I just stumbled upon the announcement that Jim Colucci, author of "The Q Guide to The Golden Girls" is releasing a new book in April!

Golden Girls: Forever (http://goldengirlsnfriends.freeforums.net/post/3814/thread)

Over 350 pages of Golden Girls stories, notes and interviews will be included...

Currently (as I write this at least. I notice Amazon prices fluctuate a lot.) half price at Amazon

http://www.amazon.com/Golden-Girls-Forever-Unauthorized-Behind/dp/0062422901?ie=UTF8&keywords=goldengirls%20forever&qid=1460137213&ref_=sr_1_sc_1&sr=8-1-spell

I've bought a copy and it arrived today. Haven't started reading it yet but had a flick through. Full of pictures and gossip. My kind of book!

I got mine at the mall yesterday and it's fantastic! Have only read the first two chapters but already there are nuggets of info even I have never heard and I've been a GG fanatic since 1992 with hundreds of magazines and articles and photos I've collected. Fans are going to love this book!

The episode where Blanche meets Big Mommy, all of Estelle Getty's scenes are from rehearsal. Bea Arthur was a pain in the butt according to the director. Estelle blew every one of her punch lines so they shot the rehearsal scenes without her knowing as to not having to shoot them later without an audience (which they had to do later) to not humiliate her. Big Mommy was suppose to be an ongoing character. The actresses lines were given to Big Daddy after the initial read-through much to the dismay of the actress.

Also in the episode where Sophia does a pizza commercial, Estelle did all her lines without an audience off cue cards and Bea lost her temper. They sometimes would send down one of the writers to laugh (his laugh was contagious) in the audience to get them going when Estelle had to do her lines for the hundredth time and the audience was no longer laughing. It also says that she had "cheats" all over the set. Written on props, the tablecloth, in books.

Apparently, at the beginning they thought it was just horrible stage fright. Estelle herself would even use that excuse as to why she couldn't memorize her lines. And as people who worked on the show said, she vandalized the sets with writing down lines, but yet was able to remember where the exact line was in a sea of dialogue from umpteen episodes.

Bea incidentally, was nasty to every guest star on the set. All of them are interviewed in that book. Bea had one guest star fired because she chewed gum. That was revealed in the book by the girl who played Blanche's daughter. The actress that played young Dorothy (http://www.outonthelanai.com/episodes-1/2015/11/24/golden-girls-special-episode-lyn-greene) also had bad things to say about Bea. The guy who played the man who Blanche and Sofia were fighting over said good morning to Bea twice and she ignored him. It wasn't until Estelle said that they wanted Cesar Romero originally instead of him that Bea said anything. She apologized for Estelle's remark.

Terry Hughes, the longest running director said in 2012, that Bea was insufferable and would say that she wouldn't do the show. He would have to call her at midnight and talk her off a ledge and plead with her to do it.

Sadly, none of this surprises me. :rolleyes:

Although I have great respect for Bea Arthur's ability to say her lines and portray her character, I've never heard anything positive about her personality, or her ability to "play well with others." There's really no reason to behave like that in the work place. The job gets done one way or the other. Better to get it done while maintaining a respectable reputation.

I can imagine it would be frustrating to watch Estelle bungle lines over and over again. I really can. But even back then, Bea should have wondered what was causing a seasoned actress to fail so miserably over and over again. They should have been worried about her........not angry at her. Ultimately, she did much better when she went on to do her character on Golden Palace. Interesting, since although she was older, she had the advantage of doing it without the stress of being around Bea. Again.......sad. :(

I own a copy of the book you've pictured, but haven't finished reading it. It's a beautiful product. Very high quality. :dance: