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8TVL_218_Designing Women: Behind the Scenes with Linda Bloodworth Thomason

Melissa Roth: Welcome to 80s TV Ladies Part of the Weirding Way Media network.

Amy Englehardt: 80s TV Ladies, so sexy and so pretty. 80s TV Ladies, steppin’ out into the city. 80s TV Ladies, often treated kind of sh#*ty. Working hard for the money in a man’s world. 80s TV Ladies!

Melissa Roth: Hello, friends. Welcome to 80s TV Ladies , where we explore female driven television shows from the 1980s and celebrate the people who made them. Here are your hosts, Sharon Johnson and Susan Lambert Hatem.

Sharon Johnson: Hello, I'm Sharon.

Susan Lambert Hatem: And I'm Susan. Many blessings to, Mister Barney Rosenzweig, producer of Cagney & Lacey, and our own wonderful producer, Melissa Roth for helping us procure our incredible guest today. This is a dream come true. We shouted it out, I believe in episode one of season two when we knew we wanted to cover one of the most quintessential and consequential 80s television shows, Designing Women.

Sharon Johnson: Today's guest is none other than the creator of Designing Women herself. Miss Linda Bloodworth-Thomason is a creator, writer, executive producer of so many popular television shows from the 80s and 90s. She's originally from Missouri, and some of her early writing credits were on Rhoda and the groundbreaking television series M*A*S*H.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Her first episode of Hot Lips and Cold Arms was co-written with writer actress Mary Kay Place and creator Larry Gelbart, and was nominated for an Emmy.

Sharon Johnson: In 1983, she and her husband, Harry Thomason, founded Mozark Productions and created and produced highly lauded and popular television series, including Evening Shade, Hearts Afire and the Women of the House. And of course, her most beloved work, Designing Women. She has written over 450 scripts for TV

Susan Lambert Hatem: Miss Linda Bloodworth-Thomason is also a novelist, playwright and documentary filmmaker, as well as an outstanding philanthropist. We are so thrilled to welcome her to 80s TV Ladies, Hello, Miss Linda Bloodworth-Thomason

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Well, hello. How are you?

Sharon Johnson: We're great and so delighted to have you join us today for the show. Long been big fans, and you're definitely a hero of ours. And Designing Women is just one of my all time favorite shows, as well as my mother and my sisters. We still talk about it to this day. So this is such a treat to be able to talk with you.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Well, I love to hear that. And I think we're like a little secret club all over America, especially in the South. But I get it everywhere I go, really. If they find out, you know, I'm connected to Designing Women, people always have, women in particular, always have a comment, but especially mothers and daughters and sisters. And it's definitely a generational thing. Unfortunately, now I get the grandma stuff too, you know. Oh, my grandmother, I watched that show with her. So it's very, rewarding to hear that. It's still appreciated decades later.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Well, it's a really particular show that I think resonated with so many people in the 80s myself included. I'm from Atlanta, Decatur, right outside of Atlanta.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Oh, you are? How did you lose that accent? You have no accent. Where did you put your accent?

Susan Lambert Hatem: Well, I used to say when I got to film school out at, ah, USC, I sold it to an actress who needed it for a part.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: That's a worthy explanation. Otherwise, I would be upset.

Sharon Johnson: I have a friend who grew up in Atlanta also and has no accent, and I asked her why one day, and she said, well, I just decided I didn't want one. And it may have also had to do with the fact that her parents were both, from England.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Oh, I see.

Sharon Johnson: So that had something to do with it as well, I'm sure. But, yeah, she, same as Susan, grew up there and left without a local accent.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: I love the Southern accent. My husband is southern Arkansas, Louisiana, and everywhere we go, people comment on his accent because they love it. It's very melodic and soft, and I don't love my own because I'm from southeast Missouri, which is the boot heel of Missouri. And so I've tried to pick his up, you know, but I can't. But anyway, the Southern accent, I think, was elevated, on our show by all of the actors, but especially by Dixie Carter, who was from McLemoresville, Tennessee. And she had such an eloquent way of using her accent that it actually elevated every speech she made and everything she said in the way that a lot of the very top British actors, you know, when they do Shakespeare, I thought Dixie always reminded me of that, that it wasn't just a Southerner talking, you know. It was, it was, higher than that. It was memorable. The melody was bigger, and the elocution was more, contagious. You just wanted to hear more of it. So, you know, I'm a fan of anybody who can master that.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Absolutely. The Julia Sugarbaker rant was made all the better by that accent.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Yeah. And I think it's something you hadn't really heard before on TV. You've certainly-- Well, you've always heard the Southern accent of, you know, you need to get out of our town, that stereotype. And then the hyper feminine Scarlett O'Hara thing, you know, I declare, and all that, but I don't think anybody ever used it the way Dixie did, and quite frankly, the rest of them, too, you know, and Jean was. Jean Smart was the only one who was from, Washington state, but she had a beautiful accent, and everyone on the show, she represented Charlene, who was from my actual hometown in Missouri. But she really. I had so many people say Jean's accent was their favorite, so, you know, you can't tell how people are going to respond to it.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Did you have a dialect coach for the actors?

