How The Golden Girls Evaded Network Censorship With Dialogue About Mr. September's Manaconda

I know its July, but last week I saw a calendar which made me think of a Golden Girls episode. I explain how in just a minute. I've blogged about "The Golden Girls" already, and in particular how the layout of the house (which was really just a set in a television studio) presents some inconsistencies. Catch that post HERE.

A memorable but incredibly funny part of the holiday-themed episode of "The Golden Girls" (Season 2, Episode 11 entitled "T'was the Nightmare Before Christmas") was during their gift exchange with one another. A bit more on that in just a second.

Anyway, to set this up, in this particular episode of the classic sitcom, Blanche opens the episode by having a gentleman caller named Ed who's dressed in a Santa suit. When Dorothy arrives, she says that the crowds in the stores had made her Christmas shopping a nightmare. She also discovered that her mother, Sophia, had been using her credit cards to buy expensive gifts from Neiman Marcus that she cannot afford. She concludes that Christmas doesn't mean anything anymore because it has become too commercial.

In response, Rose suggests to the girls that they have an old-fashioned Christmas kind of like they do in her hometown of St. Olaf, Minnesota before they return home. Upon the suggestion, Dorothy was very quick to respond that she had absolutely no intention of drinking eggnog while wearing a cast-iron brassiere. Rose responds humorously by saying "We don't do that at Christmas! We do that at Easter."

Although the each of the Golden Girls are planning to spend Christmas day with their respective families, before they each go home to their families, they want to have a Christmas gift exchange with one another. But they agree with Rose and decide to return the expensive gifts and instead give each other homemade gifts (except for Sophia, who sticks with her Neiman Marcus gifts paid for by Dorothy).

The gift-exchange between the four Golden Girls was perhaps one of the sitcom's more memorable moments, not only for the episode and the show, but for holiday-themed TV episodes overall, many of which follow a well-rehearsed script of the sort outlined in the book the now out-of-print book "Christmas on Television" by Diane Werts (ISBN 9780275983314).

As for The Golden Girls "T'was the Nightmare Before Christmas" episode, R. J. McBowlan, who was the Head Writer for that particular episode said in an interview (see https://thegoldengirlsreviewedby.com/2014/01/30/season-2-episode-11-twas-the-nightmare-before-christmas-as-told-by-an-oral-history-from-the-writers-room/ for more):

"We wanted to do a Christmas episode that wasn't like any others. We had thought about doing a 'Christmas Carol' version with the ghosts of the pasts of all the ladies, but then I thought, let's go edgier! Let's add some really scandalous moments. The result was a holiday episode of "The Golden Girls" that was one of television's better scripts, and it was acted exquisitely by the Emmy-winning cast.

Crispin Daly, the Story Editor said: "I thought, how would Blanche react to Christmas? Just like she always does, by acting like a sex-crazed maniac! It was just so simple. And you know what they say in comedy: double-down. So Blanche gives the other gals a calendar called 'The Men of Blanche's Boudoir'. Because she's such a slut! It's hilarious that such an old lady can be a slut. Can you imagine?"

McBowlan added "Yea, I really didn't think NBC would go for it, but they did."

When the girls' celebration arrives; Rose's gift to Dorothy is a whittled maple syrup spout.

But Blanche gives her roommates a calendar which she titles "The Men of Blanche's Boudoir", and she gives the same gift to each girl saying how she thought it was such a cute idea.

Dorothy opens the gift from Blanche, and she says "Oh, Blanche. Oh, honey, this is so thoughtful ... whoa!”

To which Blanch responds "September?"

Dorothy responds by saying: "Yep."

Sophia's line was really ground-breaking, because immediately after Dorothy says yes, she adds: "I'm surprised you were able to walk in October."

A YouTube excerpt can be see (for the time being, anyway) below, or at https://youtu.be/KqUxbTd8DKo.



The viewer is really left to presume that Blanche's Mr. September is really gifted with what might be called (in urban slang) a "manaconda" between his legs. (the term "manaconda" is a contraction of the two words "man" and "anacanda" which is the longest snake in the world). Draw your own conclusion.

Anyway, following Rue McClanahan's death in 2010, it became known that Rue had a LOT of memorabilia saved from her work in television; in fact she had saved so much that she ended up renting several storage units to save it all. She also had a provision written into her contract for "The Golden Girls" whereby she was permitted to keep all of the clothes that were worn by the character Blanche in the show. They were all custom-made outfits for each actress/actor in the show.

