Designing Women has been remastered in high definition widescreen on Hulu

'Designing Women,' one of the best shows ever...so much better than the Golden Girls.

I imagine we will get a Blu-ray set soon. But the question is: will it be in the original aspect ratio or the new widescreen ratio?

Is Jean Smart sitting on a toilet for full length episodes?

I hope they can get Julia Duffy and Judith Ivey to do commentary

Looks good! The technology for 4:3 to 16:9 transfers has improved a lot. Previously, everything looked stretched horizontally, and there would be a noticeable decrease in resolution.

Unfortunately, the technology applied here isn’t likely to work for TV shows that were originally videotaped (e.g. Golden Girls), because the resolution of those shows is limited to 640 x 480, where as filmed shows have enough resolution to create HD digital versions.

But who knows, maybe upscaling technology will improve, and taped shows will look nearly as good as filmed shows when digitized.

The pictures in OP's link look fabulous!

^^^^^^Whereas, not where as.

R1 Designing Women and Golden Girls were (despite featuring all female casts) fundamentally different shows. DW was a much more politically charged and concept based, while GGs was more character humor. Don't get me wrong, I really like both but GGs has a much more timeless feel than DW.

I wish GG had been filmed rather than taped because I would love to see the ladies in HD. Bea Arthur would look even more manly.

Who asked for this?

R9, I did actually.

I stopped binge re-watching Designing Women because of the cuts on both Hulu and Amazon Prime Video. Also, the dialog’s monaural sound track was off-center on both streaming sites.

Both problems have been corrected now on Hulu, and the improved video quality is a new plus. I’m ready to resume my binge watch now.

Designing Women is one of the greatest TV shows of all time.

I have never seen this show. Is it worth watching?

Very much so! There’s even a few episodes related to lesbians. Quite well done for 1986.

Here’s a photo I captured from my TV.

R5 & R8 There's a YouTube channel called GoldenGirlsHD that's done some great restoration.

The episodes are split into 4-5 minute clips.

R13 "Designing Women" is very preachy about feminist issues. If that's your thing, you'll love it.

Hopefully is an improvement all around. One episode I saw on there had the wrong closing credits.

Did they correct the opening sequences as well so it's not just the syndicated opening for every episode.

I don't think we need to see Delta Burke in HD.

Technically, it’s in 4K.

We know who you are, Ray Don.

I’m glad to hear this. The original footage was transferred to tape for its initial distribution and even on DVD this was very obvious. Glad it’s cleaned up so beautifully.

It doesn't look any better than it did before. The digital transfer is still fuzzy. There's only so much they can do with this cheap film.

But just to be safe, I'm re-watching the classic episode "Cruising," with the catty steward who swipes Suzanne's wig so he can moonlight as Bette Davis AND Joan Collins.

R24 I noticed the early “Frasier” episodes are very grainy in the remaster. They must’ve used film stock that wasn’t meant to be seen in high resolution.

“Cheers”, on the other hand, looks absolutely gorgeous.

There are apparently two ways to remaster old film into digital: The expensive and time-consuming method, like they did for Star Trek TNG (which goes frame by frame and makes it look like a whole new show), and the cheap method (which sharpens images a bit, but looks grainy on big screens.

They did the latter, of course.

Thanks for the heads up, OP. I’m almost glad it’s not a super restoration. We would be staring at Annie’s pores for 30 minute stretches.

Honestly, if they did do a release with commentary, Delta Burke would be the only one I’d want to hear from. Maybe Julia Duffy but there’s no way in hell.

“ It’ a Christmas Tree Skirt “

It looks grainy because it wasn’t digitally scrubbed and it’s also cropped to 16:9 instead of 4:3.

I don't know why everything originally in 4:3 has to be converted to 16:9 these days. Are people that stupid and bothered by the black bars on the sides and want their entire tv screens practically filled in?

So many people have told me to upgrade from my 32" TV to something much larger. I'm satisfied with my TV the way it is until that planned obsolescence bullshit kicks in in a few years and I'm forced to get a new one.

I don't need a TV that takes up an entire wall of my apartment like most people think they do. I have better and more important things to spend my money on.

Ditto. Bunch a size queens they are…

DVD cropping

2025 cropping:

Click on the image to see full size

I'm watching the pilot now. The original opening credits are back and I can't believe how bad Annie Potts is overacting in the first scene. Hopefully the director of this episode never worked again.