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Not at all, because Delta, you know, just spoke the way she speaks. I mean, she ratcheted up Suzanne a little bit, you know, just in her speech patterns, but-- And Annie has her own very deliberate with speaking. It's very Kentucky, also, melodic and been in a different way than Dixie's. And, as I said, Jean was the only person who didn't have one, but hers was beautiful, and she fooled everybody. And Meshach was just-- Meshach, you know, we never worried about if he sounded Southern. He had some Southern roots, but, you know, he was just American. and we just didn't worry about it. I mean, mainly, you know, he was black man, and he sounded like a black man, and we didn't worry about him being from the South.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That's so amazing. I love the way that you talk about the regional accents because so much of the Southern accent is sort of genericized, and that does bug me when, you know, you're watching a theater show or movies or television, when it's just generic Southern accent, you're like, no, no, there's a difference between Georgia and Tennessee.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: And Texas, and, you know, or it's overdone. There was one gentleman who was a dialect coach who, my husband believed that he infected at least 30 or 40 old movies, because you can tell when actors are overdoing it, and it's so pronounced and slow, you know, and he goes, oh, that guy was. That guy was advising people on this movement. You can tell because it never sounds like anyone we know. But mainly, aside from the accent, I also, you know, when I started with Designing Women and wrote the first, the pilot, you know, and when I sold it to CBS, my main goal, you know, I wasn't really thinking of accents. I was really just thinking about the South and how many wonderful, beloved people I knew in the South. And my family is from Arkansas on both sides. And, you know, I didn't see anybody on TV like them. I didn't, you know, and I was so tired again of that Beverly Hillbillies concept. And even in my life, you know, I experienced prejudice out here because I would say, oh, you need to come home with me. You know, we have the greatest natural springs in the world. And, you know, near my town and this beautiful river, and I'll take you canoeing. And, you know, everybody, my agents had seen Deliverance, and they were just aghast that I would even think that they would set foot where I'm from. And I just-- I didn't even realize the stereotype that I was up against until I came to California, because I actually went to school in Missouri to college. So even though it was an international school in the sense that a lot of people from different countries went there, it was still in the heart of Missouri. And I just did not know until I came to LA, you know, how entrenched people were in thinking about the South in that very kind of scary, rural, ominous, ignorant, barefoot, sometimes incestuous way. And that was why I was just determined, you know, to do a show that stood up against that. And fortunately, a lady named Fran Bascom, who I still say is the greatest casting director in the history of television, who did all of our shows. You know, she's the one who found those four women. I didn't know them, and I would never have come up with them. And, you know, she was just brilliant, and she just always came up with the perfect person. And even more importantly, the most brilliant combination of people that she had already matched in her head. And that's what she did for me. On Designing Women-- She is no longer with us. I could not get through her eulogy. It took me forever because I could not stop crying. Just this beautiful red-haired lady, beautiful clothes, beautiful temperament, just a joy to be around every day. And so supportive of actors and, you know, the ones who hadn't been discovered yet and so confident, never cocky, but so confident that they could do it. And I never saw her fail on that front. I mean, you know, whether it was Billy Bob Thornton or Hillary Swank who got the Oscar, you know, who nobody knew, whether this was not on Designing Women, but Evening Shade, Hearts Afire, this was all Fran Bascom. You know, the brilliant cast on Evening Shade, which actually, that one could have been predicted somewhat, but no one had ever put them all together. I mean, that cast had more Oscar, Emmy, and Tony nominations than any cast ever in television history. I mean, it was Charles Durning, Ozzie Davis, Hal Holbrook, Burt Reynolds, Ann Wedgeworth, Elizabeth Ashley. It just went on and on. A talent that I haven't seen before, or since. And she didn't self-promote at all, so I don't think she's even known to the public and not even that well known to a lot of people out here. But she was our secret weapon.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That is amazing. Fran Bascom. I'm going to go look her up because, you know, we love hearing about sort of the women behind the scenes that really did, did a lot of the heavy lifting for this kind of stuff. And don't get their flowers, don't get the credit.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Don’t get the credit. But, you know, besides that, if you're just talking about someone on a scale of humanity, when my mother had AIDS and I would leave the hospital late at night-- It still makes me cry. She was out in the waiting room. So, that's just who she was.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That's amazing. And I watched a little Evening Shade, rewatched some of it, and noticed that Billy Bob Thornton is in the pilot. So I did have a question about how that came about, but now you just told me. I was like, well, he's from Arkansas, right? So maybe that was a family thing.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: He is, but we did not know him. We ended up falling in love with him. Actually, he named his son after Harry. And then we went on to do Hearts Afire with Markie Post, who's one of my dearest friends. Was. And John Ritter and Billy Bob. And, again, Fran did that cast with those three brilliant people. And Billy Bob turned out to be just a wicked comedian, which he hadn't really done. And he and John bonded so much. And I know we're not here to talk about Hearts Afire, but that cast too. Leslie Jordan thrown in and the brilliant George Gaines, and Ed Asner, I mean, she put that whole cast together. Billy Bob had one line on Evening Shade. But Fran came to me and said, well, listen, I've got somebody from Arkansas, so you and Harry are going to love him. And I had one line where he delivered. He's a flower delivery guy and he gives the flowers to Burt Reynolds. And just the way he said it, he came in and said it, you know. Like, Wood, these flowers are for you. Burt's name was Wood. And just the way he said it, it was kind of memorable. And Hal Holbrook went up to him afterward and said, I don't know what you've got, but you've got something, so keep doing what you're doing. And then, of course, wasn't long before, you know, Billy Bob had an Oscar. So that just kind of shows how prescient and brilliant Fran was.

Sharon Johnson: And also how kind of Hal to go up to him and say that to him, to Billy Bob. You know, he only had one or two lines, and that's not necessarily something that often happens. So how awesome.  

