeah. You know what I mean? Completely homemade. And she's shoving them into the suitcase. She slams the suitcase shut. They go into the living room and Dorothy tells her, you know, Ma, like the family is really looking forward to your visit. The six boys are giving up their room for you. And I just wrote six boys in one sentence.

room. Yeah. Oh my God. Yeah. Steve and me are two boys in one big apartment. It's like boys live there. You know what I mean? I do. It's like boys live there. Anyway, Sophia's pissed and she's like, it's going to be a miserable week. I don't know why I'm going. Yeah. She's pissed because the grandson apparently is graduating from animal grooming school. Right.

And she just doesn't think highly of that at all. Ma, it's your grandson's graduation. Big deal. Animal grooming school. You'll know how to make that fluffy ball at the end of a poodle's tail.

So Blanche enters through the front door in a lovely lavender sweater. With a matching purple clutch. Yes, isn't that nice? I got that too. Everyone's in purple and like looking really good. Blanche is wearing a plunging next line sweater. It's plunging, but they never show too much. No, I mean, it's, you know, Saturday night after all. But she announces that she's found a way to meet more men by enrolling in a CPR class. I enrolled in a CPR class.

For six consecutive hours, I was on my back while dozens of eligible men pressed their lips to mine and breathed air into my limp little body. I wrote my limp little body. Never a missed opportunity. No, just to talk about how petite you are.

She is. Tiny she is. I've got a little CPR deep dive. Oh, tell me. So I was just curious about like, when did CPR become like a thing? So CPR, just for the record, CPR stands for cardiopulmonary resuscitation. It's an emergency procedure consisting of chest compressions off

Now, what I found so amazing about this is that it is a way of getting your body to keep functioning and keep your brain alive using only somebody else's bodies.

There's no other machinery involved. It's like if you're trained in CPR and you are having a heart attack, I can actually just with my hands in my mouth keep you alive until the paramedics get here. Like a goddamn superhero. Like a goddamn, but that kind of is. Yeah. I learned it at 11 years old. I learned it at 11. You did? Because I took a babysitting class. That is the you-est thing I've ever heard. I don't know.

At 11? At 11. Oh my, were you babysitting at 11? At 12. Wow. Which is not right. No, no. I was so scared. But in like the 80s, 90s were a different time. Like a 12 year old is going to like stop the killer. The killer comes in the front door. I'm running out the back door and screaming, the kids are upstairs. Get them. Get them. They're delicious. They're delicious.

So the thing is, there were artificial ventilation techniques going back as far as the 1800s, but that required some piece of equipment. So if you had a heart attack and were out tilling the field, if I don't have that equipment on me, like, you're going to die. Not tilling the field. Tilling the field.

Do you till a field? I took a till the field class when I was 11. What do you till? Soil? Yes. Okay. What do you do to a field? You row it? No, you plow it. You plow a field. Around the field, we're plowing. With your oxen. With your oxen.

We're plowing the field, tilling the soil. You have a heart attack. I can't save you if I don't have the special equipment, right? The CPR technique as we know it now, in which a trained person uses just their own body, their hands and mouth, without needing the assistance of some other piece of equipment, was developed in the 1960s. But it was developed by a group of doctors, all of them with different specialties. Their first effort at testing the technique was performed on a dog. Soon thereafter, the tech... I just...

But like the size of a dog's mouth, you know, 30 chest compressions and then pinching the cold, wet nose of the dog and just trying to breathe into essentially a wolf. I know.

kind of dog? That's a very good question. Like, I said, like a German Shepherd that could actually eat your face. A Doberman Pinscher. Are we talking a teacup poodle? Big difference. Imagine putting your mouth on the mouth of a dog. And also, like a teacup poodle, chest compressions, you're using just two fingers in that, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, different sized dogs require different...

I just can't imagine putting my mouth on the mouth of like one of those big, gross dogs. I just can't imagine either. But what I can't also imagine is that our Golden Girls podcast today is really about the jewels and aisle and CPR. I know.

You know, cheesecakes, you want to deep dive. I will go down any rabbit hole that I think is interesting. Not since cork cheese. Not since cork cheese, exactly. All right. So soon after the dog, the technique was used to save the life of a child. And the technique gained widespread acceptance over about a decade and was first promoted as a technique for the public to learn in the 1970s. Well, I think that's wonderful. All right.

CPR is fascinating. And I want to know more. Cheesecakes, find out what kind of dog it was. Please do. Can you believe that you can save another human being with just your hands and your mouth? Yes, but what if you're the poor fucker that tries it and it doesn't work? I know. Well, there's been situations where they had to institute Good Samaritan laws because people have actually killed people doing CPR the wrong way. Yes, you break ribs. Oh, God.

Imagine like you wake up with broken ribs. You know what I mean? And then you're suing Jeremy. You're like, look, I'm alive, but it's not worth it. It's not worth it. Thank you. Oh my God. Anyway. So anyway, back to the episode. Rose enters looking absolutely stunning. I have. She looks stunning.

Not great. Oh, no! Our taste is so different. She's wearing this like... She asked, how do I look? I think she looks great. She's wearing this beautiful blue dress. I mean, Rose has got a great body and a great rock. Now, she's got a great figure, but I have here that I'm with Blanche on this one. To the untrained eye, that polyester could almost pass for sale.

It is silk. Oh, sure, Rose. And Cheryl Teagues really buys her clothes at Sears. The fabric looks real, real cheap. Okay. Because Rose says it is silk. Can you imagine Rose putting on a polyester dress? She's a stylish gal.

Well, and then Blanche says, oh, sure, Rose. And Cheryl Teagues really buys her clothes at Sears. Yeah. For those young listeners, Cheryl Teagues was a beautiful model. Yes. She was born in 1947. And she's also a fashion designer. And she's frequently described as America's first supermodel. Oh, really? But I was thinking about that. I bet Janice Dickinson has something to say about that. Oh, Janice Dickinson's not happy. No.

because, you know, she's like, I was the first supermodel. And you don't piss that woman off. Did you ever watch the Janice Dickinson modeling agency? I sure did. It was my favorite show. So Dorothy is now doing that face acting that she does. Oh God, Rosie. So, uh, where are you going? Where are you going? You know?

Because they all know that Rose has been like seeing somebody that they haven't met yet. But she does that thing where she squishes up her face and sort of like shakes her head. And I'm like, it's weird when you catch Bea acting because she's so good. There's another moment in this episode where I'm like, you catch her acting and you're like, huh, that's weird. Well, that's what I mean. Like, because she's really gotten much better in the last few episodes of being less is more. Yes. And this is one of those more is more. Yeah, yeah, yeah. More is just what it is. Yeah.

But Rose confirms that, yes, she's been out with this person five times in the last three weeks. He's a psychiatrist from the grief center. Because Rose says, I'm going out with a friend from work. And Blanche asked her, is it the same friend you've been out with five times in the last three weeks? To which I said, Blanche is paying very close attention to Rose's dating calendar. I know. And I was like, Blanche seems like the kind of gal who wants to make sure she's having the most dates in the house. Oh, well, I mean, we'll talk about that in future episodes where she's like, stand back. She's going to blow. Yeah.

Remember? 56. 56. But I was just like, Blanche, how did you know that Rose has been out with the same guy five times in the last three weeks? I know. It's like, pick a little, talk a little, pick a little, talk a little. You know, like she's just such a busybody. I feel like she's got a little, like there's a drawer somewhere where she has like little hash marks where she's got to just make sure she's number one. Probably. When Rose

says yes she's got this like very big sweet smile on her face she's so excited to be going back out with this guy again that's right his name is dr jonathan newman and like i said he's a psychiatrist at the grief center which she works at and so blanche says as sophia's entering the room blanche says rose you're seeing a psychiatrist sophia says it's about time which i have good joke barry and mort yeah anyway she says she's ready to go to the airport i'm ready to go to the airport i

Oh, I'm going that way, Sophia. I can take you. Oh, thanks, Rose. Fine. Wait a minute. You can't run out of here. We want to hear more about this doctor of yours. Oh, well, there's not much to tell. He's a great guy, and I like him a lot. Can't wait to meet him. And his eligible doctor friend. That's right.

Well, he's very busy, but we'll have him over soon. Well, when? Soon, I promise. Come on, Sophia, let's go. It's so like in someone else's business. The gossip, she loves it. She loves it. She wants all the deets. All the deets. She's standing behind the couch with the

plunging neckline. She's leaning over the couch in the most seductive way because she wants to hear every single thing about this man that Rose is going out with. She can't wait to meet him. Yeah. And Dorothy's on board a little bit too. Not as crazy as Blanche, but she's like, yeah, like I want to meet all his eligible doctor friends.

So it's some future evening. Yes. And Rose is carrying a tray out onto the lanai, wearing an apron over her dress. And Blanche is following her in a teal pantsuit. And she tells Rose that she thinks Rose is angry because when she's angry, she purses her lips. They're like setting up the lanai for like a dinner party. And we're like, what's going on? Rose is insisting she's not mad. Blanche saying, yes, you are. The next thing happens, Dorothy yells off camera and hilariously asks if...

Have her lips come out yet? Yes. When Dorothy does enter, I just want to talk about this. She's wearing her signature grammar school art smock. This outfit makes no sense to me because Glantz is wearing this beautiful teal pantsuit. Beautiful pantsuit. Rose is wearing this like cute, like, you know, it's a very rose dress. Dorothy is wearing gray pants with like a purple shirt over it tied up like a bathing suit. In the bottom, yeah. Then it still drapes down to her knees. What is this outfit?

That's what I'm saying. They love putting her in this tied art smock. She's worn this kind of look before. A different color. What is her fashion inspiration? I know. Where does she know to get clothes like this? Why does she like it? Who does she try to look like? I don't know. She wants to be comfortable. She obviously wants to eat what she wants and have that tire roll. I like that.

I have here, though, Patrick, that what follows here as they set the table on the lanai, to your point, they're setting this dinner party up. I said, it's such a crossing of boundaries. And I'm fully with Rose on this one. A hundred million percent. I'm not mad. But if I were, I'd have every reason to be. Come on now. You're about to swallow your chin. It's just that the invitation to dinner should have come from me. I'm not mad.