It doesn't look much better, but I'm glad the cuts are back in. I can't wait for the Carlene's Apartment episode!

I just watched the wilderness challenge episode and it’s hysterical. Denny Dillon is so funny in it.

DW is such a comforting show for me.

The Thomasons, bless them had some of the worst set designs on TV. Julia’s house layout never made any sense. The living room is huge and cavernous and there’s a full kitchen in it, but no table and chairs in the vicinity. And why was Julia’s bedroom door on the same side of the front entrance.

Evening Shade was similar. They lived in a huge house yet the living room, kitchen and dining room were crammed together in one small area.

I don't see much evidence of a restoration.

The opening credits are totally pixelated on an average size smart TV.

As for the episodes themselves, everyone looks like they're swimming through silty pond water.

[quote]I can't wait for the Carlene's Apartment episode!

They showed that one on one of the boomer rerun channels today. So funny! I love Carlene's unintentionally (?) bitchy comment to Mary Jo after she comes in ranting. "Mary Jo, I hate to interrupt you. Your morning monologues are always so witty." Hooks' delivery is hilarious.

I stopped watching when Smart left.

The Thomasons' tackiest move, apart from their gushing hillbilly love for the Clintons, was how formulaic the intro to every episode was.

Mary Jo storms in, telling some story of annoyance with her kids or some article she's just read by a "Northern" journalist insulting Southerners. She gesticulates wildly while recounting the story of her trampy daughter or a columnist calling Atlanta a shithole.

Julia sits stone-faced, sipping coffee out of a teacup.

Suzanne waves her hand in a "fiddle-dee-dee" gesture, and makes some clumsy comment about poor people.

Charlene pulls off one of her cinderblock-sized earrings and makes a twangy comment about used car salesmen named Elvis, an utter non-sequitur.

Mary Jo recounts the last time she and Julia left the building, whereupon they were catcalled by males. Charlene insists that Julia recount what the men said, and she eventually does.

Bernice barges in wearing a Hardee's uniform as a ball gown.

ROLL CREDITS!

R42 Now THAT’S ENTERTAINMENT!

[quote]Suzanne waves her hand in a "fiddle-dee-dee" gesture, and makes some clumsy comment about poor people.

Fiddle-dee-dee?

It’s quite clear why I have idiot R42 blocked.

r42 is some white girl.

Remastered via AI. Netflix is doing it now with old shows and calling it remastered too.

Wrong R47. Rescanning the original negatives in 4K resolution is not upscaling with AI.

I just tried to watch an episode and the snowy grain is awful.

The grain means the detail has not been scrubbed out just like a little hiss with analog tape.

Is Anthony a fag now?

Are you insinuating I'm a Miss Valdosta Feed and Grain?

I would love to see delta Burke back on television.

I wish they would write a guest role for Delta in Jean Smart's show, "Hacks."

BLACK MAN! BLACK MAN! WHERE DID YOU COME FROM?!

Another show where the set didn't match the exterior shot of the alleged house at all.

They could have made a half-hearted attempt and stuck a tall bay window behind Charlene's desk, but they didn't care.

Lazy.

Lol @ 42. You forgot Anthony walking in while the women talk about their period cramps and is about to walk out. THen Charlene stops him and asks if he thinks women really care about how big a man's package is. Then Anthony will go off on a tangent about his unfortunate incarceration and T. Tommy Reed asking him to toss his salad.

Oops (42)

Maybe everyone already knows the actual house ‘’The Villa Marre ‘’ ( Exterior only ) is in Little Rock AR and is nothing like the interior set.

I was a young teen when it came on and had a crush on Julia's hunky college-aged son.

Suzanne (to Julia about her son): I was always worried with him being an only child, and you being his mother, he could quite easily have grown up to be a homosexual. Also, it doesn't help that Payne is a homosexual name.

I always did think Payne was a weird name. Pain.

I'm rewatching the first season and have noticed a few things:

They changed background details on the main set every single episode but ignored the interior/exterior mismatch.

Annie Potts had zero tits. Flat as a board. Not even evident nipples. With that and all the shrieking, what did cute J.D. Shackelford see in her?

Jean Smart was a superstar from the beginning. All her line readings and micro-expressions were gold. She was really slept on as an actress for too long and it's great she finally got her due.