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: That was Hal. Hal was like that with everybody. He-- I always say he was our North Star, you know, he was-- And he so adored Dixie. You know, I always say that there's something about Southern men and women when-- I don't want to make other people mad, because I know that people from other parts of the country have just as, you know, wonderful a romance as Southerners. But there's something about Southern men and women. And Hal and Dixie personified that, you know, that they just had the spark and it was just, unquenchable. And everybody saw it and it wasn't different on screen. It was the same, you know, all week on the show, behind the scenes, I would say we had to, like, on show night, we had to keep him away from the microphones because everything Dixie did, he just laughed so hard that it kind of ruined the soundtrack. And he just watched her, you know, like a besotteed kid who can't believe that this girl accepted his invitation to the prom. and that was true until the end. I wrote a eulogy about them for the Hollywood Reporter. And we had so many dinners at their house, you know, that were so adventurous. And it was like a, Dinner-At-Eight movie. I mean, Dixie always had the worst help, and, you know, we wouldn't even eat until, like, midnight. And there'd always be a lot of clanging in the kitchen and Dixie would walk, would sweep back out and say, you know, it's almost ready. It's almost ready. And then Hal would just look at her, you know, the big grin, like he just thought it was all delightful. She used to come to the top of the stairs after everybody was there, and she'd come out in her dressing gown and go, oh, my goodness, is there a party? You know, like she forgot. And it sounds so pretentious that because it's something most people could not pull off, but they did. And you got the feeling they did that even when we weren't there, you know. Then she, honest to God, lie around on the piano and sing and carry on, and it was just the most fun. But they were both so Southern. And her father, Mister Halbert Carter, was such a close friend of ours. He was such a character. But, they kind of represented all the-- I always wanted to have romance between the men and women on my comedies because I didn't think there was enough of that in the comedies I'd grown up with. You know, I mean, Lucy and Ricky had to keep one foot on the floor, and I just really wanted to show people in love because that's how my parents were. So Dixie and Hal carried that on in spades. And then Delta and Gerald McRaney, the very same thing. I think, like, with Gerald especially, you know, there's, like, in the South, maybe a lot of Southern men who have big, happy marriages, I think, have a high density of masculinity, but it's benevolent masculinity, and the women are always, you know, high spirited, feminine. and, I mean, even my husband, I hate to brag, but I've had so many women, you know, where-- How do I find somebody like Harry? And I always say, well, you have to go to Arkansas first or the South, and you should find yourself a jock who reads a lot of poetry and loves his mother and cries over the evening news. That's Harry. And they always laugh and they go, oh, that. That's such a weird combination. I go, I know it's a Southern thing, so I've always tried to get that into my shows. We did it on Evening Shade again, hopefully between, Burt and Mary Lou Henner and with Hal and, the wonderful Linda Gehringer, who was Fontana Beausoleil on the show. But there's just, you know, and if you look at Southern couples that you probably really admire their marriage, like Faith Hill and Tim McGraw or Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood, you know, Amy Grant, Vince Gill, there's a romantic spark that stays with these couples that I think is, you know, you want it to be contagious. I mean, I think they make people want to search for that and to find it because it's so appealing. So, anyway, that's something we tried to capture, and I had a lot of help with the cast that Fran gave me.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That's amazing. And you did capture it.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Yeah.

Sharon Johnson: Benevolent masculinity. I love that term.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: We'll start it. We'll start it. We'll say, enough with toxic masculinity. We want benevolent. I mean, I'm a liberal Democrat, and I'm all for LGBTQ causes. And, you know, I'm writing a movie, a comedy about trans people and all of that, but I, I do think we have to really savor and protect this wonderful thing called masculine and feminine. Just because people have abused it and misrepresented it doesn't mean we need to lose it. and hopefully, really just laying it down on film in our little comedies, maybe that will help a little. So I'll always feel a little bit proud of that.

Sharon Johnson: Yeah, there's space for all of it, I think, and there's space for all of it, so.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Yeah. And I'm not afraid to say that, because I know people are so scared now to talk about anything to do with sexuality or anything. And also, there could be this spark, absolutely, with LGBTQ Southern people. But I'm just saying there's something about Southern men and women. I'm not speaking politically or about science or anything. I'm just saying, I just believe that when Southern men and women get together and they are the right combination of masculinity and femininity, there's just nothing better in the world of romance for me, you know? And I just believe in that. You know, Jean is very Southern, even being not from the South, you know. She has such a softness and such a femininity about her, but, boy, is she strong. You only have to look at her in Hacks, you know, to see the inner core of strength that comes out of her. And when you talk to her, I mean, honestly, she's the softest, most feminist, most feminine woman I think I know. but yet she inhabits this, this great strength, you know. Just can endure anything and can give it back better than she gets. yeah, I mean, she's pretty awesome.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That is so amazing. And you reminded me, I wrote a play about, Jimmy Carter, and Rosalind Carter is a character in it, and that relationship. And one of the reasons I wrote it was I was so fascinated as both a kid and then as an adult with their relationship to each other. And that's just that Southern couple where they're both partners, yet individuals, and there's Something really--

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: You still felt like, oh, I think they're going to make love tonight. In fact, I have a friend who was a speech writer for him, and he confirmed that Jimmy would be drinking wine and then talking a little bit, which shocked me. I mean, he wasn't really talking out of school, but he was talking about how he liked to have a glass of wine before lovemaking, and I thought, oh, my goodness, I shouldn't even know this. yeah. What was your play? I have to check on that, too. What was the name of your play?