I asked you three times in this past week to invite Dr. Newman to dinner and you always put it off. I didn't put it off. I just forgot. Well, that's why when he called today, I invited myself and he says he's looking forward to coming. Well, you should have still asked me first. Oh, you're right, honey, but he's on his way over. We made a terrific dinner. So why don't you just relax and enjoy a lovely evening? We're learning here that Blanche has taken it upon herself to invite Rose's boyfriend or man she's dating to dinner without

knowledge. So this is something I would totally do. Not because I thought I was in the right, or not because I was trying to pull one over on anybody. Everyone in Rose's life sees how happy she is to be dating this man. And like they are so good at people not picking up on signals, people not understanding what other people are saying in their actions as opposed to their words. So like everybody's really happy for Rose and they want to meet the man, but they're not accepting that like she hasn't invited him over. There must be a reason. Yeah. This is not like a surprise party that you're going to

throw for someone that you've met 30 times and you're all friends. They've never met the person. Right. But from Blanche's perspective, she's like, this is a man who makes my friend really happy. He must be really special. I want to celebrate them by having like a big dinner for them. So I understand where Blanche is coming from. And I also understand that where Rose is coming from.

But I would say after like three weeks, it feels unusual for this dynamic for them to have not met the guy that she's been dating. So I would be asking questions like, Rose, what is it about this guy that you don't want us to know? It's so funny. And I'm on the opposite side of that where I like keeping things private.

private and to myself. Even to me. I know. Because the minute you share it with anyone, it ceases to become yours. Yes. And special. You know, like posting stuff on Instagram that they can, you know, like all that stuff or even just telling people it gives people a chance to share their opinion. Uh-huh. And you're like, you know, it's my thing. Yeah. That's a lesson I haven't learned. Okay. That's okay. It takes all

kinds. Yeah, that's all right. Anyway, Dorothy, to her credits, agrees and validates Rose's position. She says, oh, you're right, honey, but he's on his way over. Look, we made a terrific dinner. Why don't you just relax and enjoy a lovely evening? Because Rose says to Blanche and Dorothy, you guys don't understand. Jonathan is a very special person. I don't want you doing or saying anything that would embarrass him. Now, my note here is if you're

Blanche or Dorothy, aren't you annoyed? Like, doesn't that hurt your feelings a little bit? Like, why do you think I'm so crazy that I'm going to say something to your fancy boyfriend that's going to embarrass you or him? Yes, that's a really good point. You know? That I'd be like, well, who do you think we are? We're pretty terrific. We're throwing him a dinner party. Right, but of course we later learn what her issue is. We're the kind of people who, like Dorothy's daughter, came for five minutes, we're throwing her a wedding in my living room.

Right, right, right. You know what I mean? We're good hosts. We're going to take care of this guy. So, of course, they keep, you know, making it casual and say, you know, Dorothy's like, oh, come on, it's going to be wonderful. Stop worrying and go check on dinner. And as, to your point, as Rose exits, as Betty White exits, you know, she takes that opportunity to get a laugh on her exit line by pursing her lip and sticking her chin out. Dorothy and Blanche sort of follow Rose back into the house. And this is,

where Blanche is saying, remember, the way this happened was Dr. Newman called earlier that day for Rose. This is like a thing that would never happen now because everyone has cell phones. Right. But he called the landline and asked for Rose. She wasn't there. Got to talking to Blanche. And Blanche invited him for dinner. But Blanche also, because he's a psychiatrist, told him about this recurring dream she has and asked him to analyze it. Oh, that recurring dream I have where I'm running naked through a train that keeps going through tunnel after tunnel while a sweaty bodybuilder chases me.

He said he thinks it's sexual. He thinks? For God's sake, Blanche, you smoke a cigarette after that dream. He says he thinks it's sexual. It's just so funny. That is such a Blanche dream. It is. And for her not to connect the sexuality to it. You know what I mean? Just what could it be?

what could it mean? What could it possibly mean? And while Dorothy says this, I noticed something. It's just a little thing, but she's lifting napkins off the food and she's crumbling up the napkins and she just leaves them on the coffee table crumbled up. Oh, really? Which I think is weird if you're preparing your home to look nice for a guest. Totally. Just go back and look. It's so weird. Dorothy's like me. Dorothy's a bull in a china shop. You know what I mean? Bull in a china shop. Anyway, the doorbell rings, saved by the bell. Oh my God. All I have here, Patrick, is, oh God, here we go. This whole neck

segment. It's truly some of Rue McClanahan's best work. I mean, this is iconic. Like, this next bunch of scenes are just, like, Golden Girls canon. Yeah. So, Blanche opens the door. We see a clearly full-grown man. Full beard. Full beard in a suit and tie who's a little person standing on the other side of the door. And Blanche dismissively just says, Oh, no thank you, little boy. We already take the Miami hair off. laughter

Who was that? Oh, just one of the Donaldson boys trying to sell us a newspaper subscription again. Oh, those Donaldson kids won't take no for an answer. Neither would their father at our Fourth of July barbecue. Hello, I'm Dr. Jonathan Newman.

Are you absolutely sure? This gentleman at the door says, hello, I'm Dr. Jonathan Newman. Pause, pause, pause, pause, pause. Dorothy is just staring at him incredulously. And she just says, are you absolutely sure?

absolutely sure. The actor says, yes, may I come in? And I just have to say the way he does it, he comes in really, really quick. Yes. And makes it so matter of fact and casual. And we'll talk about this more, but his ability to make everything normal and put everyone at ease is exemplary. It's incredible because the character is so incredibly self-confident, even to the point

where, and we're going to get much more into this, but there are jokes made at his expense and not meant to be mean, but just out of nerves or people don't know how to act or whatever. And he is so disarming in the way that he either pays no attention to it or he'll be in on the joke. This character is so...

so confident and that's what makes the humor work because you know the audience is laughing you're laughing at the women you're not laughing at the little person you know so I want to give a little deep dive on Brent Collins that's the name of this actor Brent Collins was born on Halloween 1941 this is very interesting he was born with a very rare combination of dwarfism and Marfan syndrome

So dwarfism is, we know dwarfism. It's defined medically as being of unusually short stature or small size, usually under 4'11", I think is the designation. That's how it's medically defined in its most simple terms. Marfan syndrome is a genetic disorder that affects connect

So those with Marfan syndrome tend to be tall and thin with long arms, legs, fingers, and toes. Picture Abraham Lincoln. Yeah, he had that. Yes, that's what modern doctors think. Tall, lanky build, his long, thin face. He reportedly had enormous hands and feet. These are all markers of Marfan syndrome. You know what that means, though. Listen, I've been thinking it all day. Abraham Lincoln. Old gay, honest Abe. Okay. But.

But this is a very rare combination of dwarfism and Marfan syndrome. And this is what would ultimately lead to Brent Collins' death. Remember, dwarfism means you're little and Marfan syndrome means you're tall and lanky, right? And he has both of them. So when he had a growth spurt late in life, it was late 1987. So just two years after the taping of this-

Two years. Two years after this episode aired, he began growing rapidly, which led to a fatal heart attack. Oh, that's awesome. Can you imagine this little person who's been a little person all of his life suddenly hits a massive growth spurt because of the Marfan syndrome and it causes a massive heart attack? Little is known about his early life. He began his professional life as an English professor and a book editor. He was said to be a longtime off-Broadway theater performer, but the only credit I could find for him was a 1981 off-office

off-Broadway musical called Crisp. And I searched for half an hour. I could find no information on what the show was, where they did it, what it was about. I'm guessing potato chips. You think it's about potato chips? I think it's probably about potato chips. Do you think it's maybe about like a brisk fall day? You know what I mean? Or French fries. It's British. Crisp. Or maybe it's about Quentin Crisp?

We don't know. We don't know. The point is, I searched all day. Cheesecakes, if you have any information on the off-off-Broadway musical from 1981 called Crisp, please let me know. In 1982, he made the jump to TV and did really well in soap operas. So from 1982 to 1983, he played the drug lord villain, Mr. Big, on As the World Turns. And then in 1984, he moved to another world where he played a character named Willingford,

Willingford was part of a dynamic three-way friendship with two other of the main characters, and his character became so beloved that though he'd only been originally booked to be on four episodes, he became a regular character and stayed with the show for four years up until his death in 1988. Wow, that's really good. Good job. Wild, right? Yeah. So he's very beloved for his soap opera work, but there is no question for many people, his most iconic role is Dr. Jonathan Newman on...

on the Golden Girls. I don't know if this is the place for it, but I just want to say this, that I think we're getting better now in TV series of casting people where there are no jokes about that kind of thing. They just, I happen to be a psychiatrist. I happen to be a police detective and this is what I look like. I was watching an Apple TV series the other day and it was like a courtroom drama where one of the experts was taking the stand and he was in a wheelchair. You know what I mean? And there's no mention of it. And that

I think that's goals, right? I mean, that's what it should be. Absolutely. All right. So Dorothy says, oh, please, please, please come right in. And we have one of our jokes. Yes, may I come in? Oh, please, please, please come right in. May I take your height? Thanks.

You must be Dorothy. Rose has told me all about you. I have here. Thank you. You must be Dorothy. Rose has told me all about you. And Patrick, I'm like, so how does he figure it out? The art smock? Uh-huh. You know, the tall drink of water, the white hair. Like, what is it? Because like Rose has described both Blanche and Dorothy to this person. What is the description? I'm not sure.

I mean, you know, like when Rose is like off the record and she's out on her dates with Dr. Jonathan, she's like, Blanche is kind of a slut. Yeah. And you know what I mean? And I wonder if Dr. Jonathan Newman is sizing her up right away. And she's like, not this one. Oh my gosh. But I also love in this moment where she says, may I take your height hat?

He lets it slide right past. Doesn't acknowledge it. Doesn't make her feel bad. He doesn't feel bad. Doesn't even hear it. Right, right, right. He's a very confident character. Anyway, he tells Dorothy, Rose has told me all about you. To which Dorothy says, I wish I could say the same. It's a good joke.

Now Blanche enters and Dorothy does more of the face acting because she's trying to let Blanche know right away without saying it with words. This is Dr. Jonathan Newman. Oh, Blanche, Blanche, this is Dr. Jonathan Newman. But Dorothy, he's a little early. Yes, but we're delighted to see him. Get out of here. It's,

So good. I mean, the second, like, she just doesn't believe it. She is just speaking in full narcissism, thinking this all must be a joke. And I have the note that Dorothy looks...

absolutely desperate for Blanche to understand. Like, shut up. This is real. Shut up. Shut up. Yeah, already mortified. Yeah. And then Rose enters and walks right over to him. And Rose, like, her face lights up when she sees him. It's one of the reasons why I think it's sad that it's episodic and we never see these characters again. I know. I would love to watch this relationship.

