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The Facts of Life is an American sitcom that originally ran on the NBC television network from August 24, 1979 to May 7, 1988. A spin-off of the sitcom Diff'rent Strokes, the series' original premise focused on the character, Edna Garrett (Charlotte Rae), as she becomes housemother (and later, dietitian as well) to seven girls at the fictional Eastland School, a prestigious all-girls boarding school in Peekskill, New York.
[edit] ProductionThe Facts of Life was produced first by TAT Communications, followed by Embassy Television, and then by Embassy Communications (Norman Lear's production companies) and Columbia Pictures Television (through ELP Communications). Sony Pictures Television currently owns the distribution rights to the sitcom. From 1979 to 1982, the series was produced at Metromedia Square, and from 1982 to 1985 at Universal City Studios in Hollywood. From 1985 to 1988, the series was videotaped and produced at the Sunset-Gower Studios in Hollywood, California. [edit] Theme musicThe show's theme was composed by Al Burton, Gloria Loring, and her then husband, Alan Thicke. The well-known opening lyric "You take the good..." came later as the first season lyrics, some of them performed by Rae, differed from those that followed. The original lyrics eventually shifted to the closing credits before being dropped entirely. Burton, Loring, and Thicke had previously composed the theme to Diff'rent Strokes, which was sung by Thicke. The Blanks did an a cappela cover of the theme song for their album, 'Riding the wave' [edit] PremiseOriginally a spin-off of Diff'rent Strokes, the series featured the Drummonds' housekeeper, Edna Garrett, as the housemother of a dormitory at Eastland, a private all-girls school. The girls in her care included spoiled rich girl Blair Warner (Lisa Whelchel), cute gossipy Dorothy "Tootie" Ramsey (Kim Fields), and overweight, impressionable Natalie Green (Mindy Cohn). In the second season, Mrs. Garrett was promoted to school dietitian, and all the original cast members were dropped except for Blair, Natalie, and Tootie. Nancy McKeon joined the cast as tough, streetwise but vulnerable Jo Polniaczek. [edit] CastMain article: List of characters from The Facts of Life
[edit] RatingsThe Facts of Life finished in the Nielsen Ratings top 30 for four seasons of its nine season run:
[edit] PilotThe pilot for the show originally aired as the last episode of Diff'rent Strokes' first season and was called "The Girls' School (aka Garrett's Girls)." The plotline for the pilot had Kimberly Drummond requesting that Mrs. Garrett help her sew costumes for a student play at East Lake School for Girls, the school Kimberly attended in upstate New York, as her dorm's housemother had recently quit. Mrs. Garrett agrees to help, and we meet Tootie, Blair, Molly, Nancy, Sue Ann, Jennifer, Laura, and Mr. Crocker, the school's headmaster. Mrs. Garrett helps put on a successful play, while also solving a problem for Nancy, and is asked to stay on as the new housemother. While Mrs. Garrett states she would rather remain working for the Drummonds at the end of the Pilot, it can be assumed that she later changed her mind. Following the pilot, the name of the school was changed to Eastland and the characters of Jennifer, Laura, and Mr. Crocker were replaced with Natalie, Cindy, and Mr. Bradley. This episode also features more girls living in the dorm than were seen previously. Although Kimberly Drummond is featured as a student at East Lake, her character did not cross over to the spinoff series with Mrs. Garrett. Instead, she remained with Diff'rent Strokes, and occasionally characters from the Facts of Life would "visit" her. [edit] First seasonIn the show's first season, episodes focused on the troubles of seven girls, and the action was usually set in a large, wood-paneled common room of a girls' dormitory. Also appearing was the school's headmaster, Mr. Stephen Bradley (John Lawlor) and science teacher, Miss Emily Mahoney (Jenny O'Hara). The show was originally meant to be a summer series in 1979, but the head of programming decided to bring it back in early 1980. Miss Mahoney only appeared in the first few episodes of the show, and the character was dropped prior to the show returning in 1980. Early episodes of the show typically revolved around a central morality-based or "lesson teaching" theme. The show's pilot episode attracted controversy due to the character of Blair Warner insinuating that her schoolmate, Cindy Webster, is a lesbian because she is a tomboy and frequently shows affection for other girls. Although the dialogue never included the term "lesbian," instead opting for terms such as "strange" and "not normal," it was one of the first times a teen questioning his or her sexual orientation had been shown on television.[citation needed] Other first season episodes dealt with issues including drug use, sex, eating disorders, parental relationships, and peer pressure. An oddity of the first season was that despite the fact that some of the girls were clearly older than the others, the plot lines would have all the characters taking classes together. It has been reported that during the first season, Tootie was often shown on roller skates to make her appear taller and to prevent difficult camera angles due to Fields' height. This was also done in part because the character of Tootie was twelve, while Kim Fields was only nine (turning ten), and it was thought the extra height would make Fields appear older. A notable appearance during the first season's final episode, titled "Dope", was future Academy Award winner Helen Hunt.