Rue also had kept the supposed "gift" from that episode: 'The Men of Blanche's Boudoir' calendar. In an auction following Rue's death, we learned that there was a little more to 'The Men of Blanche's Boudoir' than racy photos of naked men that television viewers never got to see. Some actual photos of that particular prop taken from an auction (the price was $4,000) of her vast collection. The actual 'The Men of Blanche's Boudoir' calendar measured 9 1/2 x 11 1/2 and was signed to her from the guys in the prop department for the show. The website for Rue's the estate sale can still be viewed at http://estateofrue.com/catalog/original-the-men-of-blanches-boudoir-calendar-sold/.

For the record, Rue's copy of that prop, rather than containing photos of completely naked men (which Rue very likely would have liked), the sale revealed that the cut-up duo who ran the props department for the show had loaded the mockup with real photographs of various crew members in compromising positions. When presented with the prop during a taped rehearsal, the ladies' reactions quickly brought the scene to a halt! For the record, not all of the items from the Rue's estate sale have sold and some can still be purchased, but this one was one of the items on the "sold" list!

Regardless, it is worth noting that "The Golden Girls" being a top-rated sitcom that starred older women were able to get away with risque jokes that did not fly in other sitcoms of that era. Hence, jokes about Mr. September's manaconda were approved when the fifty-something Golden Girls said them, whereas sitcoms with younger actresses would find the network censors cutting similar lines. Indeed, NPR's Terri Gross asked Bea Arthur about that in an April 2007 interview, although Bea Arthur's response was merely "I guess so".

The relevant dialogue was as follows:

Terri GROSS: That's an episode of "The Golden Girls," with my guest, Bea Arthur, along with Rue McClanahan and Betty White. Were you able to get away with a lot of sex jokes on "The Golden Girls" because it was about older women?

(Soundbite of laughter)

Ms. ARTHUR: I guess so, I guess so. Yes, the first time you saw women - I hate that expression - of a certain age well-groomed and having active sex lives and great earrings, I remember.

The interview can be listened to below, or by visiting https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=9847148.

Still, we can thank "The Golden Girls" for pushing the proverbial envelope on jokes that a generation earlier would have been banned completely.

Super Golden Friends: Are Internet Sitcoms the Future of TV?

My readers may recall that I wrote about the Super Friends back in May 2012 (see my post HERE or at http://goo.gl/9fUIm for details). But the Super Friends as we Gen Xers knew them were actually in their prime back in the 1970s, and I know they're super and all, but they have to retire sometime, don't they?! So what happens when a group of four, aging Super Friends move to Miami in and share a ranch house, spending their golden years together? Well, that was basic idea behind this YouTube video created by artist Kevin Bapp which he calls "Super Golden Friends". Catch his video on YouTube below, or by visiting http://youtu.be/pBkAi-giu-g:



Mr. Bapp also commented in the accompanying YouTube video commentary: "This is a pilot I'd like to propose to Cartoon Network's Adult Swim, if I knew anyone who worked there, and if all the licenses could be obtained."  It's an obvious spin on the 1980's sitcom "The Golden Girls", but with aging comic book characters instead of live actors/actresses.

Hmmmm, although I mentioned "The Avengers" in my May 28, 2012 post, and even commented that Warner Brothers already had the rights to some of the DC Comics library, and we learned that the company is indeed looking at a return of the Justice League sometime in the summer of 2015 (see HERE or http://lat.ms/OUlCKL for details).

It looks as if this will be an animated feature, as opposed to one featuring human actors. Still, the concept of a new Justice League cartoon movie seems destined for the big screen in the not-too-distant future (2015 to be exact). Could Super Golden Friends Find a Home on the Internet? While the Justice League may not have the humorous edge that Kevin Bapp's version does, it does make me wonder if Warner Brothers might actually be willing to consider such a concept?

To be sure, the rights to the "Golden Girls" may be a Disney property, but the theme song certainly doesn't belong to Disney, which means that's potentially up for grabs. That song, incidentally, was from Andrew Gold, who released (and it was actually played on the radio) "Thank You For Being a Friend" back in 1978. My aunt kind of liked the song and I remember she wanted to buy his album "All This and Heaven Too".  That song can be download by visiting http://amzn.to/Vi6qFr.

