ENDED TV SERIES

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This series follows four unique Southern women and one loyal and hilarious man as they run Sugarbaker’s, an interior design firm in Atlanta, Georgia.

The Sugarbaker sisters Julia (Dixie Carter) and Suzanne (Delta Burke) co-own the firm, while Mary Jo Shively (Annie Potts) and Charlene Frazier (Jean Smart) both work as the designer and office manager and invest in the business. Completing the line-up is delivery man Anthony Bouvier (Meshach Taylor), a former prison inmate falsely convicted of robbery.

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Julia Sugarbaker (Dixie Carter) – Julia is the older of the Sugarbaker sisters and a mother of a grown-up son, Payne McElroy (George Newbern). She is liberal, outspoken and passionate about her beliefs. Julia’s husband Hayden McElroy, Payne’s father and the one true love of her life, has recently died following a series of heart attacks, leaving her alone and facing an uncertain future. She and Suzanne decide to run an interior design business from her home and bring Mary Jo and Charlene on board as investors and co-workers. By now, Julia is involved with sexy older lawyer Reese Watson (Hal Holbrook). Also widowed, Reese is the one person in the world she’ll allow to occasionally put her in her place!

Suzanne Sugarbaker (Delta Burke) – Suzanne is Julia’s younger sister and her polar opposite. The former Miss Georgia 1975, Suzanne is self-centered, hates to work and goes through husbands like Kleenex. The real love of her life was the first of her three husbands, writer Dash Goff (Gerald McRaney), who still shows up every so often. Other characters orbiting Suzanne’s life include her unlikely best friend, Anthony, her Hispanic and apparently crazy voodoo-cursing maid, Consuela (who never appears on screen), and her pet pig, Noelle. Suzanne’s many eccentricities include a fascination with guns.

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Mary Jo Shively (Annie Potts) – Pretty redhead Mary Jo is the recently divorced mother of two children, Claudia (Priscilla Weems) and Quinton (Brian Lando) whom she shares custody of with her gynecologist ex-husband, Ted (Scott Bakula). Shy at first, some time with Julia and the others soon sees her become bolder and more independent. Mary Jo is in a relationship with a talent scout for the Atlanta Braves, J.D. Shackelford (Richard Gilliland), whom she met courtesy of a blind date arranged by Suzanne. At first the date looked unlikely to go well, with Mary Jo finding J.D. callous and rude; but things looked up when she realized his attitude was a result of nerves. Like Mary Jo, J.D. is recently divorced and has children. A sarcastic wit, Mary Jo is known for poking fun at the exploits of Suzanne and later her cousin, Allison, as well as for her fascination with large breasts (she herself is flat-chested).

Charlene Frazier (Jean Smart) – Charlene is the office manager. She hails from Poplar Bluff, Missouri, a small town where she and her twelve siblings were raised by her Baptist parents, Bud and Dot Frazier. Big-hearted but naïve, Charlene doesn’t have a good track record with men and has found herself the target of con-men in the past. Still believing that everyone has some good in them, she hasn’t given up trying to find a prince amongst the frogs. Charlene is a devoted fan of Elvis Presley, Mickey Gilley and Jerry Lee Lewis and has strong feelings about World War II, wishing that she could have met every soldier at port.

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Anthony Bouvier (Meshach Taylor) – Kind and loyal Anthony is Sugarbaker’s delivery man. He’s had a hard life, raised by his grandmother after being abandoned by his drug addict mother, he was later mixed up in a robbery at a convenience store and wrongfully convicted of the crime. After his release from prison, things look up for Anthony when he starts working for Sugarbaker’s and finds supportive friends in the women there. Over time his life improves dramatically as he attends law school and becomes a partner in the Sugarbaker firm.

Carlene Dobber (Jan Hooks) – Carlene is Charlene’s younger sister and is also recently divorced. Like her sister she is naive and trusting, but she is more of a country girl than Charlene. She wants to become a singer, but her talent doesn’t match her aspirations. While she and Mary Jo become firm friends after she takes over Charlene’s job, she never grows close to Julia or Suzanne’s cousin, Allison, who buys Suzanne’s shares in the firm.

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Allison Sugarbaker (Julia Duffy) – Allison is Julia and Suzanne’s cousin and daughter of their Uncle Frank. After buying Suzanne’s shares in the business, the others are surprised when she comes to Atlanta to take over Suzanne’s role, claiming that far from being a silent partner she has a controlling interest in the firm. Trying to get the rest of the staff to follow a host of new policies, it’s not surprising that Allison’s arrival creates waves. Soon the rest of the team make their position clear and things get back to normal, but the damage is done; Allison is never accepted as one of the Sugarbaker’s gang. Her behavior and her unlucky love life is perhaps explained by Allison’s difficult upbringing as the daughter of emotionally distant parents.