[1] [edit] Second season and beyondAfter its initial thirteen-episode run, the show was retooled extensively. The producers felt that there were too many characters given the limitations of the half-hour sitcom format, and that the plot lines should be more focused to give the remaining girls more distinct personalities. Four of the original actresses — Julie Anne Haddock (Cindy), Julie Piekarski (Sue Ann), Felice Schachter (Nancy), and Molly Ringwald (Molly) — were written out of the show (although the four did make periodic appearances in the second and third seasons, and one "reunion" in the eighth season). Coincidentally, Felice Schachter was the first actress hired when the show was in its initial stages, and was the first actress to be let go following the retooling. Further, the character of Mr. Bradley was also dropped, and replaced with an occasionally seen headmaster. In addition to being housemother to the girls – wealthy, spoiled Blair Warner, chubby, fun-loving Natalie Green, and nosey, gossipy Tootie Ramsey – Mrs. Garrett became the school dietitian as the second season began, and Jo Polniaczek a new student originally from the Bronx, who was street-wise and rough-around-the-edges, arrived at Eastland on scholarship. A run-in with the law forced the four to be separated from the other girls, and forced to work in the cafeteria and live together in a spare room next to Mrs. Garrett's bedroom. The focus of the show shifted to the four itinerant girls, and the action shifted to the school cafeteria and lounge. The series was given a berth on the 1980-81 American network television schedule, and the show was a constant Top 30 hit for most of the early and mid-1980s. Memorable episodes included Tootie's meeting with Jermaine Jackson, an all-night study session, Tootie's encounter with a teen prostitute, and Jo and Blair's trip to New York City, where spending time with old friends leads them to realize how Eastland has changed them. The series tackled many serious topics, including: suicide, censorship, date rape, alcoholism, drug addiction, breast cancer, abortion, etc. In 1983, Jo and Blair graduate Eastland Academy while Natalie and Tootie are still attending school there. To keep the four girls under one roof, the plot involved Raymond, Mrs. Garrett's son, buying a bakery for her and convincing her to go into business for herself; she names it Edna's Edibles. The four girls come to work for her and live in one of the rooms at the attached house. The show became part of NBC's much-watched Saturday night lineup in 1985, but by this time, the main actors were now in their late teens and early twenties, and public interest was starting to wane. In an attempt to increase ratings, Mrs. Garrett's store, Edna's Edibles, was burned to the ground and was replaced with a pop culture-influenced gift shop that the girls ran together, called Over Our Heads. This phase of the show is notable for including a then-unknown George Clooney as a supporting actor. During season 9, a young Mayim Bialik, future star of Blossom, appears in the final two episodes of the show, along with Seth Green and Juliette Lewis. In addition to inflatable palm trees, the gift shop sold a few records, and this offshoot business was the springboard for many appearances by popular groups and singers, such as Jermaine Jackson, El DeBarge, Michael Damian, and Stacey Q. [edit] Departure of Mrs. GarrettThe ratings continued to fall in 1986. At first, Charlotte Rae reduced her role and later decided to leave the series completely. In the eighth season premiere, Mrs. Garrett announces that she is getting married to the man of her dreams and will be joining her new husband in Africa while he works for the Peace Corps. The episode introduces Mrs. Garrett's sister, Beverly Ann Stickle (Cloris Leachman), whom Mrs. Garrett convinces to take over the shop and look after the girls. Beverly Ann was never seen prior to this episode, but was mentioned when Mrs. Garrett was on Diff'rent Strokes. In Season 7's "Stake-Out Blues", Beverly Ann is referenced as Mrs. Garrett plans a trip to help her sister deal with her messy divorce. (Incidentally, Charlotte Rae named the character Beverly Ann after her own sister.) During this time, Beverly Ann legally adopts "Over Our Heads" worker Andy Moffett (Mackenzie Astin) and Australian exchange student Pippa McKenna (Sherrie Krenn), who attends Eastland Academy. [edit] CancellationBy the fall of 1987, the show, which had ranked in the Top 30 just two years before, now lagged behind, rarely ranking above #40, and it dragged down the rest of the night's lineup as a result (which, at the time, had Top 20 hits in The Golden Girls and 227). In a last-ditch attempt to raise the ratings, the show's writers created a storyline in which Natalie became the first of the girls to lose her virginity. Originally, Lisa Whelchel was offered the storyline, but she was a devout born-again Christian and premarital sex conflicted with her morals. (Ironically, it also conflicted with the first season episode titled "Facts of Love" in which Blair wanted to treat sex in a casual manner, but her boyfriend wanted to have a committed relationship with her prior to having sex.) Finally, Mindy Cohn volunteered to Blair's part and Whelchel was not in the credit in that episode. Three of the girls who were cut from the show after the first season returned in the second-to-last