Golden Palace [Archive] - Sitcoms Online Message Boards

TALLguyinKY

07-07-2003, 05:06 AM

Hey Matt! Welcome, I hope ya come back here, and that you get used to the boards. :)

I'm sorry to say I don't have any GP episodes, but I thought you might like to at least read about the experience of the show from one of the girls---Betty White:

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"When we began our seventh season of Girls, we were pretty much aware that it would be our last. Bea had begun to get restless the season before, and our last year was no fun for her at all. She wanted out, and she made no bones about it. She wanted to go to England; she wanted to do a musical; she wanted to do a lot of things. Our show just didn't happen to be one of them. Well, we had enjoyed a good long run and were reconciled to the fact that the time had come to move on.

None of us even considered doing Girls without Bea. It would be like taking one leg off of a table and expecting it to balance. So we had no idea what to expect when Paul Will and Tony Thomas called Rue and Estelle and me up to their office for a meeting.

After the usual amenities, Paul and Tony began to spell out their appreciation for their good fortune---they now had eight shows up and running. Great as that was, it was a very full plate, and they were tired. The last thing in the world they had in mind was to face putting together another show. However...

They then went on to say that Susan Harris Hitt had come up with an idea they couldn't resist, and they proceeded to describe it.

Dorothy, Bea's character, would get married, but not to her ex-husband, Stan, with whom she had had an on-again, off-again relationship with for seven years. No, this would be someone completely new, and the whole thing would take place, develop, and resolve in a one-hour Golden Girls episode that would close the season---and the series.

Then, the following season could begin with a new series, using our same characters but in a new environment. With Dorothy moved out, Blanche, Sophia, and Rose would sell the house and buy a small hotel in one of the reclaimed and currently popular sections of Miami.

For seven the Girls had been living together, as much as a hedge against lonliness as for economic reasons. But they had always faced life from the shelter and security of their home. Now, by leaving that familiar setting, these characters, whom the audience knew so well, would be forced to do what so many women these days were having to do in real life---meet the world as it comes through the front door and deal with it.

As well as being good writers and producers, Paul and Tony were also no slouches in the selling department. They didn't ask for an immediate reaction. They wanted us to think it over, sleep on it, discuss it among ourselves, and then we would have another meeting.

There was a lot to think about. There were some pros and there were some cons, but the idea of bringing the women out into the real world was an intriguing one. After much discussion and soul-searching, several meetings later we all agreed to have a go at Golden Palace---which was the name of our new hotel."

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"Over that summer, power meetings (as opposed to just meetings) had been going on between Witt-Thomas-Harris, NBC, CBS, and Buena Vista. When all the dust finally settled, The Golden Palace was leaving the Peacock and set to air on CBS.

The new show took a little getting used to, which was to be expected. When Golden Palace started shooting for the following season, the series opened with Blanche, Sophia, and Rose moving out of the house and into the hotel. It actually felt like we were leaving home.

There were some new cast members: the chef, who dominated the kitchen, so consequently was on a collision course with Sophia; the young black manager of the hotel; a little boy who just showed up and wouldn't leave. Also, each week there would be a guest celebrity written into the script, which was fun because we never knew who would show up for read-through on Monday morning. You can imagine how tickled I was the morning Eddie Albert walked in.

The action took place primarily moving between the big kitchen, the dining room, and the huge lobby, which were all adjoining. We did log a lot of time behind the front desk. I was right back where I started with Tom, Dick, and Harry. No feather duster this time. Once in a while we would go outside for a scene or two, or to one or another of the hotel rooms upstairs (it was the same room, redressed).

We shot the first two episodes before the fall season started, with a highly rated comedian from England playing the role of the chef. Unfortunately, he was used to doing stand-up and couldn't get the hang of ensemble playing at all. Paul and Tony nipped the potential problem in the bud with some instant and inspired recasting. We reshot all the kitchen scenes from the first two shows with Cheech Marin (of Cheech and Chong) now playing the part, and by the time we went on the air, it was as though Cheech had been born in the part. Don Cheadle played the young manager, and Billy Sullivan was the little boy. Billy was such a nice kid and a great little actor. However, it became more and more difficult to find ways of working him into the story line each week, so after a few weeks, he was written out of the show. It was a tough pill to swallow, but Billy took it like a trouper and still visited us often. He also came to all our subsequent cast get-togethers.

The show was enjoyable, the reviewers were kind, and the ratings were satisfactory. In other words, Golden Palace was a moderately pleasing show---not a grabber.

With the number of other shows they had going, it was physically impossible for Paul and Tony to keep hands on, as they had with The Golden Girls, although one or the other usually attended Monday readh-through and dress rehearsal.

Rose Nylund's longtime love, Miles, played by the wonderful Harold Gould, came along for a couple of shows. Being an actor in great demand, Harold had another commitment he had to fulfill, so the writers had Miles marry Nanette Fabray. The cad.

Dorothy's character was kept alive by us referring to her now and then, and Bea made one guest appearance for a two-parter.

The season continued: it didn't progress. Soon a pattern began to emerge. There had been many rewrites during the week on Golden Girls, and as a rule they were improvements---just minor fixes here and there. With Palace, far too often we would start out with one script Monday, with major changes Tuesday, and several times we received a whole new, unrelated script on Wednesday. What had caught our interest originally---the idea that these three women were trying to compete in and cope with today's world, as it was happening just outside the lobby doors---somehow got lost in the shuffle. In desperation, one or another of us would be given a funny run of dialogue, not necessarily connected to the story line, and it would be like doing Golden Girls in the Lobby. There were some good shows mixed in, but not enough.

There was one show that went very well. It dealt with the rescue of racing greyhounds. In the course of the comedy we were able to get across the very serious message of how many of these fine dogs are destroyed each year when they don't win races, and to celebrate the people who work at finding good homes for them. Naturally, I would like that one, but I wasn't alone---we received more mail on that episode, by far, than on any of the rest. Marco Pennette, whose idea it was, did a good job of making his point in the script.

Once the basic problems with the show were identified, things began to improve. By the end of the season, while CBS had not given us a firm pickup yet, they were most reassuring. They told Paul and Tony they were something like 96 percent sure of renewing but had to give themselves a little leeway until all the new pilots had been seen. Not the most sanguine way to sign off for the summer, but Witt-Thomas-Harris were very optimistic.

By the end of May, the long-awaited new fall schedule was announced---and we weren't on it. Tony said he had been told, for what it was worth, that we were listed on the schedule until the night before announcements, but in countering some move by one of the other networks, we didn't make the cut. C'est la cotton-pickin' vie!

It was disappointing not to be picked up, but it was by no means the heart-wrenching loss it had been at other times. I think what I missed more than the actual show itself, aside from the people involved, of course, was the structure it afforded. Working for three weeks, then getting a week off to give the writers a chance to catch up, is, to me, the best schedule in the world. And it's a different show each week, so the routine doesn't settle into a rut. However, any habbit pattern wears off quickly, and there is always plenty to do---all those things there was no time for when the days were 'structured'. Such as beginning to make notes for a new book, for instance. I'll never learn."

---"Here We Go Again: My Life in Televsion", Betty White, 1995