Susan Lambert Hatem: It's called Confidence and the Speech. And it's about the ten days before President Carter's crisis of confidence speech. But it's told from a modern feminist perspective, looking back at that time and in the play. The president's actually played by a woman, who's telling the story of her time as a young female intern. And so the guy that's asking her questions about this time plays her as a young female intern in the Carter White House. So it's kind of a made up package, ah, for a real life event. And I use it to talk about the confidence it takes to speak up in the room, women in politics, and all the leaps you have to make in your head to imagine a woman president. It may have been, you know, written right around the time of, I don't know, 2016. but it's ahead of its day.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: That hasn't been realized even today. But, yeah, well, that sounds very, layered and interesting, and I congratulate you on that. That sounds so original. The courage to speak in the room is something that, you know, and I won't talk about this now. We can talk about it later. But, you know, I did take a lot of the money I made from Designing Women and take it back to my hometown. And, you know, we are the number one donation spot for the NRA in my town. And, I just wanted to do something for the girls. And so, you know, I started this foundation. and that's really the big thing that we do, is give people, the women, the courage to speak in the room. We spent-- We've sent dozens and dozens of girls all through Europe, and all, you know, every year, they would go to the Broadway shows. They would come out here and stay with me and go to the sound stages, and so we're going to have a big event next year. Everybody's coming home. We've put 177 women through college, and we've sent people to Harvard and Duke, and really just, you know, it was really my money from Designing Women that did that. I'm not bragging, but I just mean, I want to make clear that it was my money came from Dixie and Delta and I, and, Annie and Jean. And so they really did that, you know, with me. But I'm just so proud of it, because the women are all coming back. Only one has passed away. So they're all saying they're coming back next year, and we're just going to have a big homecoming. But, yeah, I've been getting a lot of the letters from the young girls who traveled, who wouldn't have gotten to do these things otherwise. And, you know, they all talk about what Designing Women, the spirit of it, and what this money that came to them because of those women, you know, has. Has meant to their lives. And it's meant everything. And this all started, really with me when I was a little girl. You know, my dad gave this river I talked about that I used to bring up to my agents. It is the most beautiful river, I think, in the world. It's kind of wild. It's called Current River, and it does come from the largest natural springs in the world. And my dad loved it. He grew up on it. And he gave me my own canoe when I was seven, you know, and he gave me the paddle and he said, you can out paddle any boy on this river. Don't let anybody tell you otherwise, you know. And that river just became my world, you know, whether I was paddling around in sloughs by myself or, you know, or-- I had a couple of girls who were like my sisters who had the cabin next door, you know, and, oh, my gosh, we smoked crepe vines, which are, you know, nothing. You just smoke them to be smoking. But, you know, we'd sit around with our legs crossed and, you know, give speeches and talk about everything, and we were big readers. But anyway, that I always think about, you know, that gave me the confidence to speak up in the room was just the fact that, you know, I owned that river, and I did race all the boys on that river in my canoe. And so just the template of that, I just kind of wanted to bring back to my town and give all these girls a leg up, which I think they really got. And I'm anxious to see them in person because I haven't seen them-- This started in ‘90, about 1990. So I'm really anxious to see them all and see what they're doing.

Susan Lambert Hatem: That is amazing. Okay, we want to keep talking. We're gonna take a short break. Okay, we're back. Is this the Claudia Foundation?

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Yes, the Claudia Foundation is the umbrella of it, because, you know, my mom came from, didn't, have a sister. Her mother died when she was 13. This is in a little tiny town, Alicia, Arkansas. and she grew up, you know, really didn't get to go to college because her dad didn't have the money. And she came to, the last place they moved was Poplar Bluff, Missouri, and they came over the Arkansas line. She'd grown up in Arkansas. But anyway, she was the secretary for my dad's-- He was a lawyer, and he came home from the war, and there she was working for my grandfather. My grandfather is the one who's really responsible for me becoming a writer. He only went to 6th grade, and he wanted to be a lawyer. So he studied and clerked under a judge, and then he became a lawyer, and then he became a newspaper editor. And then he became what today would be called a civil rights activist. And he is really responsible for the liberal spirit that I hope exists in my shows. His name was CT Bloodworth. He was about six foot with white shock of hair. My favorite picture of him, he's in a Venice canal in a gondola with his Stetson in the air, waving it. When he died, I got all of his books. Thackeray, Shakespeare, Dickens. He had four sons. They were all so interesting. They put themselves through law school by playing poker, and they defended him when he got in a huge fight with the Klan. My grandfather defended and found abhorrent, you know, that they were tarring and feathering black people, running them out of town. This was in Corning, Arkansas. So they had a lot of shootouts at my grandmother and grandfather's house in Arkansas. The governor would come. I mean, it was a huge thing. It went on for years. And finally they did shoot my grandfather in the chest. And he lived, but he moved his family just across the state line to Poplar Bluff. That's why I grew up there. So then his sons grow up, and my dad became a Japanese war crimes prosecutor. And my uncle, my uncle Charles was a judge advocate at Nuremberg. And he brought home the transcript from the Nuremberg trials that was written in hand, and we gave that to the University of Missouri. But all the sons became lawyers, and it was the largest family law firm in Missouri in the 50s. But the way they were different is that, you know, they always came. They were interested in social justice, and they had read a lot, and all of the boys could recite, you know, Longfellow and Shakespeare. It just went on and on. and I grew up being around that. I never mastered that myself. But, you know, it was just common. You know, they would get out their cocktails, and if it was sunset, somebody might be reciting Tennyson. Now, I'm not saying they did that every day, but, I mean, it was in our lives, you know, and it was interesting, and they were interesting, and they were always very aware of what was going on in the town. And my dad was really alone in a lot of his opinions. Nevertheless, people loved him. He was a very popular person. But, you know, we couldn't join the country club because blacks and Jews couldn't belong, that kind of thing. Then when he died, I said that in his eulogy and my mother said, well, he also didn't want to pay the dues at the country club. I looked like my dad. My mother looked like a movie star. And because she didn't have all of this female support, you know, I was everything to her. I was her only daughter. I have a brother also. But, anyway, when I, you know, was a, she died of AIDS in, 1986. And the day I found out that she had AIDS is the day I found out that Designing Women was going to be a series. And so it was very, very, you know, hurtful and, and awful for, six months. She died Thanksgiving of that year. And my husband's mother died four weeks later. So it was a pretty horrible year. And, but, you know, they canceled Designing Women and my husband came out here and saved it. And he got Viewers for Quality Television, you know, behind him. He got 50,000 letters to come in and he got Bud Grant, the president of CBS, to raise the white flag. CBS literally raised it, which would never happen today, and said, okay, we're going to give you another chance. Because they had been moving it around and they hadn't given it a chance. But anyway, my mother, yes, I wanted to honor her so much, because she, you know, just gave me everything. My dad gave me my confidence, but my mother just poured all the love in the world into me. And, you know, that is part of being confident. I think giving someone confidence is to just love them up every day. I've never felt like, you know, I had to get a man or, or be anything because I felt so loved, you know, from her. And so, like being married, being happy would just be icing on the cake because I was already good to go, you know, just from being around her. So I wanted to kind of give that love to the girls in my hometown. I did a film for Hillary. I was very close to Hillary Clinton's mother, Dorothy Rodham, who stayed with me a lot at my house in Santa Barbara. And they had basically the same relationship. You know, her mother grew up, in a very impoverished environment and two teenage parents who were 16 years old could not take care of her. She was given to a family, California relatives, who were very unloving. And yet somehow, she invented love. You know, she figured it out and she just filled Hillary with love. And that gave her all the confidence to be who she was. And in 2016, I made a convention film for Hillary that was online, and it told their story about towards the inventing love and giving it to Hillary, and then Hillary going all over the world, you know, and helping girls in Afghanistan and women who, you know, who are living in poverty all over the world, and the misogyny that keeps women down all over the world. All of that came from a mother and a daughter. And so I tried to kind of duplicate that, you know, with my own mother and hopefully on a smaller scale, you know, have done kind of the same thing.