I should acknowledge that Andrew Gold himself passed away on June 6, 2011 (see http://bit.ly/mICzjk).  If Warner (or DC Comics) don't want to license the characters, I think Mr. Bapp could always do what Pixar did with "The Incredibles" ... they just wrote around it with familiar enough if not exact superhero characters. Mr. Incredible?

Nope ... not from any Marvel or DC Comics from what I can recall.  But it didn't matter.

Internet Sitcoms Arrive

Having said all of this, the concept of licensing the characters for comic value might be appropriate to an online audience. But the idea that television is needed to produce a series is, to some extent, becoming history. For example, there are already a few series already in production exclusively for the Internet. Some even have big-name Hollywood talent behind their efforts. One such example is Jane Espenson, who has written for shows including "Buffy the Vampire Slayer", "Angel", "Firefly", "Gilmore Girls", "Ellen", "The O.C.", "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine", "Dinosaurs", "Andy Barker PI", "Battlestar Galactica", "Dollhouse", "Caprica", "Game of Thrones", "Torchwood: Miracle Day" and others.

While I wasn't really a huge fan of any of those shows, the fact is that she had the experience and credentials in the entertainment industry to do pretty much what she wanted. She raised some eyebrows in Hollywood when a recent project, notably a sitcom, which follows all the rules and conventions of any sitcom, except it's about a gay married couple.  Oh, and it airs on YouTube.  As she described it: "Mad About You but with two guys." When she and her co-writer Brad Bell came up with the idea, they realized it was such an obvious concept for a series that if network TV had wanted to do it, they already would have. So instead of going around pitching the show, they made it on the cheap, with their own money, on the Internet. A sitcom veteran, Jeff Greenstein, who did countless episodes of "Will and Grace", directed.

The end result is a YouTube series known as "Husbands" (http://husbandstheseries.com/) which is now entering it's second successful season, perhaps a sign that the era of internet series has finally reached a new phase of maturity.

Indeed, guest stars on "Husbands" in Season 2 will include some big-name talent from the small screen, including John Cryer of "Two and a Half Men" (although at least a few of us remember him equally as "Duckie" from the John Hughes' film "Pretty in Pink").

NPR's "This American Life" blogged about this effort HERE, writing: "Jane's hope is that some brave network – AMC? NBC? – will notice their little experiment and give them a budget larger than the cost of a Hyundai to blow people's minds on real TV. If they do it right, of course, they won't be blowing minds at all. They'll just be the New Normal."

I would dare say that the producer Jane Espenson seems to be breaking new ground not only with the content covered in her series "Husbands" but also with delivering sitcoms via the internet. Why Viacom's gay-themed network Logo hasn't picked the show up is beyond me.  Instead, Logo is running reruns of "16 and Pregnant", like any gay man or woman can even relate.  However, I would not be surprised if the "Husbands" show starts to have it's own sponsors in the not-too-distant future.

But the series' success also indicates that the role of the big media "gatekeeper" of what audiences are entitled to see may be over. Indeed, WNYC's "On the Media" program discussed this in a May 2012 broadcast, which can be listened to at http://wny.cc/SKi4t1.  For example, this year's Upfronts - the model that has been used by television channels to sell advertising and show off their slate of shows - featured a new competitor, and a new platform: online.  Digital programmers held the first-ever event to show off their online programming, which they've dubbed the "Newfronts".  Again, WNYC's "On The Media" covered that, which can be listened to at http://wny.cc/Ub9J65.  This is really a continuation of what began with the proliferation of cable stations with their own programming, but takes it a step further.

Time magazine (see http://ti.me/RPKaSh for the review) wrote:

"A lot of TV sitcoms about gay couples stick to very personal stories (adoption, surrogate parenting) and work from those to strike themes about larger changes in society. Husbands is doing the opposite: it starts from a high-satire topic about the public debate over gay marriage—its leads, being celebrities, know their marriage will be in the press no matter what—and through that, ends up telling a very sweet story about two guys trying to find a way to have a relationship simply as people."

They close by writing:

"It's the sort of thing that, in a bigger-scale TV show, might just collapse under its own sense of significance and topicality. Not so, so far, in Husbands, a show that manages to make a very little go a long way."

Regardless of whether someone has an interest in "Husbands", that show's success on the Internet goes a long way towards opening show content once deemed "inappropriate" (by the network executives) for mainstream television audiences. In doing so, the concept of there being a "Super Golden Friends" doesn't seem so far-fetched after all!