Oh, I know. Wouldn't it be great to have Dr. Jonathan Newman be Rose's boyfriend for a season and see what that's like? Yeah, it would be. It would be so interesting. But she walked over to him and said, hi, Jonathan. Jonathan says, hello, Rose. You're looking lovely this evening. And this is where Blanche just cracks. She just cracks. And she thinks it's a big joke. Oh, wait a minute. Rose Nyland, you devil, you. I just figured out what's going on here. Blanche. Blanche.

You were sore at me for inviting your friend without asking you. So you had this guy to come over and teach me a lesson. Three times. Yes. She laughs. She punches Rosa's shoulder. Then she looks to Dorothy. Then she looks out. So it goes a little something like this. So you hired this guy to come over and teach me a lesson.

God, I wish I was dead. God, I wish I was dead. It is absolutely iconic. Yeah. Iconic.

Dorothy has her head in her hands. Rose is pursing her lips again. She's like, you embarrassed me. This is the exact thing she was afraid of. And so Dorothy just blanched. Let's go get the hors d'oeuvres. Excuse us. And Blanche and Dorothy go into the kitchen. Right. And Blanche is like, I've never been so embarrassed in my entire life. I made a fool of myself, didn't I? And Dorothy says, yes. And there's lots of hands to the head acting by Dorothy here. The thing that I love about this movie is that it's so much more than just the

love in this moment is that Blanche says, I feel awful, just awful. And she really, really does. It's what Stan Zimmerman was telling us about, Stan Zimmerman, the writer of many episodes of the first season, how Rue McClanahan had said to him, give me complicated storylines. I want to challenge Blanche. And I think, you know, Blanche has lived a very sheltered life. And in these moments where we see her being exposed to new people or kinds of people that she hasn't met before, it

And she feels like she's made him feel bad. And I was really watching her on my second watch of this. Like, she doesn't break. She feels really bad about it. As we were saying, this next line, Dorothy's telling her, look, if you don't want tonight to turn into a total disaster, you have to stop being so self-conscious. And I want you to know that

I had here before Jonathan Newman even says the word self-conscious coming up. Yes. I said, and that's the thing. He's not self-conscious at all. No. It really is her. And that's where all the comedy is coming from. Now, these are a lot of jokes about little people. Is that okay? I don't know. I don't know if that would fly today. I don't think it would. No, it probably wouldn't. And I will say about that, you know, Betty White is quoted as saying this is her favorite episode ever.

And she said, even though every short joke in the book was used, none of them were really hurtful. And I thought to myself, it's like, okay, that's your opinion. And, you know, not every woman can speak for every woman. Not every man can speak for every man. Well, not every little person can speak for every little person. Well, not every non-little person, Betty White, can speak for all little people. Correct. You know what I mean? So it's like, I'm sure people have varying opinions. And listen,

Listen, I scoured the internet today for him saying, for this actor talking about his experience. I went to Jim Colucci's incredible book. I encourage everybody to read it. It's called Golden Girls Forever. Go check it out. But I could not find this actor talking about his experience of shooting this episode. All of the humor comes from Blanche's own self-consciousness. That's right. Because Blanche just has this great line now where, you know, she's saying... Her delivery's perfect. It's...

because, you know, Dorothy has said you have to stop being so self-conscious and Blanche says, Oh, well, you're right, of course. Dr. Newman is a guest in our home. If I'm self-conscious, he'll be ill at ease. I can't allow that to happen. It would be un-Southern.

It would be unsusent. Now, my thing when she says he'll be ill at ease, that is one of the lines from this episode that so stands out to me because it feels so perfectly forced Blanche. Like she slips right back into Southern Belle. Oh, yeah. It is so gone with the wind, you know? Yes, yes, yes.

Yes, exactly. And she holds her hand up to her, like her earring. Yes, because she's got us together now. She's like, I'm fully together. I'm going to do this. Dorothy says, that's a good bell. And Blanche picks up the tray of food. And then she says, Dorothy, get the door. She's going to go out there and fix it. And this is probably in the top three of the most famous things that

to come out of the series because she comes out and before I, you know, we say the line, she just does a nonstop circle to him and right back into the kitchen with her flexed left wrist. And she says, get the door. Shrimp. Shrimp.

Because that's what's on the platter. We don't know what it is until this point. And of course, she what? She feels self-conscious. And she catches herself at the moment and she flicks her head like she can't believe she just did it again. And she turns and walks right back into the kitchen. Absolutely iconic. And I have here that it even looks like Betty White was trying not to laugh, you know. And again, Jonathan, he's so great. And he says, she's pretty uptight. I'm going to have fun teasing her tonight.

you know, cheers to the writers who wrote that line because it's like, that is such a good way of giving him the power. It's putting him at a higher status. That's right. It's him saying, she's self-conscious, I'm fine. And good naturedly saying like, this is funny to me and I'm going to give her a hard time, but everything's going to be okay. Right.

And I was just thinking, you know, I tried to find out if there was any little people who consulted in the writing or the producing of the episode. It doesn't say anything one way or the other. So that to me says no. But that's the kind of thing that I wish would have happened. Yeah, me too. Or if this

actor maybe have been given some input or asked questions about how did he feel? Right, because that's a great question because these lines that he has are basically giving the writer's permission to make these jokes. And I'm wondering if this human being felt the same way. Yeah. And like I said earlier, not everyone would feel the same way. Absolutely. And it's the kind of thing where when you're a member of a

marginalized group, you know, like, and you get a job as a member of that group. And, you know, like the idea is like, are you just grateful for the work or do you even feel like you can speak up? He is a little person playing a little person in this very strange situation. Is he allowed to give feedback? Is he allowed to say anything? I mean, as an actor, how does that go? Do you just show up and shut up and do your job? Well, and like famously, like Sammy Davis Jr. was the brunt of so many awful racist jokes with the Rat Pack. And so it's just, it is a

question I would like answered. And like you, I couldn't find a lot of information about it. Yeah. But it really is the marginalized group that has, I think, the final say on it. It's like you said, it's not up to us. Yes, of course. To say if it's, you know, appropriate or not. Which is how 2024 worked. But I bet 1985 was not like that.

Oh, certainly not. Certainly not. Yeah. So we have another short joke coming up. Dorothy says, why don't we just go start dinner? Jonathan says, good. What are we having? Long pause. She just stands in the doorway because she knows she's got to say it. Feels like five minutes and she just turns finally and she says, short rib. Short rib.

Have you ever wanted to learn another language? Maybe it's something you've always wanted to do. Or maybe you're planning a trip abroad, but trying to memorize endless vocabulary words never works. That's where Rosetta Stone comes in. For over 30 years, they've been the trusted experts in language learning, helping millions of people get the chance to learn different languages.

Rosetta Stone immerses you in the language from day one. No English translation, so you truly learn to think, speak, and listen in that new language. And they keep the process simple. Whether you're on your desktop or learning on the go with their mobile app, it's all about flexibility.

So don't put off learning that language. There's no better time than right now to get started. Listeners can get Rosetta Stone's lifetime membership for 50% off. Visit rosettastone.com slash rs10. That's half off unlimited access to 25 language courses for the rest of your life. Redeem your 50% off at rosettastone.com slash rs10 today.

Cheesecakes, we are thrilled to tell you about Kenan and Lakin Give You Deja Vu, a step-by-step rewatch podcast. Hosted by Stacey Keenan, who played Dana Foster, and Christine Lakin, who played Al Lambert, Kenan and Lakin Give You Deja Vu takes you through every episode of the hit 90s TGIF sitcoms.

Stacey and Christine share their personal memories of coming of age on television, eagle-eyed analysis of the choicest 90s fashion from the TV show, and juicy behind-the-scenes stories they have never shared before. Stacey never watched her own show and brings fresh eyes to this nostalgic time.

Which is weird, Stacey, because I watched it over and over and over again. Also, Christine and Stacey bring you inside their lifelong friendship from TV stepsisters as kids in the 90s to now sharing perspectives from both inside the industry. Christine is a choreographer and director and out. Stacey is now a prosecuting attorney and my friend. So whether you follow along rewatching the show that brought those Friday night warm fuzzies or are discovering it for the first time, you're in good company.

The studio audience has lavished the pod with hundreds of glowing reviews. One recent reviewer wrote, Christine and Stacey are hilarious, thoughtful, poignant, and have chef's kiss chemistry. I love that. Me too. They're great. Season two of Kenan and Lakin Give You Deja Vu just launched. The new season features interviews with other step-by-step cast members and creators and other 90s stars. Also brand new for season two is the Kenan and Lakin Give You Deja Vu Patreon, which

with full video episodes, extended interviews, and bonus content for our VIP studio audience. And Kenan and Lakin Give You Deja Vu is produced and edited by Stephen Ray Morris of My Favorite Murder fame. Check out Kenan and Lakin Give You Deja Vu on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen. And follow them on social media at Kenan and Lakin. Love them.

I have here, this might be a good time to quote something from Jim Colucci's amazing book, Golden Girls Forever, right? In his book, he goes, not episode by episode. It doesn't cover every episode, but it covers most episodes. And I really wanted to read about this episode. And it's a short chapter, but he interviewed one of the writers, Barry Fennaro. And this is what Barry Fennaro had to say about this episode. He said, I always say that this is my favorite episode and Mort and I won an Emmy for it. It's

So he's saying that he's writing about discrimination and that, like, the idea that you should be able to love whoever you love, right? Like, he's saying, like, that's the point.

So I thought that was a it was a nice sentiment written by a straight white man who isn't a member of any marginalized group. And we'll get to what he's talking about by the racism in a minute. It's another storyline. But that's his sentiment on this episode. It's the episode he won his Emmy for. And, you know, to him, it's an episode about discrimination. So the next thing we see is they are all laughing and they're reentering the living room post dinner. They have, you know, like champagne glasses in their hands and cocktail napkins. And they seem to be having a great time.

Everyone is in a really good mood. They're coming in. It seems like dinner went so well. The ice has been broken. There's no more tension. That's right. Jonathan is telling a story. I thought it was interesting that they gave him this kind of monologue. Because he's telling, like, we're catching the middle of a story about him being in Nairobi. And he's like, and there I am sitting at the bar.

and who do I run into? But my roommate from Harvard, he had also decided to go someplace exotic where he didn't know a soul either. And everyone laughs. And I'm like, I love that they want us to know that this man went to Harvard. He went to Harvard. He travels the world. He's worldly. Wealthy.

you know he's got money he's very successful that's right you know the follow-up to his line you know he decided to go someplace exotic where he didn't know a soul either and Blanche says small world isn't it and of course she feels embarrassed again and Jonathan says not from where I'm standing so again he tries to yeah smooth it all over and you know Blanche is like I did it again I apologize please forgive me it's also just like that's a

thing that people say, Blanche, and it's actually like apropos to the situation. You can say small world when you're right. It's a small world story. You know, Dorothy's like Blanche. I'm sure he was only joking. And Jonathan, this is where he says, don't be self-conscious about my height. I'm not. Yes. And this is a wonderful, you know, thing that he has because Blanche is like, really? He says, really? Look, everybody has something about themselves they'd like to change.