R62 did you notice the fireplace disappeared?

All kinds of things popped up and disappeared, R63.

Meanwhile, the "kitchen" area — with a half-sink and half-refrigerator — sufficed for a fully prepared Thanksgiving dinner, the storeroom remained the size of a postage stamp, and the door to the second-floor bedrooms opened into air and a straight drop to the ground, according to the exterior.

It's square fish, Phyllis.

Don't forget that Julia had a beautiful formal dining room in the episode where she took temporary custody of the bratty child client. I guess Thanksgiving wasn't enough of an occasion to have dinner in there.

Julia founded the company, and hosted it in her home, but we never really see her qualifications as a designer. She had good taste and knew the right people, but Mary Jo was the trained decorator. Charlene had been Hayden’s secretary, and Suzanne was the investor and salesperson.

Was it all just Julia’s widowhood hobby?

[quote]J.D. Shackelford

Richard Gilliland was fucking sex on a stick in his prime.

R64 That was only the door to Julia's bedroom, I believe.

I like the interior, but like the Connecticut house in I Love Lucy, it seemed there was a lot of open and empty space.

R64 I always thought that the front area was remodeled to be the official "storefront", while the real kitchen/dining/living area was in the back. I mean, it is (or at least from the exterior shots, appears to be) a giant house.

The front interior set of the Designing Women mansion is basically just a slightly reworked version of the front interior set of The Nanny mansion. I could imagine the Sugarbaker space looking a lot like that before the theoretical remodeling. I mean, the Sugarbaker house is obviously much larger than the brownstone in The Nanny, so I see no reason why there would be room in the back for a formal dining room, giant kitchen, bathroom, and study in one house and not the other.

The only problem of course is we see the back door/patio clearly from the back of the storefront in the Sugarbaker house, so I'm not sure where the back living area part would fit in. But that's kind of like the Golden Girls' house, where technically the garage would be the girls' bedrooms. It defies the laws of physics but we just ignore it to accommodate the story.

Suzanne and Mary Jo had nicer and bigger houses than Julia. Their husbands must have been wealthier.

Mary Jo had a much smaller house. Did you see the exterior establishing shot?

Wasn't Julia's house the Sugarbaker's family home that was passed down to her?

R72, Mary Jo's house is bigger on the inside.

I'm glad they got rid of Charlene's giant wicker chair from season one. It was ridiculous looking.

"Yes, that's right. What we're getting is a 1989 van. But I have a little news bulletin for ya, Stan: IT'S 1990!!!!" :D

Dixie Carter said Annie Potts was as good an actress as Meryl Streep

The New Orleans episode might be my favorite.

Consuela uela, bo bela, banana fana fo fela, CONSUELA

Just watched a few S1 episodes. They no longer have the awkward transition that happens at least once an episode.

I always wondered how Sugarbaker & Associates could stay open. I'm not questioning the ladies' taste, but it seems like they'd easily alienate clients in various ways (judging their taste, exceeding budgets, butting into their relationships, etc.).

Weren't Sugarbakers constantly on the verge of bankruptcy? I think that's why BJ bought in-she was filthy rich and didn't care if it was a bad investment. She needed friends and these were fun time gals (especially Bernice).

They needed that fourth partner. They needed Suzanne's investment, then when she went to Japan, they needed Alison's. Then it was BJ.

Julia actually gave BJ the business in a poker game, but BJ gave it back on the condition that she be a partner. Which is funny because I don't think they had a single story that season that actually revolved around the business itself. It was Mary Jo seeing Elvis in her shovel, and Julia's charm school coach coming to visit.

The BJ year was horrendous.

[quote] The BJ year was horrendous.

I agree, the writing was terrible-like they just gave up. A total waste of Judith Ivey. By that point, Mary Jo and Julia were beyond shrill and obnoxious and Anthony's marriage to Etienne felt lame and forced. Only a few funny moments here and there with Carlene and Bernice.

So, even if we do, on the particular day, happen to have our head temporarily stuck in a fence, we are not going to take any crap off some 2-bit low level bureaucratic usherette.