season for a "reunion of friends" in an episode titled, "The Little Chill." Julie Ann Haddock, Julie Piekarski, and Felice Schacter reprised their roles of Cindy, Sue Ann, and Nancy, mentioning that Molly was unable to attend the reunion because she was so busy (a nod to actress Molly Ringwald's successful film career after her departure). However, the ratings showed little improvement, and the show was eventually cancelled in the spring of 1988. The producers had hoped to keep the show going by using the final episode as a backdoor pilot for a potential new spinoff in which Blair impulsively bought Eastland Academy, made it co-ed, and became the new headmistress. In addition to Cindy, Sue Ann, Nancy, and Molly, was the recurring character of Geri Tyler (Geri Jewell), Blair's cousin who had cerebral palsy. Other recurring characters included the judgment-impaired Miko Wakamatsu (Lauren Tom), the snobbish Boots St. Clair (Jami Gertz), and the royal princess Alexandra (Heather McAdam). Shoplifter Kelly (Pamela Segall) was billed as a regular during the fifth season. Other guest roles included the boyfriends of the girls, Jo's parents, played by Alex Rocco and Claire Malis, Blair's parents, played by Nicolas Coster and Marj Dusay (Blair's mother was played by Pam Huntington in one episode during the first season), Tootie's parents (Tootie's mother was played by Kim Fields' real life mom, actress Chip Fields, and her father was played by Robert Hooks), and Natalie's parents, played by Norman Burton and Mizi Hoag. (Natalie's grandmother was played by Molly Picon and appeared in two episodes.) A 1984 episode was built around Natalie coming to terms with the sudden death of her dad. Characters from Diff'rent Strokes also appeared in some first and second season episodes. Some quirky episodes took place in the last few seasons, evoking The Golden Girls, The Twilight Zone, and a sixties-ish episode guest-starring Bobby Rydell and Fabian. [edit] Attempted spin-offsMuch like what had been done with The Facts of Life parent show, Diff'rent Strokes, NBC attempted to use the popularity of The Facts of Life to launch a successful spin-off show, but none of the proposed shows ever made it past the pilot stage. The various attempts at spin-offs were backdoor pilots, which were shown as episodes of The Facts of Life. These episodes include:
[edit] Controversy[edit] Geri JewellThe Facts of Life was one of the first television shows to feature a person with cerebral palsy as a recurring character.[3] In an interview as part of an episode of E! True Hollywood Story, Geri Jewell stated that she believed she was going to continue as a recurring character on the show during the sixth season, but the producers offered her only one episode for the season because viewers would immediately assume that any episode with Cousin Geri would be a "very special episode". Jewell stated that she stopped appearing on the show for this reason. [edit] WeightAnother issue during the show's early seasons concerned the stars' appearances. Lisa Whelchel has stated in various interviews, including on E! True Hollywood Story, that the cast spent a lot of time on set doing nothing, so the natural inclination for many of them was to eat, as food was readily available all over the set. This noticeably affected the girls' appearances, leading Joan Rivers to dub them "The Fats of Life" during the cast's appearance at the Emmy Awards; the producers eventually restricted what the actors could eat while on set. Mindy Cohn, in the E! True Hollywood Story, stated that the situation was the exact opposite for her. She had been losing weight during this period, and the producers asked her to stop because her character was known for being overweight. Cohn said the producers compromised with her regarding her weight by dressing her in baggy clothing to make her appear heavier than she was. [edit] Syndication
[edit] VHS and DVD releases[edit] VHS releasesIn 2001, Columbia House released The Facts of Life: The Collector's Edition, a 10-volume "Best of" the series on VHS (40 episodes in all). Since Sony, the company which now distributes the Columbia library, focuses more on DVDs, the tapes have been discontinued and can only be found on websites such as amazon and eBay at higher prices than they were originally sold.
[edit] DVD releasesSony Pictures Home Entertainment released the first two seasons on DVD in Region 1 on May 9, 2006 with new interviews with most of the cast, including Season 1 originals Felice Schachter and Julie Anne Haddock (now Julie Anne Becker). To promote the DVD's release, McKeon, Whelchel, and Cohn appeared together on various shows such as Entertainment Tonight, Today Show and CNN Showbiz to reminisce about their time on the show and talk about their lives; unfortunately, Fields was unable to take part due to other commitments. Seasons 1 and 2 proved to be such a success that Season 3 was immediately planned for release on October 24, 2006.
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Categories: American television sitcoms | NBC network shows | Video on demand series | Television spin-offs | Television series by Sony Pictures Television | American comedy-drama television series | Teen dramas | High school television series | 1979 television series debuts | 1970s American television series | 1980s American television series | 1988 television series endings | Television shows set in New York | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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