The trick is getting beyond it. Don't get me wrong. I'd love to know what it feels like to be the center on the Boston Celtics. But all in all, I'm pretty happy with who I am. And I wrote like that's the crux of the episode. Like the lesson here is like try to learn to love yourself. You know, like I think that's a beautiful sentiment. Like he is the most centered, grounded one. He really is like the grounding force of the episode. Everybody is sort of except for Rose. Everyone's really like tiptoeing on eggshells. They want to say the right thing.

He's unencumbered by that. But she's conflicted, too. I mean, as we are going to find out. For sure. It's just like in this social situation, he is by far the most comfortable. Yeah. You know, and that's it's kind of a beautiful thing to see. And it's so sweet because, you know, Rose is, oh, God, he gives me goosebumps when he talks like that. Fully turned on by him. Oh, yeah. Fully, like, very turned on by him. Which is like, give us a whole season. I want to see a season of Rose. If they ever reboot this with your friend Tina Fey, tell them. Yeah.

Give us a full season of Rose dating Dr. Jonathan Newman. I want to see it. Okay. So this is another great moment because Rose and Jonathan go into the kitchen to make coffee. And this is another moment I think about sometimes when I'm just on the subway. Dorothy looking to Blanche and just saying, what a delightful man. Yeah. And she's saying that not like, what a delightful man in spite of dot, dot, dot. Right. She's just saying like, what a delightful man. I think it

any of the women in this room would be thrilled to be dating this man. Exactly. They're all a little bit into him. Well, and Blanche, she says it, and he's wearing the cutest little gray suit I think I've ever seen. I mean, completely lusting him. Completely. And I'm thinking like, He's won her over. Yeah. Dorothy's into his mind because he's smart. He's worldly. He travels. He went to Harvard. Blanche is into his body. She just wants to jump his lungs. She just wants to get on top of him. And Dorothy's like, you just can't help yourself, can you, Blanche? I know.

But just then, Sophia enters through the front door. Now, this is a shock to everybody. Yeah, including us. Right, because Sophia's back. And I was like, this might be a really good time to remind everybody that Sophia had a stroke that robbed her of her ability to censor herself in any way. I think that's a very important thing to remind us of. And Dr. Jonathan Newman is in the kitchen. She doesn't know he's there yet. But first, let's just say that the reason she didn't stay is because her grandson didn't graduate because he failed.

Yes. His course, basically. Out of pet grooming school. Which is not a slight. Once again, I know how hard that job is. Right. You know what I mean? But it doesn't seem like he was trying very hard. No, but also she's talking about her grandson. She calls him the big dope. I know. The big dope failed. There isn't going to be a graduation. The big dope failed. Ma, you're kidding. You wouldn't be surprised if you saw him. 22 years old and all he did the whole time I was there was drink beer and shoot cans with a BB gun.

Jesus. Thanks, Grandma. I know. Well, Rose and Jonathan enter, and Rose and then the other ladies soon appear genuinely worried, to Patrick's point. Yes. Rose instantly just screams, Sophia! Right. Like, what is she going to say? Everyone's like, suddenly Blanche and Dorothy are holding each other. They're biting their hands, worried. Hands in their mouths. Yeah. You know, they introduce them. Dorothy says, Ma, this is Rose's friend, Dr. Jonathan Newman. Dr. Newman, this is my mother, Sophia. Jonathan says, nice to meet you, Sophia. And Sophia just...

very cool and normal says nice to meet you too I hope this doesn't sound rude we're wondering well because she's walked over to him and as soon as she says that the audience loses it yeah all the characters in the scene are like holding their breath it's gonna happen and then she's completely normal and lovely but she says I hope this doesn't sound rude but I've just gotten back from a long trip and I'm very tired if you'll excuse me the thing about this is he's legitimately the same size as her you know what I mean

Like, he can't look that small to her because they are like eye level. Right, right, right. But he says, of course, nice to have met you. So all went well. And then... Well, Sophia walks away. And I love it when a sitcom does this, when you get the character with the back to the camera that then shouts something. Dorothy, can I see you for a minute?

Audience goes wild. Bananas. And they're only three feet away from Dr. Jonathan Newman when this exchange happens. This always happens. She asked that guy over there, is he the M word? I'm not going to say it. Yes. And Dorothy says yes. And Sophia says, thank God. I thought I was having another stroke. Yes. Which is just kind of like, all right, Sophia does have the sense to know when to be nice or like when to be pleasant or just not rude. I also thought, though, in the writing, that was such a great thing that the guys did. They gave us the opposite of what we expect.

Yes. And that was smart. I love that. And that's what makes the show very smart. One of the things I was reading about this episode somewhere today was that, like, by the time we get to episode 13, everything has settled. The characters are who they are. The writing is very strong. The jokes are fast and furious. They're one right after another. Every joke lands. You know, like, this is like the first episode of, like,

oh my God, we are in for like a dynamo TV show. So then they sit down for coffee. Jonathan realizes how late it is. He says he can't stay, but thank you for having me. And like, as he's saying goodbye, we really see how much all the characters like him. Like, you know, Dorothy's like holding his hand saying like, we really hope that we'll see you again soon. That's right. As they're at the door, Jonathan asks Rose if they could have dinner tomorrow after work. There's something important he wants to talk to her about. Now, whenever any man says to any woman on this show, there's something important I want to talk to you about. They all jump to marriage.

Immediately jumped in marriage. It says a lot about me that I would jump to break up. He wants to break up with me. Oh, I hate that for you. Listen, you know what? Kittens, it's all good. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm in my blancher. I'm doing just fine. I was going to say, nobody needs to worry about Mother Cheesecake. She's doing great. Anyway. So he leaves and- They're touching hands. Oh, they're so sweet. Which is sweet because we've pointed out that the ladies and the gentlemen callers they date, they're notorious for not having any physical contact.

We never see anybody kiss anybody ever. Ever, or touch. I know. I feel like the closest we get to any actual romance is when Blanche's gay brother comes with his cop husband. You can just feel the sexual tension rising off those two. Anyway. So he leaves and she asks them, like, what do you think? And Blanche and Dorothy just, they cannot say emphatically enough, like, what are you doing?

a man. Yeah. What a great guy. He's quite a man. Oh, he certainly is. And they're clearing stuff into the kitchen. And Rose says, I'm glad you both feel that way because I think Jonathan's going to ask me to marry him. Now, Blanche has walked into the kitchen already carrying a tray of dishes. And from within the kitchen, we hear the tray drop and all of the dishes break. I'm glad you both feel that way because I think Jonathan's going to ask me to marry him. Yeah.

I got to tell you, a glass breaking, dish breaking joke will always work on me. It will. It's hilarious. It is hilarious. And then she just peeks through the swinging door into the commercial break. Yes. Very good.

As a parent, you always want to set your child up for success. So when they're struggling in school or they need help with homework, you try your best to step up. But sometimes you might not be equipped to answer. And it's better to leave that to the experts from iXL Learning. iXL Learning is an online learning program for kids. It covers math, language arts, science, and social studies.

iXcel can help your child really understand and master topics in a fun way with positive feedback. Powered by advanced algorithms, iXcel gives the right help to each kid, no matter the age or personality. And when you sign up, one subscription gets you everything you need for all the kids in your home, from pre-K to 12th grade.

iXL is used in 95 of the top 100 school districts in the U.S., with one in four students across the country using the program. So don't wait any longer. Make an impact on your child's learning. Get iXL now, and listeners can get an exclusive 20% off iXL membership when they sign up today at iXLLearning.com slash audio. Visit iXLLearning.com slash audio to get the most effective learning program out there at the best price.

So after the commercial break, we're in the living room and Blanche comes to the door and says, marry him. Dorothy's like, honey, what makes you think he's going to ask you to marry him? Yeah. And I found this interesting. LaRue says, I know he wants to get remarried. And I love this. I'm like, what's the story there? Is he widowed? Is he divorced? I have the same note and I didn't think anything of it. I know. Who was the first Mrs. Jonathan Newman? I don't know. Did he kill her? Right. Yeah.

Right? Yeah. He got away with it. He got away with it. Like, he literally did, like, antifreeze. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm telling you, that's how you get away with it. Right, with the sweet iced tea. But I will tell you, though, that the antifreeze, it crystallizes in your body. No, they find that shit. It stays in there forever. Like, if anybody exhumes the body, you're not getting away with it. But no one's going to necessarily know how she died if that's the method you take. So, Dr. Jonathan Newman, murderer, wants to get remarried. I'm telling you, we could do it.

season of this guy. We get to learn about his first wife, Deborah, or whatever her name was. I don't know. You know? And you know what? We'll never know. We'll never know. We didn't find the body. Yeah, that's true. Anyway. So she's saying he wants to get remarried. Our relationship is getting much more serious. He just asked me to dinner to talk about something important. Believe me, he's going to ask me to marry him. We're in the kitchen now, and Rose finally starts to explain her discomfort. You were embarrassed to have us meet him. Yes. Yes.

I hate myself for feeling like that, but it's true. When Jonathan and I are alone together, everything's wonderful. But when we're around other people, I'm uncomfortable. I know they're staring at him and they're talking about us, and it bothers me. I know it shouldn't, but it does. I mean--

How big a man is shouldn't make or break a relationship. Not a word, Blanche. I like that it gets real like this because we've had the experience of seeing Rose be really into him. And like the point of like seeing her like sexually turned on by him. Like we know that Rose really has feelings for him. She's really attracted to him. Rose is not the center of attention.

You know what I mean? Unless she's bowling, Rose does not want to be the center of attention. Or playing Lady Macbeth. You know what? Let me reconsider my position. Oh, yeah, I would. Maybe Rose does want to be the center of attention. Maybe. But not this kind of attention. No, she doesn't like this kind of attention. She knows that people are staring at him and talking about them. And it

bothers her. And she says, I know it shouldn't, but it does. I mean, how big a man is shouldn't make or break a relationship. Not a word, Blanche. Because Rue is physically indicating she is about to talk, of course. She's about to say. Fill in the gaps. Exactly. And Dorothy, again, with the honest, probably real conversation that a lot of people would have. She says, Rose, you're involved in a relationship that has very special problems and only you and Jonathan can decide.

whether those problems are worth working out. This is where Blanche says she can relate. And we're about to get a Blanche story. I have strap in. I know.