So was Jackee definitely intended to be a regular going into season 7? I assume they fired Julia Duffy with that intention and then couldn’t get her back when they decided not to go with Jackee? Or were too embarrassed to ask? Or did Duffy not want to return? Even though her character struggled fitting in it seems odd to cast yet another replacement rather than let the audience keep adjusting to her. The ratings certainly stayed strong during her tenure. Duffy has no credits the year Ivey was on the show so it seems like she could have stayed on in the role another season

I don’t know why I’m so fascinated by the train wreck years of Designing Women but I am. I’d love a juicy tell-all but I don’t think any of the surviving participants would ever go there

Season 7 was indeed a trainwreck, one of the worst final seasons of a previously classic show in TV history.

The BJ character was boring, and without the bitchy conflict provided by Suzanne/Allison, Julia and Mary Jo got loonier to compensate. It was against their characters and destroyed the show.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason was distracted by her other shows, the previous very capable EP Pam Norris had left, and season 7 was in the hands of two hacks (Dee LaDuke and Mark Alton Brown) who were not up to the task and, after that season, barely worked in TV again, except for a Pauly Shore sitcom.

But LaDuke somehow dares to show her face as a screenwriting professor at Fordham to this day.

No love for LaDuke and Brown's Jackie's Back?

I think I saw Jackee Harry in an interview say that Dixie Carter did not like her. Dixie also had issues with Gary Coleman on Diff'rent Strokes. I'm seeing a trend there.

There was a DL thread on Jackeé vs. Dixie.

On Twitter, Jackeé said that she was intended to be a regular on DW but:

[quote]Unfortunately, Dixie Carter and I did NOT get a long. At all

[quote] Chile, she was a republican. Acted like one too. 😝

[Quote]I'm seeing a trend there.

She hated working with the talentless?

According to the DL thread at R90, Dixie had a problem with blacks and effeminate gay men.

R92 If that were the case, then why would she launch the career of that chubby little priss, Marc Cherry? She gave him his first job in television.

I think Marc Cherry picked up her dry cleaning. He wasn't writing for her.

From what I remember, If Delta had stayed, the storyline would have had Anthony and Suzanne become a couple and then marry. The show had been slowly inching up to it, especially moments of the fifth season.

Delta and Jean should've have never left or at least returned full time for the final season. Jan Hooks was great, Julia Duffy was terrible and Judith Ivey is a great actress too but her time was wasted with the paper thin cardboard cutout of a character they had her playing.

The last two seasons were a lot worse than when Marc Cherry fucked up the Golden Girls with the excessive character flanderization and dialing up the camp to 11. He and Ryan Murphy seriously both need to learn that less is more. For fuck's sake.

Ugh. Now that it's in Hi-Def you'll definitely be able to see that Hal Holbrook always looked like he was about five days past his last shower.

Jan Hooks was wasted on Carlene. She was dumb as a goddamn post. At least Allison and BJ had more than one trait.

Jan knew that 7th season was failing because she hauled her ass back east to be on SNL for guest appearances. I think that tanked her from getting another gig at CBS. All for that Phil Hartman dick (allegedly).

Jean Smart got out while the getting was good.

Annie has been talking more lately about the medical reason behind her distinctive limp. Poor girl.

Yes, Annie Potts was in a very bad car crash that left her ridden with pain. She was able to hide it in her younger years but arthritis has caught up.

The thing about Annie, Jean, and Delta is they seem like old friends I’ve known for years even in real life. They’re great actresses, but some of their real life persona spills out and shows how special they are.

While I agree that season 7 is 100% a train wreck, I still love watching those episodes. The disastrous nature of them is entertaining in a strange way, plus the way they crank Bernice up from charmingly eccentric to dangerously unhinged is hilarious to me. On the other hand, I find watching almost any season 6 episode a chore.

I love R60s quote. I love the way Delta said "homaSEXshul."

I just watched the one with Mary Jo wanting to get fake tits. Still makes me laugh out loud, and Annie Potts is hilarious in it.

One of my other favorites is Suzanne taking Mary Jo to the supermarket to learn how to meet men. “ Mary Jo, men do not come up and talk to a woman who is wheelin' around a 25 pound sack of dog food and a big box of Kotex!”

"There's some Black People Comin' to Dinner!"

"EXCUSE ME! EXCUSE ME!"

I can't believe that half the cast is dead. So many of them died prematurely. Dixie, Meshach, Alice Ghostley, Jan Hooks and Mary Ann Mobley are all gone.

