The Golden Girls - casting mistakes

To me the big casting mistake was how ugly so many of the men dates were.

[quote]To me the big casting mistake was how ugly so many of the men dates were.

Really, R1, like who?

Of all the men the girls dated, married or had sex with, [bold]Ham Lushbough[/bold], [bold]Laszlo[/bold] the Hungarian artist and Sophia’s boyfriend [bold]Rocco[/bold] (Mickey Rooney) are the only unattractive ones who immediately come to mind.

Alex Rocco & Jerry Orbach (Dorothy’s married boyfriend [italic]Glen O’Brien[/italic]) were meh but not ugly. Ditto for [bold]Jason[/bold] (Alan Rachins), the guy Blanche dates while pretending to be the mother of her granddaughter.

[bold]Eddie[/bold] the love machine that a dating service matched Dorothy with was also meh.

[bold]Fidel Santiago[/bold] and [bold]Murray Guttman[/bold] were old but looked age appropriate for Sophia.

Overall, looks wise they all did pretty good.

Fat Ham was hideous and that episode/plot was stupid

They all had a turn with actor [bold]Patrick Vaughn[/bold].

[bold]Al Beatty[/bold] and [bold]Kendall Nesbitt[/bold] were played by the same actor, he died of a heart attack while having sex with Rose in an early episode and was Blanche’s boss/date in The Case of The Libertine Belle.

Dorothy:

[quote][bold]Ken the lawyer/clown[/bold] (Dick Van Dyke), [bold]John Noretti[/bold] (Hal Linden), Blanche’s [bold]Uncle Lucas[/bold] Hollingsworth (Leslie Neilson), [bold]Stan’s brother[/bold] played by McClean Stevenson, [bold]Lyle Waggoner[/bold] (dreams count), the [bold]Beetlemania guy[/bold] played by the actor who played Bernie in Weekend at Bernies.

Blanche:

[quote][bold]George[/bold] (George Grizzard), [bold]Jake the caterer[/bold] (Donnelly Rhodes), [bold]John Quinn[/bold] (Edward Winter), [bold]Rex Huntington[/bold], [bold]Stevie the cross-dressing baseball player[/bold], Kevin McCarthy as [bold]the rich guy with two young kids[/bold], TV news anchor [bold]Jerry Kennedy[/bold] (Peter Graves), Fred Willard as the virgin, Ken Howard, [bold]Simon[/bold] (Robert Culp) the guy Blanche is dating when she gets the pacemaker, [bold]Stephen[/bold] played by the guy who played Chester Tate, [bold]Mel Bushman[/bold] (Alan King), Bruce Kirby the [bold]war veteran pharmacist[/bold], the [bold]jewel thief[/bold] at the Moonlight Madness party, the [bold]jerk in the wheelchair[/bold], twins [bold]Rob & Bob[/bold],

Sophia:

[quote][/bold]Tony Delveccio[/bold] (Cesar Romero), she spent Valentine’s Day with Julio Iglesias and a random night with Burt Reynolds.

Rose:

[quote][/bold]Skipper[/bold] from St. Olaf (Ken Berry), Miles Weber/Arnie Peterson,

Rose’s list should be longer, Mr. Terrific, Dr. Jonathan Newman and the Cheeseman are the only other boyfriends I remember.

The casting wasn't the problem, but how realistic was the Japanese gardener? The girls lived on a fixed income--always having trouble paying for unexpected things that needed repairing/replacing, yet they could afford a Japanese gardener? He probably had degrees in horticulture and botany, and you know that's expensive. Why would they pay for an expert gardener when they could hire a 'fresh off the boat' Cuban for 1/3 the price?

Um, two Jewish women about a year apart in age as Italian mother and daughter?

The casting choices worked, but the continuity errors were so irritating.

I thought the casting of Lucy was good, she was not that attractive and was supposed to have low self-esteem so would do anything with a guy, which is why she got dropped because she let them do 'anything' on the first date.

R7 it is strange to binge watch older shows that had no concept of knowing the level of re-watching that would be done in the future and how jarring the re-casting of certain players would be without the actual year between seasons.

I actually like it when an actor keeps popping up - that means they clicked with the cast and had fun. They don’t invite anathemas to come back and play.

GG was ridiculous about continuity though. Entire past histories were forgotten completely and reimagined. Numbers and genders of children were peppered about randomly. Yeah I’d like to “picture it”, Sophia, but your big fish stories change so much that I can’t seem to make it come in clear, ya dig? Somebody start writing that shit down! Making that Paul Junger Witt money and nobody can be bothered to pick up a pencil? Shameful

Speaking of the gals and their beaus, I always had a crush on Harold Gould. In fact, he played two characters on the show, proving my earlier point about recurring actors! He and Betty had good chemistry and were both quite sexy in their autumn, imho

Betty White.

I have to say, I never understood the casting of the second Kirsten, Lee Garlington just does not fit in any way as Rose's daughter. She reads as a little too world-weary and blue-collar for Rose's daughter, especially in light of the other two actors cast as Rose's daughters.

R12 I thought Kirsten #2 was better cast than Kirsten #1, whom I found too hard-looking and sounding to be Rose's daughter. She overpowered Rose in their scenes together.