B.J. Poteet (Judith Ivey) – B.J., real name Bonnie Jean, is originally from Texas, where she was a Houston court reporter. Now a wealthy widow living in Atlanta, she has invested all her money in Sugarbaker’s following the death of her husband, James Poteet of Poteet Industries. A recovering alcoholic she, like Julia, loves to give her opinion on any topic. Cut from a different cloth to the others, B.J. is nevertheless kind, funny and down-to-earth and fits perfectly into the Sugarbaker’s team.

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Main Cast

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Additional Cast

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Trivia

As a child, Dixie Carter (Julia Sugarbaker) wanted to become an opera singer but a botched tonsillectomy at the age of seven ended her dream. She did, however, have a beautiful singing voice and studied classical music. She was able to play the trumpet, piano and the harmonica.

Annie Potts (Mary Jo Shively) has been married four times and has three children, all sons. Shortly after her first marriage to college sweetheart Steven Hartley, they were in a serious car accident when their Volkswagen bus was demolished by two drag racing drivers. Her husband lost a leg and Annie broke nearly every bone below her waist, leaving her with chronic arthritis from which she still suffers to this day.

As well as Designing Women, Delta Burke (Suzanne Sugarbaker) starred in Women of the House, Filthy Rich, Delta and DAG. She also had guest spots on several shows, including a brief recurring guest spot on Boston Legal.

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Jean Smart (Charlene Frazier) was diagnosed with juvenile diabetes at the age of 13 and has played an active part in raising awareness of the disease over the years.

Meshach Taylor (Anthony Bouvier) has acted in various television shows and an assortment of films, but is best known for his roles as Designing Women’s Anthony Bouvier and as Hollywood Montrose in the box office hit Mannequin.

Designing Women debuted to respectable ratings, but after several changes of time slots its audience declined and CBS considered cancelling the show. After a viewer campaign it was returned to the air in its original Monday night slot and, helped by going back-to-back with the incredibly popular Candice Bergen series Murphy Brown, it spent the next three years in the top 20 rankings.

Julia Duffy (Allison Sugarbaker) played the spoiled inn maid Stephanie Vanderkellen in the series Newhart for seven seasons. She was also nominated for an Emmy Award seven times but never won.

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Jan Hooks’s (Carlene Dobber) best known work is as a repertory player in the late 80’s and early 90’s on NBC’s Saturday Night Live.

Annie Potts was the original choice for the psychotic character Alex Forrest in the movie Fatal Attraction. She dropped out of the role to star in Designing Women, with Glenn Close giving an iconic performance in her place.

Judith Ivey’s (B.J. Poteet) first movie appearance was in Steve Martin’s The Lonely Guy.

Much like her Designing Women character Suzanne Sugarbaker, Delta Burke was in many pageants when she was younger. She won the title of Miss Florida in 1974 and was paired with Miss Georgia, Gail Nelson, in the 1975 Miss America pageant. Though she did not win Miss America, she did win a talent scholarship from the Miss America Organization, allowing her to study for two years at the distinguished London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art.

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After marrying her first husband Arthur Carter, Dixie Carter left the stage for eight years to focus on raising their two daughters, Ginna and Mary Dixie. She returned to acting when she was 35, but found that no agent was willing to take her on.

Meshach Taylor has been married twice and has four children.

Jean Smart gave birth to her first child, her son Connor Gilliland, in 1989 at the age of 38. She and her husband adopted a second child in May 2009, a little girl named Bonnie.

Annie Potts was the voice of Little Bo Peep in the first two Toy Story movies.

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Julia Duffy married Jerry Lacy in 1984, and they have two children together.

Delta Burke has struggled with her weight and eating disorders since the days when she was in pageants. She also suffers from type-2 diabetes.

During the show’s fourth season Delta Burke told reporter Barbara Walters that filming on the set was unstructured and tiring, with the cast and crew spending 15 to 16 hours a day filming a 25-minute episode. This angered executives at CBS and led to problems with the creators and producers of the show, Harry Thomason and Linda Bloodworth-Thomason. Several months of tensions followed during which actresses Annie Potts and Jean Smart reportedly remained neutral, while Dixie Carter supposedly sided with the producers and cut off almost all contact with Burke. Eventually Burke refused to work and was written out of several episodes. To make matters worse, the press and producers started commenting publicly about Burke’s weight gain. CBS tried negotiating with Burke’s agent but agreement could not be reached and Burke was eventually fired from the series. Surprisingly, Burke did work with the Thomasons again just a few years later, reprising her role as Suzanne Sugarbaker in the series Women of the House. The show was cancelled after only one season.)

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Judith Ivey has been in various television commercials for products such as Gerber baby food, Red Lobster and StaPuf fabric softener.