R11, I agree! Some of DW’s funniest lines were cut.

Mary Ann Mobley did one episode. Hardly part of the cast

The Gone with the Wind two parter was a weak way to end the series. Even if Delta was still iced out from the show at that time, they should have done everything they could to bring Jean back for one last appearance.

Did they know that would be the last episode? There are times the decision isn't made until the summer hiatus. I've seen several of "The Jeffersons" cast complain about their unannounced demise.

Had the show been picked up for another disastrous season, Dixie and Annie would've left it. They were both done after seven.

I believe the producers thought they were getting another season and that the show was cancelled after filming had wrapped on the seventh season so they had no way to wrap up the series.

I love the episode too with Suzanne helping Mary Jo find a man. "Oh look there's a couple of guys. Forget it, two guys one cart, fresh pasta. Think about it."

Could Jan Hooks and Judith Ivey have carried season eight as the sole leads?

r114 With good writing, probably

When I watched this show as a kid, I didn’t think the BJ and Carlene years were horrible. They just weren’t as good as the years with Suzanne and Charlene.

The episode where Allison loses her wig to expose her frizzy red hair while locked in a jail cell is priceless!

Was Dixie on her way out? I know that Annie was, but I didn't know Dixie was ready to go. I figured if there was going to be an eighth season, the regular cast would be Julia, Carlene, BJ, Anthony, Etienne, and maybe finally Bernice (since she was a de facto series regular by this time).

I just looked it up on IMDB. Alice Ghostley was in 15 of the seventh season's 22 episodes, including the last 11 in a row.

Wasn't Alice Ghostly showing signs of dementia while on the show? I thought I remembered reading the cast dreaded episodes when she appeared because she slowed down taping nights. Maybe I'm mixing her up with Estelle Getty

Was Aunt Bernice in from the first season of DW or was she the show's cousin Oliver?

She wasn’t anyone’s aunt, and she was in it from the first season.

"I'll be puttin' on mah dancin' shoes!"--Bernice to Daddy Jones in the tornado episode.

[quote]When I watched this show as a kid, I didn’t think the BJ and Carlene years were horrible. They just weren’t as good as the years with Suzanne and Charlene.

No, the BJ year was awful. I will say the Julia Duffy year had some good episodes, and strong writing.

The last season, by contrast, just has shitty storylines, and bad overacting.

I will say as much as Judith Ivey gets criticized for her performance on the show, the best episode by far of that year was when she thinks that her late husband cheated on her. It was the only one that had the spirit of the show.

Judith Ivey’s cartoonish accent and tacky costumes were overdone by half. Texas women don’t talk like that. Hell, Oklahoma women don’t talk like that. She was over-practiced and it was overdone.

She recycled the bad twang on Will and Grace, where she played Leo’s mother.

[quote]Wasn't Alice Ghostly showing signs of dementia while on the show? I thought I remembered reading the cast dreaded episodes when she appeared because she slowed down taping nights.

I remember reading an account by a screenwriting student at the time whose professor hooked him up with tickets to the tapings, so he saw much of season 6 being done.

Supposedly Alice Ghostley went up on her lines a lot and required retakes/pickups. It's pretty evident in the show; there are often awkward cuts in Bernice's scenes.

“I liked to never got this thing on!”

R126 “Bernice, it’s a Christmas tree skirt. It’s for your…Christmas tree.”

Remember when she worked a shift at Burger Guy and sang “Misty” into the drive-thru intercom?

I liked the Allison/Carlene season 6, at least the first half when the writing was better. I think they showrunners caved to the pressure because Julia Duffy wasn't Delta Burke. She was a totally different type of character and was a good shift in show direction IMO.

It wasn't Allison's fault, she had OPD-Obnoxious Personality Disorder!

I thought Duffy's character got better as the season went on. But the damage had been done by then. I think Julia said she knew her days on the show were numbered starting halfway through the season.

But she was particularly good in Mamed and the All About Eve songwriting episode.

I loved Bernice.Those resentful bitches should have been happy just to still be on TV!

Julia: Let's don't engage Bernice, she's in that belligerent mode.

Bernice: Hell, I don't wanna be engaged to any of you either.

“Here. Have a WHORE-d'oeuvre.”

It's really only a problem for the early seasons. Once Delta packs it on, they change the lighting and the picture looks clear.