Susan Lambert Hatem: I love the idea that you don't have to take sort of abuse and terror and fear in your life and continue that. You can actually turn that and decide you're going to make a decision to make sure that the people that come behind you and the people that are around you are going to be filled with love. you can interrupt.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Yeah. And that's what Dorothy Rodham did. I know the show's not about Dorothy, but I love her so much. I have an English garden at the foundation that's dedicated to mothers and to Dorothy and to my mother. Dorothy, at six years old, was on a train. You might know this story because Hillary has talked about it. She was on a train to California with her little sister, who was three, alone on a train from Chicago for three days. You know, the stories that make me cry the most are the ones where women help each other.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Because I do think things are so stacked against us all over the world. And, you know, I mean, I won't make my big soapbox speech here because that's not -- It is, kind of. I know it's what you all are about.

Susan Lambert Hatem: It is what we do.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: We got to get some comedy in here. But no, just that, you know, our national hobby is obviously killing and raping women and then making shows about it and documentaries about what was in the killer's mind. And I'm just so fed up with all of it, you know, that. I mean, the. Just the, it's really a celluloid holocaust, you know, of what we do to women. And then I-- The way women are treated all over the world, whether it's the Taliban or it's the pornography industry, you know, that is now commensurate with, really, the arms sale. It's the biggest, business in the world. I just feel like women, and I feel like we're going backwards, too, and I won't get into all of that, but it's very disappointing, you know, and women are just constantly over sexualized now, and it's, you know, it's the side boob, it's the under boob. Have you seen this? You know, I'm not afraid of nudity, but why is this the only thing that's being constantly presented everywhere? I just feel like I don't want to be like, old Lady Bloodworth, screaming, get off my lawn or in my day, Just the Kardashian thing. Just constantly, oh, my God, here I am. Here's my-- Look at my a$$ once more. I watch the show. I know them. I've been to their house, to dinner. I try to kind of keep up with the Kardashians, but enough is enough. In the show, one of the shows I saw recently, they found a book in an old box in their garage, and they were so puzzled. No one knew what to do with it. It was a book. I was screaming, Read it! Read it! Anyway. Enough. Okay. Thank you for letting me get that in.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Oh, my God.

Sharon Johnson: You're absolutely right. I mean, even to something like, you know, Vanity Fair does this cover every year of, you know, up and coming people in Hollywood? In some years, it's all men, some years it's all women, sometimes combination. But in the year that it's all women, all the women are dressed in lingerie or bathing suits or whatever. And then the men, they're all in t-shirts and suits, and it's maddening.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: I don't understand it. And then when they do their Oscar shows, they've got Sofia Coppola halfway lying on a bed with her legs up, with her pants pulled down. I'm like, oh, my God. Well, when did Marty Scorsese do this? When he was nominated. You know, it's just so. I mean, I don't care. Everybody can be naked. You know, I'm fine. Human body can be beautiful. We get it. But what is the purpose? What is the message? I don't understand it. On this latest HBO offering, Lily Rose Depp, you know, is completely naked for the entire series with her legs spread, with him looking like he's giving her some kind of gynecological exam. And then, you know, abusing her many ways. And then they, they rush in to say, oh, that, we're showing you that that's wrong. You know, we're teaching a lesson. Of course that's wrong. We don't really need to hear that. Your concerned parents are concerned producers. We know what you're doing. And for that to fill in where Succession was, come on. You know, that was shameful. So anyway, yeah, I went over between, looking at The Idol on HBO, and I switched over, and on another channel was Harrison Ford in Witness watching Kelly McGillis prepare to take a bath, and he was at the door, and she didn't know it. He was just looking at her so lovingly. And I thought, oh, wow, you know, I'm sorry for all the young people looking at this other trash, that they might not see these things. You know, Harrison is old, and that's an old movie. But, you know, that kind of, you know, really carefully, brilliantly constructed sex scene is just so erotic and appealing. I think so much more than just, you know, what is it now? Every love scene is just slamming a woman around the room, choking people, choking women. I don't get that. Like, I'm just. I asked my husband, does anybody just, like, make love anymore? Like, it doesn't even exist in filmmaking anymore. I know we're way afield of Designing Women.

Susan Lambert Hatem: This is a whole new podcast.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: You can tell. You can. You can tell I've been cooped up during the pandemic. But anyway, it kind of does stem from the kind of, you know, romance we were trying to show. On behalf of the women who like Designing Women, I would like to appoint myself one of their representatives to say, you know, ladies, please stop taking us backwards. You know, we can do a whole podcast. What has happened to women? That's what we can call it.

Melissa Roth: Oh, and, you know, you're so right. That scene in Witness between Kelly McGillis and Harrison Ford as one of the hottest scenes in movies

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Isn't it?  

Melissa Roth: Oh, yeah.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Yeah. If only young people could be exposed to these things. And I think their world is smaller, you know, maybe than ours was, at least for girls, because, I don't-- I'm older than you ladies, but, you know, when I was growing up, the world was our oyster, you know, and we were running free, you know, I mean, we did what we wanted. We said what we wanted to say. You know, we loved who we wanted to love. I mean, we were really wild in that sense. And, oh, I just see girls trying so hard to be-- I'm going to say the word, because that's what's used in our industry constantly. Is she hot? I see women as that is their greatest aspiration, and it makes me sad. You know, there's just so much more to life than this over sexualization of everything.