Annie Potts starred as Elizabeth “Gigi” Stopper in the series GCB. She said that she based her portrayal of the character on former co-star Dixie Carter. She added, “Were she still alive, the role would have been hers and should have been.”

Jean Smart had a recurring role on the popular series Frasier, for which she won two Emmy Awards.

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Dixie Carter was married three times and had two daughters, Mary Dixie and Ginna Carter. Her third and happiest marriage was to actor Hal Holbrook, lasting for nearly thirty years until her sad death at the age of 70 from endometrial cancer.

Jean Smart resigned after Delta Burke was fired, saying that she was simply tired of the show. Julia Duffy and Jan Hooks were drafted in as fresh blood, but the audience did not seem fond of Julia’s character and she was released from her contract after only one season and replaced by Judith Ivey as B.J. Poteet. Despite a more positive response to the character of B.J., the show was cancelled soon afterwards when CBS changed its time slot and its ratings plummeted.

Julia Duffy was seriously considered for the role of Diane Chambers on the hit show Cheers, but lost out to actress Shelly Long. She later guest-starred on the show as a friend of the Diane Chambers character.

Judith Ivey has won two Tony Awards for Best Actress in two different Broadway productions.

Despite her character’s liberal opinions, Dixie Carter was actually a Republican who disagreed with Julia Sugarbaker’s many speeches. She reached an agreement with the producers that allowed her to sing a song for every liberal speech her character made.

Annie Potts went to Stephens College in Missouri, also attended in the 1920’s by famous actress Joan Crawford.

Delta Burke is a firm supporter of gay rights. Her sister, Jennifer, is a lesbian.

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Dixie Carter was the valedictorian of her high school class.

As of 2012, Meshach Taylor is semi-retired.

Probably the biggest guest star on the show was country singer and actress, Dolly Parton. It was Parton herself, a long-time fan of the series, who requested the opportunity and she appeared in a one-hour episode as the “Guardian Movie Star”.

In addition to her eating disorders, diabetes and depression, Delta Burke has received therapy for compulsive hoarding syndrome.

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As well as her work in television, Annie Potts has appeared in popular movies including Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters II, Pretty in Pink, and Who’s Harry Crumb?

Jean Smart married her husband, Richard Gilliland, in a rose garden belonging to her former co-star, Dixie Carter.

A Victorian mansion called the Villa Marre in the Quapaw Quarter district of Little Rock, Arkansas was used for the exterior shots of Sugarbaker’s (which was, of course, also Julia’s house). The exterior shots of Suzanne’s mansion were of another building in the Quapaw Quarter, the Arkansas Governor’s Mansion. Both buildings are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Despite her many performances in theater, films and on Broadway, Judith Ivey is perhaps best remembered for her one season as B.J. Poteet in Designing Women.

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Jan Hooks has appeared in films including Wildcats, Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure, Simon Birch and Batman Returns.

In 2003 while Delta Burke was on the set of a new series called Sweet Potato Queens (which did not get picked up), some of her jewelry, including her engagement ring and wedding band, was stolen. The items were sadly never recovered

Dixie Carter guest-starred on television series Filthy Rich, Law and Order: SVU and Desperate Housewives. Marc Cherry, the creator of Desperate Housewives started out in Hollywood as Carter’s assistant on the Designing Women set.

Delta Burke won the part of Katherine Wentworth in Dallas but had to turn it down due to a holding option on her contract for the series Filthy Rich. The part ended up going to Morgan Brittany.

The series was aired on the Lifetime network for more than a decade but ended in 2006, in spite of its popularity. In 2003, The Designing Women Reunion aired on Lifetime, reuniting the five original cast members to share their memories of the show and featuring interviews with the Thomasons, several writers and a few of the special recurring cast members.

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Meshach Taylor was in the made-for-TV movie Double, Double, Toil and Trouble, which starred the Olsen twins of Full House fame.

After his marriage to Dixie Carter, Hal Holbrook renovated her family home in McLemoresville, Tennessee, where they spent part of their time when not in Beverly Hills. Carter’s father, Halbert, also lived there until his death in 2007 at the age of 96.

Two of the main cast members met their husbands while on Designing Women. Delta Burke married Gerald McRaney who played Dash Goff (her ex-husband), and Jean Smart married Richard Gilliland who played Mary Jo’s boyfriend, J.D. Shackelford. Both couples are still together.

Judith Ivey has been married twice and has two children.

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In 1996, Dixie Carter published her memoir, Trying to Get to Heaven. In it, she talked about using human growth hormone for its anti-aging properties.

Jan Hooks was born in Decatur, Georgia.

Of the original cast members, only Jean Smart was not born in the south or southeastern part of the United States. She was born in Seattle, Washington.