Will you take us through this? Okay. So Rose asked her, they're sitting down at the kitchen table. Yes. And Rose says, you once dated a little person? And Blanche says, oh, no, no, no, no, no. What I was referring to was a relationship I had in high school with a young man named Benjamin. Now you have to understand that in those days in the South, a lot of things were still taboo. Certain people were not to mix.

So Benjamin and I had to meet in secret. This is where Dorothy is doing face acting. Oh, yeah. Dorothy is being a very attentive scene partner. She's listening. Yeah. She's got her hand on her face. Her mouth is agape. Oh, yeah. She is entrenched in the story. That's right. And this next sentence... Oh, we knew if any of the bigots in town found out about us, there'd be a terrible scandal. Let's just pause right here. Yeah. She's saying...

the word bigots, certain people were not to mix. The name Benjamin, all the, and so we're filling in the gaps. Yes. All of us are thinking, okay, so Blanche was dating a young African-American man. In the South. In the South. In the 50s or whatever year it would have been. Right, because that's what the writing is leading you to believe. Exactly. Anyway, she says, And then one day I had to make a decision. Benjamin invited me to our senior prom. I didn't know what to do.

Should I go out with this boy I really cared for, or should I bow to the pressures of an unjust society?

And Dorothy is wrapped her attention. Oh, yeah. So what did you do? Blanche has this, like, smirk across her face. She's so proud. You could just feel her shoulders press up and back. She says, I walked into that gymnasium on Benjamin's arm. Heads turned, jaws dropped while the room was buzzing all evening. I didn't care. I had followed my heart and I've never regretted it.

And Rose just says, oh, Blanche, that's a beautiful story. That must have taken real courage for both of you. And in the world where this is a black young man, absolutely. I love that they point out that it would have taken courage for both of them. Of course. Yeah. And then Dorothy says, And it's terrible to think that the two of you were almost kept apart just because Benjamin was black.

Benjamin wasn't black. He was from New Jersey. I went to my senior prom with a Yankee.

Black. That's the way Blanche says black in this moment. And then she drops the S of wasn't. She says black. Benjamin wasn't black. He was from New Jersey. I went to my senior prom with a yanket.

And the idea, too, that bigots don't like Yankees. Also, the fact that in the world of the story, Blanche was really proud of herself at the moment for going to the prom with a Yankee, but has since decided to regret that decision. I know. You know what I mean? The look of disgust on her face over what she has done. And just when you think it couldn't get better, Dorothy comes in with... A Yankee! A Yankee! A Yankee! A Yankee!

That is incredible! And you'd think they made a movie about that deadbeat Gandhi. Well, there's a story like this that hasn't been told.

That writing is very good. The writing is really, really good. Because the other thing, too, is when Dorothy says, because Benjamin was black, the look on Blanche's face. I love it when the characters, like the audience, everyone fully thinks we're hearing a story about one thing. And when we say it and we realize that we're wrong, not only are we wrong, but the idea that it could be misconstrued as that kind of a story to the character telling the story never occurred to them. Oh, yeah.

She is just for the very first time. She's told the story 8,000 times. She's as confused as if they pointed out to her in the first episode, but we're going to be homeless if you get married. I know.

What are you talking about? It is so, so true. So Rose gets up and says, I'm like more confused than ever. She says goodnight and she goes to bed. Now they all follow her to Rose's bedroom. We got to talk about Rose's bedroom. It's huge. There's a whole seating area. There's two seating areas. We will learn later another bathroom. So we're now up to one, two, three bathrooms. Also Rose's room is now in a different place than it ever was before. It's at the end of the hallway on the left, where usually it's at the

beginning of the hallway on the right, but that is also sometimes Sophia's bedroom. And that's sometimes Dorothy's bedroom. And that's sometimes Dorothy's bedroom. They switch it up. Right, exactly. Maybe because they're not all even in size. Maybe they do rotate. Oh, I love that. Maybe. I love, but this bedroom is absolutely enormous. It's enormous and decorated so 80s. I was thinking the footprint of this house is 8,000 square feet and it's all bedrooms. You know what I mean? This 19 bathroom house. Just a ranch from Dallas.

I mean, Dorothy and Blanche come in, you know, and they're asking, is there anything we can do to help? And Rose is like, no, I've got to work this out for myself. And Blanche says, why don't you sleep on it? We know you'll make the right decision. And then as they leave, they're like, they're closing the door and Dorothy says, good night, honey. And then she looks at Blanche and says, a Yankee from New Jersey. You're a profile in courage, Blanche.

So Rose is laying down on the bed. Okay. Yeah. Here comes the dream sequence. Now, this gets absolutely absurd. So I actually thought upon my second viewing, this reminded me a lot of absurdist theater. Yeah. And so I actually looked up the definition of absurdist theater just to see if I was on the right track. Oh, cool, cool. Yeah. So the definition.

Yeah. Yeah.

couple of minutes of Rose in a dream sequence trying to understand what she thinks is complicated in her life, but it's really very simple. Yeah. That was the only way I could make this make sense because the acting in this, like it's a dream. So they're all acting weird and they're all acting. I love, very heightened. Very heightened. I think their acting is great. If we apply it to the theater of the absurd, it's that Rose is trying to understand this very complicated situation that is not complicated at all, which is just that she likes this guy.

Exactly. You know? So Rose, you know, lies on the bed. She closes her eyes. She starts to fall asleep and you start to hear Blanche's voice like an echo thing. The right decision. The right decision.

The right decision. The right decision. And there's a knock on the door. Rose says, come in. Now, she's laying in the same position where she fell asleep, but now she's in a wedding gown. Yes. Okay. Dorothy and Blanche are in, you know, wedding gear and they're wearing corsages. And as I said here, everyone's delivery, save Rose, is very, very heightened. I wrote, dream Dorothy's got a lot of energy. Oh, yeah. Let's go, Rose. Everyone's waiting for you. Let's go, Rose. Everyone's waiting for you.

and rose is just saying like i don't think i can go through this and now we get dream blanche who's equally on drugs as dorothy she's standing at an angle like she's like a very angular you know pose or whatever and her words are very staccato it's very weird what's the matter honey you and jonathan have a fight no it's just that i think marrying jonathan might be a mistake he is a lot shorter than i am really i hadn't noticed me neither

It's another nod to the absurdity of it all. Like, sure, maybe he's shorter than you, but like, who cares? Yeah, exactly. You know what I mean? Like, we emotionally didn't notice. Right. And Rose is like, how could you miss it? Everyone notices. Wherever we go, people stare at him. And this in her dream is the thing she's trying to work out because this is the

only thing holding her back from just like being completely in love with this guy. Exactly. Exactly. Sophia pops out of the closet. That's how she enters. Like a priest. They all come from weird places. Yeah. And she's saying like, let's go. Let's get this wedding on the road. And Rose is wondering why Sophia looks like a priest. And she's like, Sophia, why are you in a priest outfit? Because I'm the one who's going to marry you.

That doesn't make any sense. What the hell do you want from me? It's your dream. Come on, Rose, let's get you married. But I'm still not sure. Now, Rose's dad enters from a closet. Yes. You know, they all come from where? In the dream, he's a little person. Yes. And it's played by an actor named Billy Barty. I have some information on him. Oh, great. Yeah.

So Billy Barty was born William John Bertinezzetti, October 25th, 1924. He was an American actor and activist. Okay. I love this. He was an activist for people with dwarfism. Oh, wow. And he founded something called the Little People of America Organization in 1957. Amazing. Yeah. Like ahead of its time, I think, you know, he was on the board. We've talked about this organization on TCO. Oh, my God. When we covered Natalia Grace. They're represented in that documentary. Okay. Well, he founded it.

Wow. In 57, yeah. He was on the board as well with former President George Bush to help pass the Americans with Disabilities Act. Amazing. The thing that's so interesting about this character is that he's playing Rose's dad. And when he shows up, like she recognizes him as her father. Right. And I'm like, in the world of this...

I'm like, does he look exactly like her dad except in this version? I'm guessing so, yeah. I love that. And also, like, dress him in farmer clothes, you know, and Minnesota rural, you know. Yeah, like, Rose just can't believe that her dad is there. And, you know, and that's when Blanche says, Dada, you mean you're dead, Dada? And Dorothy's like, see the lengths people have gone to to come to your wedding? That's right. And he says, you know, I heard you were getting remarried and I wanted to meet the lucky guy. Yeah, and it's like, this is where Rose has having the moment where she's saying, like, This is so strange. I always thought Daddy was much taller.

I don't remember him like that at all. Well, that's probably because his size didn't matter to you, Rose. When you really care for someone, you see them for what they are on the inside. Nothing else matters. Well, actually, girls, Rose is right. I am much taller. I just appeared in the dream this way to make a point. Dick!

Daddy, you always did know the right thing to do. The point is just being a little bit overly hammered here, which is just like, if you love somebody, you love them, you know? And like, that's not even the question. Rose's dilemma here is that she's embarrassed. She loves him, but she doesn't want the stares and the looks

and the talk behind her back. Right. You know? But she does agree that her dad always knows the right thing to do. And she asked him, do you really think Jonathan and I will be happy together? Yeah. And dead daddy says, Rose, all you can do is follow your heart. No one can predict the future. Except for Gene Dickinson.

So enter Jean Dixon, who was one of the best-known psychics and astrologers of the 20th century. She's a real person, a real famous psychic at the time, and the real her is here on the episode. Yeah. Wow. Jean, could you tell me what the future holds? Sure. In January, Brooke Shields and Lady Di will star together in a Broadway musical comedy. Senator Edward Kennedy will once again run for their... No, no, no. I mean, what the future holds for me and Jonathan. Okay.

Rose? I'm not getting a clear picture on that. However, I do know that Jackie always hides a knot again. Oh, thank you very much, Miss Dixon. Enjoy the wedding. So I did a deep dive of her. She's most famous for, because it's like psychics, I want to believe in them. Are they real? Right. Jean Dixon is most famous for predicting the assassination of John F. Kennedy. So get this, in the May 13th, 1956 issue of Parade magazine, she wrote that the 1960 presidential election would be

dominated by labor and won by a Democrat who would then go on to be assassinated or die in office, though not necessarily in the first term. And that did come to pass. Now, the thing that people forget is that before any of that happened, she went on to change her mind and incorrectly predicted that Richard Nixon would win the election. She later admitted that she, quote, saw Richard Nixon as the winner and made unequivocal predictions that he would win. Now, she's famous for predicting the assassination of John F. Kennedy because...