Melissa Roth: It's pornography. I mean, we didn't have. We didn't have pornography available, like, five-minute pornography available to us on the Internet freely.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Yeah.

Melissa Roth: Now, by high school, they've all seen pornography, and we know that that's where women are getting beat up for the first time. They see it. They see it. That's what it is. And the--. And they're being taught.  

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: And they replicate it.

Melissa Roth: Ah, that's correct.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Yeah. And boys begin to think that's what you do to girls.

Melissa Roth: That's correct.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: I just think, you know, I think there's a lot of people, a lot of people in America who feel this way. And I think the conservatives in our country would be surprised to know that a lot of liberals, like me, feel the same way. and this could be a meeting ground, you know, for all of us. If we can't agree on Donald Trump or January 6, let's agree on this. You know, it's a starting place. You know, let's start teaching our kids, you know, let's start teaching our boys that this is-- This is really not, you know, how things are supposed to be. And teaching our girls that they are worth way more than this ridiculous over-objectification, you know, of their genitalia and of their bodies and of their, their sexual beings. I just feel like a lot of girls just aspire to this now. And I do everything I can, you know, in my little town, to get the girls not to feel that way. Okay. This is another podcast because we barely talked about--

Susan Lambert Hatem: And I have two stepchildren and then a, ten years younger boy. And you want to raise good people. And it's very challenging right now because there's so much cruelty in the air.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Cruelty is a good word. Thank you for saying that. It is cruel. You know what they're doing. I'm so glad you said that. A lot of this stuff, I think. I think girls have become very confused that they confuse cruelty with masculinity. You know, they think if the guy treats them poorly, that's sexy, until they can't take it anymore or they're dead. I don't know. I always thought. I think kindness is probably the sexiest thing around. you know, that's what I think about my own husband when I see a man like Brad Pitt or George Clooney. You know, a lot of the actors who I know are kind like Keanu. I always want to-- I guess because of my canoe.

Susan Lambert Hatem: You want to make it canoe? Yeah.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Anyway, you know, that's what I find sexy, because they're so kind to people. That's a turn on. And now I think that's interpreted as weakness. Like, during the pandemic, you're not as social, and you watched a lot more TV which is what happened to me. I saw a lot more of what, what is out there, and it made me feel lonely and sad and depressed that, you know, how will you ever fix this? Well, okay. I mean, these young people, they may never get over this. I mean, this is what they think, and we've. And this is what they feel is hot and sexy, you know? And I don't think Hollywood does anything to help. No, I was chosen. I was chosen. No, I mean, they're the cause of it. They're the cause of it. Absolutely. And I brought this up at the Academy of Television Arts and Science because I had one year on the board. Every year, the president gets to have a guest. And I was chosen the president of, that year to be the guest. And I, I don't really like organizational things too much. I mean, I don't enjoy it. I don't join a lot of clubs. But I went, you know, and I made my little speech there. And I said, you know, I'm not, I'm not advocating censorship, but I'm just saying we can do better. You know, like, does the actors really need to walk naked on Game of Thrones down the street naked? Why is she the only one? Why is she the woman doing it? You know, these are just examples of even the most prestigious cable organizations do this crap. And I'm just saying, think about it. You know, I know you see yourselves as, you know, the most liberal, open-minded people in the world, and you, and you do this. You continue to do this. It's denigrating women. And you do it because you can. And I don't want to pass a law that stops you. I'm just asking you to consider, maybe don't do it on, you know, at every opportunity. Maybe turn it down for your daughter or your wife or even your mother. Maybe don't do that. And, oh, it was not well received. and the arguments went on. Even when I got back to my office, I still had, I won't say who, but the head of a major network called me, and we had quite a long argument because I, you know, made him feel defensive. He called me to tell me that he hoped his own daughter would be president. and I said--  

Melissa Roth: Of what country?  

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: He was so defensive because they don't see themselves that way, you know?

Melissa Roth: And you hit a nerve.  

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: They just think it’s art.

Melissa Roth: Yeah, yeah, you hit a nerve. You called him on it.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: I hit a nerve.

Sharon Johnson: Yeah, yeah, because it--

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: And he’s a very cool guy. He’s a cool network, a cool guy.

Sharon Johnson: It may be art, but it's, it's. For me, it's about the balance. If there was a balance to all of this, then, then fine, but there's no balance. It's very tilted.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: It's very tilted. And women are losing this battle. And, you know, if you think if you say something, you're not going to be cool, you're going to sound like Tipper Gore when she got after the music industry for bad lyrics. But, you know, I mean, come on. Have you listened to some music? You know, the violence toward women, the horrible descriptions of their genitalia, what they're going to do to women, and then all these big corporations are giving them millions of dollars. I don't know. It's just a whole, you know, all of the entertainment industry is riddled with this misogyny, and nobody wants to talk about it because we're supposed to be the supportive, liberal minded, feminist people, but, you know, we're kidding ourselves because we're going backwards. So. And it is really kind of relevant to your podcast, although I know there's no way that this can be part of a, you know, the Designing Women,  

Sharon Johnson: You'll be surprised.  

