Aunt Fran's gut-busting swan song is on MeTV at 6 pm ET tonight.

https://www.datalounge.com/thread/13667162-so-what-went-down-between-rue-and-dorothy-lyman-on-mama-s-family-that-caused-rue-to-quit-

Definitely one of the best episodes, especially of season 3. I hated to see Rue go but I'm really glad she did because Blanche Deveraux is one of the greatest sitcom characters ever created and she could've only been brought to life by the great Rue McClanahan.

Definitely one of the best episodes, especially of season 3. I hated to see Rue go but I'm really glad she did because Blanche Deveraux is one of the greatest sitcom characters ever created and she could've only been brought to life by the great Rue McClanahan.

Rue herself said that Fran choking on that chicken bone was the best thing that ever happened to her. :)

Rue herself said that Fran choking on that chicken bone was the best thing that ever happened to her. :)
I thought she choked on a tooth pick.

^It was an inhaled toothpick in a bathroom stall at The Bigger Jigger.

^It was an inhaled toothpick in a bathroom stall at The Bigger Jigger.

Good thing she didn't have the fish.

^Yeah because that all-you-can-eat catfish is too good to pass up! LOL

Even though Rue was on GG and happy to be not playing Aunt Fran any longer, any word on whether Vicki called Rue to let her know what they were doing with the Fran character? You know, just as an FYI- :)

Even though Rue was on GG and happy to be not playing Aunt Fran any longer, any word on whether Vicki called Rue to let her know what they were doing with the Fran character? You know, just as an FYI- :)

That's a good question. I guess it would depend on how close she and Rue were in real life.

There's never been any indication of that. My assumption is they just stayed in their separate "show universes". Besides, it wasn't Vicki's decision to kill off Fran, it was writer Rick Hawkins'. And Rue probably couldn't have cared less what happened, which is a shame in a way, because Aunt Fran was one of the highlights of the characters of Raytown.

Fran was one of my favorite characters from the first incarnation, and I am glad she got occasional mentions in the syndicated universe.
"Farewell Frannie" was a good episode anyway, but especially well done as a transition episode from NBC into syndication because all the changes were explained and didn't make the script clunky in doing so.

Fran was one of my favorite characters from the first incarnation, and I am glad she got occasional mentions in the syndicated universe.

Same here. Some guy blogged about his top ten episodes of each season last year, and he couldn't appreciate the unique niche Fran had in the family, or how utterly funny she was (she has some of the best lines). She was one of the highlights of the NBC years.


"Farewell Frannie" was a good episode anyway, but especially well done as a transition episode from NBC into syndication because all the changes were explained and didn't make the script clunky in doing so.

Exactly. Rick Hawkins wrote a near-perfect script (I say near-perfect because, if only he didn't kill Fran off, lol).

I thought this was one of the worst eps!:( But at least Fran was gone. I really didn't like the character of Fran at all!

IMO Mama's family wasn't any good at all till Iola and Bubba came and Fran and Vinton's kids left!;)

I disagree only because I think there's a lot to be appreciated from both runs of the show. They were markedly different, and it's understandable to prefer one and completely dislike the other.
In a perfect world, at least for my preference, they would have mixed the network run into the syndicated one better. By that, I mean having some of the family come back occasionally. Obviously that could not be done with Carol Burnett and to a lesser extent Betty White, but my least favorite thing about the syndicated years was that the farther along the show went, the network run and some of those family members were pretty much completely forgotten.

Vicki and Rue were close friends offscreen, so someone from the show probably called Rue to let her know what was going on. For Rue's part, I remember her saying one time in an interview that the one positive she took away from Mama's Family was that she and Vicki became so close.

I re-checked Rue's Emmy TV Legends interview, and she didn't say anything about she and Vicki becoming close. She didn't say anything about being close with Vicki. She just said Vicki was hilarious on the Burnett show as Mama and she loved that character and thought she was hilarious, and then later she says Vicki "was good to work with, but she wasn't warm, sweet, and lovely. She was very..sort of distant, and very much into her character, and best friends with Harvey Korman who was the director on the show. I was like the new kid on the block".

It wasn't that interview; I forget which one it was. I just remember hearing something like that at some point coming from Rue.

I'm not doubting you, though. Stars tend to blow hot and cold on people depending on whether they've made friends with people in other casts they've worked in more recently, whether they're still in touch with the person they're being asked about, and a thousand other things. Maybe they were on the outs for some reason at the time, or maybe Rue hadn't heard from Vicki in a while. Remember, at one point Carol wasn't speaking to Vicki either, and today they're close as can be again.

Yes, but Carol and Vicki really had been close for years before the "silent fallout" happened. I was just saying I'd never heard any indication at all that Rue and Vicki were close; after all, Rue didn't even call in to Vicki's talk show when she Vicki had her Mama's Family reunion---but Betty did. Of course none of us say we can know the circumstances of that. But if you really did hear or see that in an interview, I would be curious to see/hear the evidence just because I have never heard anything supporting that.

Only slightly off topic, but as long as I have watched Mama's Family, I am not sure I knew this oddity ... in some places, including on this very website, Soup to Nuts is listed as the Season 3 premiere and *not* Farewell, Frannie.
If this was indeed the case in 1986, any idea why? Seems completely backward. I can't think of a good reason you would not lead off that season with the episode that explains everything about the new life of the show. It's sort of like Season 1, where shows with Vint not yet being married to Naomi were shown at the end of the season, well after the wedding.
In syndication, Farewell, Frannie is always shown as the Season 3 premiere.
Given this order, one could say Fran was actually still alive in the show universe when Soup to Nuts took place; she was just off screen (maybe at a punctuation seminar?).

Well, on Wikipedia "Farewell, Frannie" is the season 3 premiere with production code 302, while "Soup to Nuts" is episode 5 with production code 301 (actually it's interesting to note many of the shows filmed a bit out of order then re-arranged for broadcast order).

I believe this is one of those common cases where the cast films at least one episode first that will air after the pilot or premiere, so that by the time they film the pilot or premiere episode, the cast has "jelled" and will be a strong viewing for the start of the season (even Jim Henson's Fraggle Rock followed that pattern, filming the 3rd broadcast episode first before filming the series pilot).