Because nobody knows or remembers or has chosen to forget that second half of this, which is that she took it back. Right. So Dixon wrote seven books, including her autobiography, a horoscope book for dogs and an astrological cookbook. Many of these books sold millions of copies. This woman was filthy, filthy rich. Wait, a horoscope book for dogs that, you know, like she's like, well, you know what, Fido? You're going to have someone perform CPR on you. Yeah.

Kiss your big wet mouth. But you're going to change the world, Fido. You're going to change the world. Richard Nixon apparently took her predictions very seriously. He even met with her in the Oval Office once in 1971 and even created a cabinet committee based on her predictions that there would be terrorist attacks coming to the United States. So basically, Jean Dixon became famous for telling people she was a psychic, but she wasn't very good. She was...

so often incorrect in her predictions that John Allen Paulos, a mathematician at Temple University, coined the phrase the Gene Dixon effect, which is the tendency of Dixon and her fans to promote her few correct predictions while ignoring the larger number of incorrect predictions.

Well, I will say she's also a fairly stiff and terrible actress. She's not a good actress. She's not good in this actress. Because back to the episode, like the real life Jean Dixon enters, she basically gets a standing ovation. People in 1985 knew who she was. And she has a fierce figure. I mean, she looks like a fashion model. 100%. She's just this tall, lanky, beautiful woman. And then Doris says, thank you very much, Miss Dixon. Enjoy the wedding. They escort her out and she gets another massive round of applause. Yeah. And

Of course, it's Dorothy because she's just like, she's a terrible actress. Thank you.

Don't let the door hit you on the way out. Ms. Dixon. But it's funny, just our researcher really wanted us to know that none of those predictions came true. Not a single one of them actually happened. Even though they were jokes. Yeah, even though they were, exactly. Just so you know. Right, just so you know. I want to make it clear that. And to Patrick's point earlier, this is where we find out that Rose does actually have a bathroom because Jonathan enters from the bathroom. Yes. And he's wearing a very nice white tuxedo jacket, kind of a cream, off-white. Yes, he looks great. And he's also...

He's also the only one not acting strangely. He's the only one acting like... Well, he and Rose. Right. They are acting like their normal selves. That's right. That's right. And he asked her, what's the matter? And she says, oh, I don't know. I'm so confused, Jonathan. You see, I and all the others hold up their hands to their ears. Dorothy, Blanche, Sophia, and dead daddy. They lean over with their hands to their ears. Very heightened. As if to offset

set how normal Jonathan and Rose are being with each other. I'm very into this being a piece of absurdist theater. It's great. I think it's really well done. It's really well done. And Rose says, do you mind? We'd like to talk in private. So that's how she's going to get rid of them. Yes. And Sophia, of course, with a barb. Why are we in the dream in the first place if she's throwing us out? Yes. So they leave. And, you know, Rose says, oh, Jonathan, I'm just not sure I can go through with this.

And Jonathan says, Rose, I know this may not be the perfect relationship, but I care for you. We can lick any problem, big or small. But also just like him saying to her, if we love each other, we oh, my God, I'm going to get emotional. If we love each other, we should be together. Yeah. You know what I mean? I do. Really? It's beautiful. So meaningful. Yeah. Jonathan, I'm just not sure I can go through with this. Rose, I know this may not be the perfect relationship, but I care for you very, very much.

If you feel the same way about me, we can look any problem, big or small. Oh, I do care for you, Jonathan. Then will you marry me? Yes. Yes. Oh, yes.

So Dorothy and Blanche enter in their pajamas. Dorothy says, Rose, and Blanche says, oh, Rose, honey, wake up. She calls her Rosie. Rosie, wake up, darling. I'm like, who the hell's Rosie? And anyway, she wakes up and she's like, I just had the weirdest dream about Jonathan. Blanche is like, oh, was it a bad dream? And, you know, and she's like, no, no, it helped me make up my mind about our relationship. I'm going to keep seeing him. And she, you know, her dream helped her. It's like, you know, she repeats what was said to her, that if they actually care about each other, they can lick any problem, big or small. So we're the last

scene of the episode, we're in the restaurant with Jonathan and Rose. This is the moment she thinks he's going to propose. And Rose is in such a good mood. She loves the food. Oh, yeah. Their white wine looks like apple juice. It absolutely looks like apple juice. You know, it's a French restaurant. It's just like French is

so romantic. I love the food. I love the wine. And I especially love the company. And this is really great here, this next thing. And the writers, again, just like the story that Blanche told about the Yankee story. Yeah. This is so good because we, the audience, think that he's about to say one thing. And of course, he says another. Yes. So he says, Rose, I've been putting this off all evening, but there's something I want to talk to you about. Yes.

She asks what it is. He says, I want to talk about us. Even though we've only been dating for a short period of time, I feel that our relationship is starting to get serious. Rose just says that she feels the same way. But Rose is really ready for a proposal. Yeah, that's right. And Jonathan continues. I want you to know I care for you a lot, but there's a problem we cannot continue to ignore. Rose.

Rose, in order for a relationship to be complete, each person has to accept the other for what he is. I don't think that can ever happen between us. Jonathan, you're wrong. I can accept you.

I've had time to think this thing through and I can honestly say it doesn't bother me that you're small. Small? No, I meant I can't see you anymore because you're not Jewish. Now, Rose, really, I gotta say, like, I'm glad that she's being true to herself and she, like, loves this man and she wants to be with him. But Rose is really, in a way, patting herself on the back.

for being able to like look past this other thing. And she's saying, no, Jonathan, you're wrong. I can accept you. And she really is being a little,

little sanctimonious. Yeah, and sanctimonious. And he just says small. Now, when he says that, it was nowhere in his mind that what he's saying could even have been construed as he was trying to say my smallness is the thing that we can't be together because of. Because it's not an issue to him. And now, Rose, this is like a

thing about Rose that I couldn't get over. I wanted to be wrong about it, but Rose cannot believe she's getting broken up with. Oh, yeah. She is the person who's decided she's going to see past what she sees as a potential problem with his size. Now, the real issue is that she's not Jewish and she's getting broken up with and she can't believe it. And Rose...

very out of character, jumps out of her seat and starts yelling at him. Oh, yeah. No, this is that side of Rose we only see occasionally, but she's pretty pissed. Yes. It's like, you're dumping me because I'm not Jewish? She stands up. I can't believe this. I've been agonizing over this relationship and now you have the nerve to. And Jonathan is begging her to lower her voice because the prophecy has come true and everyone is looking at her. Right. Remember, that was the prophecy from the dream. They're not looking at him. They're looking at you. Right. And Rose says, she

Hilarious. Very funny and Rose agrees. It snaps her out of whatever she's going. She's having a reaction. She's probably sad because she really likes this guy but she also can't believe that she's getting dumped in this situation. But it snaps her out of it and Betty White is so good in this moment because she starts really laughing. Yeah. You know, they're laughing together. Yeah. And we've all had

moments like this where you're in a tense moment with somebody that you really love and they say something, the right thing that sort of breaks the tension. And now you're laughing at this person you were just yelling at. I will say it sort of reminds me, though, of the episode we did with on Golden Girls with Blanche's grandson, where it's really hard transition really fast. Yes. And she has to turn from being this kind of monstrous behavior into, you know, like, I'm sorry I did that. I guess I was upset. I mean, it's just it's really

It's just a very quick transition. I totally agree. But I was watching it again today when I was watching it the second time. I was like, this really works. It doesn't. There's no other way for her to do it. And she does it well. Totally. So Rose apologized. I'm so sorry. I was upset, Jonathan. I understand. I guess it's been a difficult relationship for both of us. And Rose is like, but...

actually, it hasn't been difficult. It's been wonderful. And this is like, this always makes me sad. She says, I'm going to miss you. And he says, I'm going to miss you too. And I was like, is there a law in Florida that if you decide you're not dating anymore, you can't just hang out and be friends? Well, no. They probably will be eventually. And they're going to see each other at work. They're going to see each other at work. But, you know, they have to take some time because they want to have sexy time, probably. You think so? Well, that's...

coming up because the waiter says, how was the shrimp? Yes. And Rose says, unfortunately, I'll never know. And then to end the episode, you see, he's Jewish and we can't see each other anymore. But as far as the how is the shrimp? OK, let's just we stipulate that it's a short joke. Yeah. Unfortunately, I'll never know. And obviously they've never slept together. And

Patrick, I'm like, so I wouldn't agree to get married without seeing if I'm sexually compatible with that person. 100%. You know what I mean? Oh, my God. I didn't even think about that. Yeah. So they haven't crossed that divide yet. Especially like a sexual beast like we know Rose is. She kills people. She kills people. She kills people with her sex. She's so good at the sexing. That they just die. That's right.

So, Cheesecake, stick around. When we come back, I'm doing the deep dive on Torch Song Trilogy, the gay play I'm obsessed with, the gay play that gave us Estelle Getty. I cannot wait. Don't go anywhere. We're going to be right back with that. Church's original recipe is back. You can never go wrong with original. Still tastes the same like back in the day. Right now, get two pieces of chicken starting at only $2.99 or ten pieces starting at only $10.99. Church's. Offer valid at participating locations.

Get ready to tackle the NFL action with FanDuel, America's number one sportsbook. Because right now, new customers can bet $5, get 300 in bonus bets if you win. Make every moment more with FanDuel, an official sportsbook partner of the NFL. 21 plus and present in Arizona. First online real money wager only. $5 first deposit required. Bonus issued is non-withdrawable bonus bets which expire seven days after receipt.

Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342.

Jennifer Samardi, you ready for my Deep Dev on Torch song trilogy? I am ready and I know you are. And I'm just going to interrupt right off the top. Yes. Cheesecakes, this is a big deal because this was so formative for Patrick. I'm already feeling like the tears. Well, yes. So lay it on me. All right. I was nervous about this. I worked hard on it because I feel a lot of pressure. It's part of LGBTQ history. And of course, the reason we're talking about it is because Estelle Getty got a part in this.

And it made her famous in the theater world. And it's what brought her to L.A. doing the tour of it. And it's how she got the Golden Girls. And so I'm basically going to tell the story of Torch Song Trilogy first. And then we'll talk more about Estelle's connection to it in like a second part of this. That seems like a good plan. Yeah. So Torch Song Trilogy is a four-hour play in three acts written by and starving Harvey Fierstein. You said starving. Did I say starving? That's okay. That's okay.