Melissa Roth: We're just gonna make a career out of this interview

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Well, you could, you know. You could pick this up and kind of have this be a tributary of, you know, the river you've been riding, back to the canoe metaphor, because it is so important, and it is connected. We have seen how television changes the world. We have seen how television changes the world for women, you know. And my three mentors when I started out, who were Norman Lear, Larry Gelbart, and Jim Brooks. And I had no idea because I was so young. I was just out of college. I had no idea that that was an incredible thing that had happened to me. You know, now I get it. I mean, it's like winning the, you know, the billion-dollar lottery. And there weren't that many women comedy writers. And my partner was Mary Kay Place, and we were kind of exotic because we were just cheerleaders from Oklahoma. We didn't come from an urban environment, you know, and we were trying to be funny and to be real serious comedy writers. So what I found out, though, is here's Norman Lear, you know, changing the world, racially changing the way people feel about black people. And then here's Larry Gelbart changing the way people feel about war. And there's Jim Brooks changing the way people feel about women and the way women feel about themselves with Mary Tyler Moore and Rhoda, which I grew up on. And so I just see how powerful it could be because I lived it, I saw it, I participated in it, you know. I got to work with all those men. And I honestly feel like Norman and Jim and Larry changed the world more than most legislation can do. And so it breaks my heart now that we still have even more ways to reach people. You know, never could you have imagined from the four networks, we have 500 outlets now, and this is what we're putting on it, you know, and it just, it's a real squandering of, an opportunity that wasn't available, you know, for hundreds of years. And now we have it. Now we can reach everybody, and we can change the way men think about women and women think about themselves, and we're just not doing it. Instead, we're reverting back to, you know, this toxic masculinity all over the world. And women better be quiet and, you know, do what we say. and that's what's happened. So I'm just hoping, you know, that, there'll just be more and more. Yes, there's some beautiful things on cable, but just more and more brilliant, edgy, original, new things for women that are not over sexualized. And what is the chance for that? Right now? I feel like it's pretty slender. What do you all think?

Melissa Roth: Two words.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Okay.

Melissa Roth: Barbie and Oppenheimer. I can't even describe my frustration and anger that those are like, they came out in the same day. They're being touted as, like, the best.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Barbenheim. Barbenheimer. Yes.

Melissa Roth: Yeah, Barbenheimer. I mean,

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: well, the critics are all little boys now.

Melissa Roth: Is that it? But it's just so weird. It’s like the femininity and then, like, destroying the planet. You know what I mean? Really? That's all you guys got.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: You guys are so good at condensing my rambling because then after I've done, you'll just go, one word. Pornography. That's exactly what I've been trying to say. And then you just did it again. Yeah, I think, but what are we going to do? And we can see this happening to us, to our daughters, and to, you know, all the women we care about. We can see it happening in front of us, but we're not stopping it. One reason is I think people publicly are, real women are very afraid of being considered not cool and not sexy, you know? And I know actresses are very much afraid of being labeled, you know, oh, she's, you know, she's trouble and she's not hot. You know, nobody wants to be not hot. If you're not hot, you might as well be dead. And so, you know, unless you can be Maggie Smith or somebody like that, for all the women in between, like between 50 and 75, very dangerous area to still be hanging around. you know, there's a lot of women on the precipice who are getting ready to go into that dark tunnel, like, you know. Yeah. You know, where they pick you up in the van and take you to Palm Springs and throw you out in a ditch. That's kind of what's coming. And, you know, because we've done nothing to change the perception. There are still cultures that revere older women. Unfortunately, we're not one. And the interesting thing is, I just think there are millions of us, but we're not organized. You know, we're not organized. And I don't, you know, at some point, we get old and tired and we go, good luck. I came already.

Melissa Roth: It's your turn now.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Yeah, but, all you can do is your little corner of the world and make it better.

Sharon Johnson: Exactly.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: And make it more beautiful and make it smarter, make it more unafraid, like the unafraid girl, you know, make it brave. And when I first sold Designing, I first got my first big check from Designing Women, I called-- You know, my town is not a very pretty town. And the girls, I felt, had nowhere to be, to just be themselves and to read and to spend an afternoon and to have access to things that the public library doesn't have. You know, just like beautiful coffee table books and, you know, learn how to cook food other than what was really, you know, native to our area. So anyway, I called Crowther and Sion, who are the 400-year-old English architects, who did, you know, the queen's architects, I should say. They redid Windsor Castle. They are, you know, responsible for all the palaces. And, I said, I'm here in the Ozarks, and I would love for you to build a big English library for all the girls in my town, because I think they're the most beautiful rooms in the world, and could you do that? And they said, oh, ma'am, we don't even know where you are. What are the Ozarks? And so they looked it up, and they called me back and they said they would do it. And they built it in England, came across the Atlantic, came down the Mississippi River by barge, came to my town on flatbed trucks. They lived in the town for almost a year and they reconstructed it on my grandparents’ house next to it. And then we redid the entire thing. But the library stands on its own. I have Lord Byron's fireplace, beautiful things. And, so. And then now we're just now getting, you know, then I got involved in politics, so I didn't get to do everything I wanted to do. But now we're doing the English garden and we're-- I think we're going to be on tour America, I hope, and have people come see it. But meanwhile, this is where, you know, all the girls can come and they've, through the years where they've met and they've, you know, gone on their trips and come back. It's really like a big clubhouse, you know, for the girls. So I feel like as I, you know, I'm getting older, okay, that's going to exist forever. Nobody can take that away. And there's a philosophy that I think we've instilled in the girls that they'll pass it along to their daughters. So how many, how many girls does that make, you know, altogether? Well, we've probably affected maybe 500 girls, but maybe that will multiply and I guess that's the way we'll have to do it. Do you all, ah, feel like, you know, a lot of girls who are, who are of the same mind as you and that makes you feel good about the world?

Susan Lambert Hatem: I am astonished at, ah, the generation that's happening and coming up, the younger generations, because as much as they're being fed consistent messages of cruelty and pornography and also just damage the kindest people ever, my kids and their friends, ever so kind to each other, so supportive. And maybe they're a unique, particular batch, but I think that the challenge that we're in and that is very hard for me and what I assume my generation to be is we're in this transition. And so the access to so much kind of horror and pornography and sort of terribleness is also in the same pipeline as access to other cultures, other people, other understandings and vast communication that can be misused, but can also be used to communicate with like-minded people, to sort of spread the message that, you know, that gender is a different conversation for the younger generation and in a way that's much more accepting of who you want to be and how you want to be and when you want to be it. And so I actually have a lot of hope for that generation, though. I think they're being damaged. Like, I think that it's that weird conundrum of the Internet and of this fast communication. We're being sort of pummeled with really kind of horrific things. And yet it's also accessible to find someone who loves what you love, wherever they are. And if you're alone in your town and love whatever it is that you love and no one else loves it, you can find somebody online who loves it, too. And you can recognize that community and be in community with that. And so I think it's going to be a very tumultuous few generations. But when I'm looking for hope, right, and I'm a big optimist, I think of 80s TV ladies, and Melissa's rolling her eyes at me right now, I'm sure.