Are you hungry? I actually am starving. Do you want to eat Harvey Fierstein? I would devour. He's such a national treasure. I would devour Harvey. So it tells the story of a drag queen and torch song singer named Arnold Beckhoff, who lives and works as a professional drag queen in New York City. The play takes place between 1979 and 1980, which kind of importantly is pre-1990.

AIDS? I mean, right on the cusp. So AIDS was obviously something that was happening and people were getting sick and dying, but we didn't have words for it. We didn't really know much about it. It was certainly not the epidemic it became like six months later. But AIDS is not a factor in the play at all. Literally, the word AIDS did not exist yet. The plot of the play centers around Arnold looking for and finding love. In the first act, Arnold meets and falls in love with a bisexual man named Ed who

who eventually leaves him for a woman, which leaves Arnold devastated. That plot point is based on a real thing that actually happened to Harvey Fierstein. Oh, okay. In the second act, Arnold meets another man named Ellen, and they fall into a blissful romance and even decide to adopt a teenager from the state foster care system. For, you know, 1979, 1980, for a gay couple to do that is crazy. Yeah, that's huge. And then in the third act, we find Arnold raising the teenager on his own...

And we learn that Alan, the boyfriend, has been killed in a brutal hate crime. I'm sorry. I just remember seeing the film, too. And it was so hard to watch. It's really... It's so devastating. It's awful. The third act also gives us Arnold's mother, played by Estelle Getty, who he calls Ma and has come to visit him from Miami. So I don't know.

Have we seen the mother from Torch Song Trilogy and Sophia Petrillo in the same room? I don't know. So the thing about the mom character is that she really does love her son, but she really cannot accept him as being gay. And we'll get more into that in a minute. So the theme of Torch Song Trilogy really is, this is what Harvey Fierstein was trying to convey, that gay relationships and straight relationships are essentially the same.

And we're talking all relationships, relationships between partners, between parents and children, and that gay people are just like everyone else in their quest to find love and to be loved. And I know it sounds crazy, but this was really a groundbreaking thought for the time that this play was written and performed. And the reason the Torchdrunk Trilogy is such a classic and important piece of theater is because the message really works.

worked. It really broke through. And Torchshank Trilogy, the play, and eventually the movie, really is a piece of art that helped bridge the gap and help the mainstream world start to understand gay people and gay relationships in a more accepting way. Yeah. Like, it really is a piece of art that really changed the way that people thought about gay people. And then, do you agree with this or not, that this play, four hours long, flew by? Yes. Yes.

And they did another version of it like in 2017 and again, flew by. It's so engaging. It's so engrossing. It's so good. Yeah. So to understand Torch Song Trilogy, you have to know a bit about its writer and star, Harvey Fierstein. The most important thing I'm going to tell you in this deep dive, Harvey Fierstein is not Harvey Weinstein. Oh, God.

The oh no. The oh no of it all. There really was a bit of confusion about this during the time of the Harvey Weinstein trial. Like Harvey Feierstein like took to social media and he was like, I'm not Harvey Weinstein. Isn't that wild? He didn't say it like that. He said, I'm not. That's because I'm not Harvey Weinstein.

That's exactly right. Harvey Fierstein is best known in pop culture as an actor. He played Robin Williams' brother in Mrs. Doubtfire. He's the one that put him in the Mrs. Doubtfire drag. He was in the movie Independence Day. He's got that really raspy voice. Do it again, please. I'm going to do it again for you, Patrick. Exactly. It's very distinctive, and you recognize it immediately. His voice sounds like that due to an overdeveloped vestibular fold on his vocal cord.

I don't really know what that is, but essentially it gives him double voice when he talks. It'd be like if I took both of those microphones and spoke into them, you'd get a sound kind of like that. You know, I have overdeveloped vestibular folds. Oh, do you now? They're called my titty bags. Ha ha ha ha ha!

So Firestein was born in 1954 in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, a neighborhood where he says Jews cautiously befriended Italians who guardedly befriended the Greeks. Aw. From as far back as he can remember, he describes wanting to dress up and wear makeup. And around age seven, he wondered if he was actually supposed to be a girl. He says, no, he wasn't. But from a very young age, he describes himself as a gender warrior. Hmm.

Harvey Fierstein is very smart. He skipped two grades to start high school early, and he described his teenage years this way. He says, I was a fat little kid leading a double life. I lived at home. I went to school by day and performed as a drag queen by night. As a child? As a teenager. As a teenager? Yeah, like in his high school years, like as a young teenager. Wow. During this time, he says he weighed 240 pounds and invented the drag characters Birth of a Nation and Virginia Hamm.

which are names he would go on to use in Torch Song Trilogy. Do you have a drag name? I have a couple. Minty Fresh was like the original. I have some. What are yours? Detritus. Detritus. I love it. Pitney Bowes. And I come out and I just like, I copy other people's drag shows. Yeah.

That's really good. I like it. Thank you. I like it. At 17 years old, Harvey Fierstein won a role in an Andy Warhol play called Pork. He said, I was cast as an asthmatic lesbian maid named Amelia. So Pork apparently is the only play ever written by Andy Warhol. I didn't know he did write one. I'm fascinated. Me too. I didn't know much about it, but I pulled this quote from the New York Times Review. Oh, no.

All in all, it's a cozy bunch. Take out the fornication, masturbation, defecation, and provocation with which pork is larded, and you might have a certain similarity to the juvenile gang in Your Good Man Charlie Brown. Ha ha ha ha!

If I had had a drink of water, that would have been a spit take. An absolute spit take. Wow. But the thing that was important about Harvey being a part of this play is that it introduced him to an organization called La Mama Experimental Theater Club, or La Mama for short, which is where Pork was done. And that's where Torch Song Trilogy would eventually get its start. Amazing. So a little bit of a background on La Mama. La Mama is considered an off-off Broadway theater. Now, the definition of

off-off-Broadway, off-Broadway, and Broadway usually comes down to the number of seats in the theater. Off-off-Broadway is supposed to have fewer than 99 seats. La Mama is still around and thriving, but has over 250 seats. And it's still considered off-off-Broadway, so I don't fully understand what's going on here. I know that they started out as like a cafe space with fewer than 99 seats, and they grew and grew and grew. Now they have over 250 seats, and they're still considered off-off-Broadway.

off-off-Broadway. La Mama is fancy now, but when it was founded in 1961, it was scrappy, and I need to mention that La Mama, which for more than half a century has been the heartbeat of the downtown theater scene, was founded by a Black woman named Ellen Stewart, who ran it for decades.

Ellen Stewart was a true visionary and pioneer, and she needs to get her own deep dive. I'm definitely doing a deep dive on this woman. This is why I think that Ellen Stewart counts as part of the Golden Girls universe and therefore gets her own deep dive. Because without Ellen Stewart, there is no LaMama. Without LaMama, there is no Torch Song Trilogy. And without Torch Song Trilogy, there is no Estelle Getty as Sofia Petrillo. Absolutely. It's a direct line from LaMama to Estelle.

as Stelgetti, as Sofia Petrova. Yeah, no, I'm here for it. So La Mama was one of the core four off-off-Broadway theaters that founded the off-off-Broadway theater movement in the 1960s, and it's the only one of the four still in operation today. The thing that set La Mama apart from other theaters was that founder Ellen Stewart was really focused on the playwrights. She says she wouldn't even read the plays that were submitted for consideration to be produced because instead she relied on what she called foreplay.

quote, beeps or quote, clicks, which were just a feeling she would get when she would meet playwrights that would help her decide if she wanted to work with them. So it wasn't about the actual work necessarily. It was about the person. Like, did she believe in the person? Did she believe in the person's vision? Did she get that kind of feelings

from them that she wanted to sort of help them. And I love that you use the word pioneer and visionary for her. And I was thinking about that with him at 17 years old and even younger doing drag shows after school. And here she is, a Black woman in charge of this theater, you know, just a boss lady. And all of this is happening at a time way before. I mean, it's still not safe to do so. No, the 1960s. I mean, absolutely.

Absolute pioneer. And she just seems amazing. I can't wait to learn more about her. So that story about Ellen Stewart, like paying attention to her gut and like going with like the person that she wanted to work with. It's a great story. But that is not what happened with Torch Dawn Trilogy. Oh, there were no beeps or clicks when she first heard about Harvey's play. So in 1979, Harvey begins writing the first play in Torch Dawn Trilogy called International Stud, which is all about the character Arnold's

quest to find the perfect man. And when Kenny Hill, who was Ellen Stewart's assistant at La Mama, brought the play to Ellen, she was dead set against doing it. Wow. Yeah, she just didn't like it. I think she just didn't like the idea that a play set in a bar, like it just wasn't elevated enough for her. Okay. But then

Kenny Hill, her assistant who brought her the play, was killed in a bathhouse fire. Now, not to get too much into like a side deep dive here, but I did like that sentence shocked me so much that he was killed in a bathhouse fire that I did look into it. And there was a story about it in the New York Times. It happened at the Everhard Baths on 28th Street, which was on the third floor of the building it was in. The space was completely not up to code. It had a history of fires. It had a

sprinkler system that was never connected to the water main and all of the windows were covered up which made rescue efforts near impossible so on may 26 1977 a fire broke out trapping a bunch of people inside and killing nine people including this man kenny hill do we know how the fire started or we don't okay they looked you know my first thought was yeah is this a hate crime yeah exactly they looked into it it was never fully determined what happened here yeah but just like the

fact that like all the windows had to be covered it was a very secret like clandestine play like it's just like the state of being a gay person at this time the fate of it all though i know that kenny hill who brought her this play and playwright and then his subsequent death yes gave her pause so what happened was she went to harvey firestein and was like i need a new assistant like kenny's gone i need will you do it holy moly in exchange i will produce your play

Oh, my gosh. So that's how that happened. But it was after this deal was made that the idea for it to become a trilogy kind of happened. And it's kind of a funny story because the director of the play, his name is Eric Conklin, told Harvey, just tell Ellen it's going to be a trilogy. And Harvey was like, why? And he said, because then she'll be locked into producing two more of your plays. And Harvey was like, OK, so he does it. He tells her that. And she's now stuck having to produce them. But he's also now stuck having to write them.

Well, that worked out. So that works out. So the next steps in the Torchton Trilogy story, between 1979 and 1980, all three plays were written and produced independently at La Mama. So it took over two years to find someone to produce all three of the plays together as one play, which was always the intention. And Harvey Fierstein told Playbill in 1982, people would say, fabulous writer, fabulous play, but gay, so goodbye.

And mostly nobody believed that a gay play could make any money. So finally, in 1981, a production company called The Glines agreed to produce the play in its full four-hour entirety for an eight-week off-off-Broadway run at a place called the Uptown Richard Allen Center. And Harvey said for the first two weeks, literally nobody came. He said he couldn't even give tickets away to his friends. Oh, man. But then Mel Gusso, the reviewer for The New York Times, came. Now, Mel Gusso had seen the first episode

act of Torch on Trilogy at La Mama when it was just international stud. And liked it? Hated it. And he had panned it, given it a really bad review. But seeing the four-hour three-act play in its entirety, he absolutely fell in love with it and wrote this incredible review. Yeah, a love letter. And this

This is just like one of the quotes. You should read the review. It's a really beautiful review. Well, I'm going to now, yeah. But he says, among other things, the play deals fairly without any attempt at exploiting the situation or manipulating our emotions with varieties of sexual orientation. For example, Arnold's lover is a bisexual who's caught between two magnets, what he thinks he needs and what he feels.

The evening studies self-love and self-hate, headstrong passion and heartfelt compassion. And suddenly Harvey said you just couldn't get tickets. You know what's great about what you just said too is going back to his theme that it's about love no matter who you love. That is

So universal. Yes. Caught between your head and your heart. A hundred percent. And so Harvey says that after that eight week run, the play then moved off Broadway to the Actors Playhouse where it ran for four months. And then the Broadway offers started to come in. But producers wanted Harvey to massively trim down the four hours or cut some of like the racier stuff and

none of which Harvey was willing to do. So then in 1982, the Glynes agreed to move their original off-off Broadway production to Broadway in its full four-hour entirety. And it went to the Little Theater, which is now called the Hayes Theater, where it ran... I'm going to cry.

where it ran for 1,222 performances over three years, which is nearly unheard of for plays. And it won the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play and for Harvey Fierstein for Best Play. So it was an unexpected win for Best Play. It beat out Marcia Norman's hit Nightmother. And when producer John Glines accepted the award at the Tony Awards, he described stepping to the microphone in the room getting really quiet. And remember, it's a

play about a lot of gay people and drag queens and an idea that just months before nobody thought could work as a commercial venture. And that had just won the top prize at the Tony Awards. And so what was this producer going to say when he accepts the award, right? So he does the usual award show stuff with his speech, but then he ended his speech by saying, I want to thank the one person who believed in and followed the dream from the beginning, who never said, you're crazy, it can't be done. And I refer to my partner,

And I refer to my partner and lover, Laurence Lane. How did you know that? Because I was watching it in real time with my mother. Oh, my God. That is wild because everyone in the room was shocked because it was the first time a person openly acknowledged a real life gay relationship on network television. Yeah, I was in my parents' bedroom lying in bed with my mother and we watched it as it was happening. Do you remember her reaction? Both of us, because we knew it had never happened. And it was just great. We were both just like, oh, my God.

Oh, that is incredible. You know, in describing Torch Song Trilogy and what the point of the play was, Harvey said to Playbill in 1982, it's educating people every night after you see Torch Song, you can't put down gays in quite the same way you might have wanted to before. You see real people who want real things. They're not self-pitying. They're real people, people who want to live.

So getting to Estelle Getty as the character Mrs. Beckhoff, we touched a bit on this in Estelle's Deep Dive, but Harvey and Estelle knew each other through the off-off Broadway theater scene and La Mama. And Estelle was so impressed with Harvey's previous writing work that she literally just asked him to write a part for her whenever he wrote his next play. And then in 1978, she came to La Mama to see the first act of Torch Song Trilogy, which was called International Stud, and she directly challenged him. She said, and you can just hear...

hear her saying this. She said, listen, Mr. Big Shot Playwright, why don't you write the role of your mother and I'll play it opposite you? You know what I love about this? What? You said he couldn't give tickets away. She showed up. Exactly. Do you know what I mean? Exactly. I mean, yeah. And she's going to all these things and they knew each other. Like, I know what that's like when you're so busy or sometimes, you know, you get a little too big for your britches or whatever and you stop going to things. Yeah. You're tired or whatever. And the fact that she's just like, no, I'm going to go. I'm going to go. I mean, it's just. And remember her life. Like she was doing all this theater for free. She had a

family at home that she's taking care of. She's trying to hold down a job, but she's making time for her passion. You know, and it's like remembering who said yes and supported you before you became the big shot. Yes, yes. That matters. Right. And so Harvey said to himself, you know, I'm stuck writing a second and third act of this

Anyway, why not just write a mother character? And so he wrote the character based on his own mother, but with Estelle in mind. Like, with her personality and her way of being in mind. And the mother character only appears in the third act, which is called Widows and Children First. And he said, I knew that if I put the right lines in her mouth, she could rip their hearts out. Mm-hmm.

The mother is a tough character. In some ways, she's a lot like Sophia, but like less accepting. She loves her son. There's no question about it, but she really can't accept him being gay. And much of the third act is about their relationship with that conflict at the center of it. So Harvey has said about Estelle, I love this. This is important. Listen to what he says here. So great was her performance that almost every audience member identified with my character.

You read that right. Estelle's Mrs. Bekoff was so identifiable that everyone claimed her as his or her mother. And if she were their mother, then they were a six-foot-tall drag queen. It was magic. And what he's saying about that is that Estelle's performance was so perfect that every audience member adopted her as their mother, and so they became...

became Arnold, the drag queen, her son. So every audience member, gay, straight, man, woman, conservative, whatever, Estelle's performance made everyone there who saw the show live in Arnold's shoes for a little while, which is how the play was able to transform the hearts and minds. Really, her performance is the heart of why the play worked because it was her performance that

made everyone identify with our shared humanity. Yes. And in this human being, Arnold. Exactly. So Harvey also said the thing about Estelle was that you could not catch her acting. She was being if her character was supposed to be angry, Estelle got angry. If her character was heartbroken, the actress was heartbroken on stage. There was simply no deception. It all felt real.

And as we all know, Estelle did the play on Broadway for a few years. Then she took the show on tour, which brought her to Los Angeles, which is where the Golden Girls producers saw her. And that's how she got the gig. And years later, Harvey would say, popular thinking is that by creating Mrs. Beckhoff, I launched Estelle's career. But it was just as true that when Estelle inspired the mother character, she gave me mine.

I don't know why I'm so emotional. It's okay. And you know what? I know the cheesecakes love you for it because it's real. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, and lastly, like without the mother, Torch Song Trilogy would never have achieved its universal popularity and might not have reached further than La Mama. But with the mother, the play was and remains a force not to be denied. This is, I have to say, just from a

purely clinical point of view. My love and respect for all of them, but it makes me love and respect Estelle even more because this is a four-hour play that she did for years. Yes. That's hard. Yes. Broadway's hard, y'all. Like, I mean, just the athleticism it takes. At 60 years old or whatever. Yeah, exactly. To do working six days a week. And you may think, oh, it's just

a few hours, but your whole day is prepping for those few hours. And it's so emotionally charged. You have to live that. The energy that you spend, it's like working out, you know, it's just, it takes a lot out of you. So we got to talk about the movie for a second because the world is shitty when they made the movie, Estelle did not get to reprise her role as Mrs. Beckhoff. The role instead went to Anne Bancroft. Because the idea was that they needed a

to get people to go see a gay movie. And Harvey said that he and Estelle never directly talked about it, but he knew that she was heartbroken. And he recently said, I've come to know exactly how she felt. And I think he's referring to the Hairspray movie where, you know, he created the role of Edna Turtelat on Broadway, won the Tony for it. It was, you know, it was like a famous Harvey Fierstein role, which went to John Travolta,

for the movie. I hope one day we can stop doing that. I know. I know. Truly. Make it with the person who made it work. Yeah. You know? So I just want to end by saying that Estelle Getty was an integral part of why Torch on Trilogy was such a massive success. And the success of that play, like I've been saying, really advanced the ability of stories of the LGBTQ plus community to be told in big, expensive commercial productions that would reach the masses. And in telling those stories in that way, it makes the world a safer place for LGBTQ plus people.

And there is an argument to be made that without Estelle Getty inspiring that character and her performance as that character, that play might not have happened at all. Syzygy. Isn't it wild? It is wild. And you know, I talked about this in the Estelle deep dive, but Torchshorn Trilogy went into the Helen Hayes Theater, which is now the Hayes Theater. Hmm.

Which I only was ever on Broadway one night. And when, you know, Jillian and I did True Crime Obsessed on Broadway and we did it at the Hayes Theater. And the ghosts of Torch Song Trilogy were with me the whole day. I could feel it. I could feel it. I mean, Broadway theaters are magical, you know? When I stepped out on the stage, I...

thought about Harvey and I thought about Estelle and I thought about all the people involved in that play and I really felt it. The reverence of it. Yeah. Yeah. The respect. And I respect you. That was excellent. That was my deep dive on Torch Song Trilogy. I don't think we, you know what? We're never going to top that deep dive. No, that's not true. Oh my God. Thanks for listening, Cheesecake. You're amazing, Patrick. Love you. Love you.

Oh, Cheesecakes. Thank you so much for listening to the Golden Girls Deep Dive podcast. Hey, Cheesecakes, keep those Apple podcast reviews coming. I know I'm asking for it a lot, but it really means a lot to us. You click on the thing that says write a review. You give one sentence about what you like. It bumps us up in the algorithm. We're seeing in the Facebook group so many people are finding us because Apple or Spotify is suggesting the show to them. Yeah. And that happens when you write us a nice review. In fact, I think we're new and noteworthy now. We are an Apple podcast. That's because of you, Cheesecakes. That's right, Cheesecakes. And Cheesecakes, join our Facebook group.

group. It is growing every day rapidly. Yes. Like exponentially. Yeah. And we're having such a good time there. It's Golden Girls Deep Dive Podcast Discussion Group. Please, please, please come. You know, I'm new to it too. And I'm like, this is actually a blast. It's really fun. I really love reading everything. My favorite thing about making a new podcast is building the community around the podcast. So that's what we're doing it right now is in the Facebook group. Come find us there. Also, we're on TikTok and Instagram. If you want to see the funny videos from today and from all of our recordings, it's

at Golden Girls Deep Dive on Instagram and TikTok. Just go search for us. Yeah, you'll see a lot of pictures in these great videos that Aaron makes, the things that we reference in the episodes. Yeah, like anytime that we bust out laughing, Aaron, our social media guy and our friend, turns them into like these really funny videos. So go look at them. Patrick, I love you. I love you, honey. This is so fun. Thanks, everyone. And we'll see you next week. Bye. Bye.