Melissa Roth: Not really.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: No, I'm hearing you. I like what you're saying. I think it's so clear. What you're saying, you know, is that there's a kind of a war going on for the soul of our girls. And I do understand both sides because you explained it so perfectly that everything I've been complaining about and you all are saying, amen, we hear you. We feel the same way. I'm so glad you said that, because, this is the other conversation I've had with my friends, is that we are gobsmacked by how compassionate and empathetic these young girls are. You know, they want inclusiveness. They will not stand for anybody being bullied or ridiculed. You know, I think, oh, my God, these are like, just what you said. These are the kindest, dearest people, and they feel so deeply that yet there's this other thing happening to them, you know, an assault on them, really, where you feel like because of the. Not only the Internet and the pornography, but just the way, you know, the entire, you know, media industry of the world, you know, is presenting them and over sexualizing them in a way that, just summons them and beckons them to try to be that creature, or you're not worthy, you know? And it's got to be so confusing. It's like they have kind hearts and deep convictions about what is fair and how everybody has a right to be at the party, you know, but yet they're being told, you know, well, if you want to be at the party, you know, get your clothes off and, you know, saddle, up, because, you know, this is the ride you're going to get. It's very interesting that you pinpoint it that way, and I don't think anybody really has, but I've heard of, you know, I haven't read anything like that. But I think you've hit up on something.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Well, it's part of the reason, like, you know, the deeper reasons of this podcast are looking at, you know, these shows that we loved and having a good time with them. I promise we'll get to that good time. but, also because this is more important.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: It really is.

Susan Lambert Hatem: This is important conversations because this is. How do we get here? We should be. We should be in a better future for our kids. We shouldn't have just pushed back women's rights 50 years. We should have been pushing them forward 50 years. And it's all tied. It's tied to this, what I would say is an out-of-control capitalism. It's tied to this pushback against great strides for LGBTQ and people of color and black people and women. And now suddenly there's this giant, oh, no, we're gonna shut that down or we lose generations. And that's-- It's sort of a-- It is a fight that has come to a certain precipice, and yet it's also tied to the strikes, the actor strike and the writer strike. It's tied to worker strikes and workers going, wait a minute.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: And the greed.

Susan Lambert Hatem: The corporate greed and the corporate greed. It's corporate greed. It's also just this cultural greed and controlling the information. And I'm sure we're going to. We better get to a conversation where we're talking about people in power doing damage personally to people as if it's their right. And that filters down in the messages that they have sold us over the years and the stories that they have prioritized and that. Making sure that, you know. Yeah, we're going to make it edgy bye. By doing all of our exposition while women are naked, you know, and that's going to be art. And don't worry. Maybe we'll show you a guy, too. Like, it's fine.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: Yeah, that's what they do. Thank you. They show one guy's behind. Yeah.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: And then we're good to go for about three months where another one has to get up to bat, so to speak. yeah, that, you know, you're. You should have a podcast.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Oh, thank God you said that.

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: No, but really, you're so smart. That was everything you just said is so true. At the base of it, though, since you have been so good at condensing what I've just said, I would, if I was looking through a little telescope right now for who is the real offender in all of this, it would be the white, out of control, pissed off, toxic, masculine guy who is now stomping around all over the world, you know, and they're the people-- I'm not saying they control the purse strings, but they are the people who are providing also big push back on women, Jews, blacks, LGBTQ, because they're losing their power, you know, and that's what was happening on January 6. That's what's happening all around the world. And, you know, we, the people who work in television, could have a big influence on that. It can't just be with elites coming on CNN, you know, and saying, oh, woe is me. You know, we don't change minds that way. You know, we've got to do programming that's really smart and brilliant and appealing. And I have to hand it to Taylor Sheridan. You know, what he's been doing with 1883 is showing a real America. And that fearless girl who rides that horse every week, you know, is just incredibly appealing and beautiful. You know, that's the way we change their minds. Nick Kristoff always says, you know, you can tell Americans that 50,000 people are dying of starvation in Africa and they won't send a check, but you tell them one story, and that check will be in the mail. And I think, you know, just talking about how women can start to elevate themselves again. And, people always go, oh, well, a little sitcom shouldn't trouble itself, you know, to. I mean, how pretentious to change the world. And once again, I give you Norman Lear, Jim Brooks, and Larry Gelbart. Or even, in our own way, just Designing Women. You know, we did this Strange Case of Clarence and Anita, and, CBS Jeff Sagansky was wonderfully supportive of us, you know, said-- hey, I mean, he's a big Republican. He said, hey, if it's funny, do it. I'll put it on. You know? And I did. And I think I know from my mail, you know, that, that, yeah, it's a lot of people love, and it made a lot of people change their mind, you know, and believe in need of help. So I don't know. I'm just saying we have more tools than we've ever had to change the world, and we're just, just not using them. You know, we're not using them properly and with the, respect that they just. I mean, they talk about far reaching. You know, there's almost nobody we can't reach now, but we just keep putting the same kind of, you know, some of it's brilliant, but so much of it is setting women back and we don't have to do that.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Yeah, I would have to say, you know, because I was trained on, say, some really amazing 80s TV ladies, I'm going to put you in that category of changing things between Designing Women and for women to find their voice and make those connections. I was trained on how to speak by 80s television and particularly the women of 80s television. So I'm putting you in that category with Norman Lear and James Brooks, with the shows that you created. So we should probably talk about them.

Melissa Roth: You want to take a little break?  

Linda Bloodworth-Thomason: That was a nice segue.

Melissa Roth:  Excellent segue.

Susan Lambert Hatem: So obviously, our discussion with Linda Bloodworth-Thomason continues and is so great, we are making this a two-parter. I don't want you to miss a bit of it.

Sharon Johnson: Please tune in next episode to hear part two of our deep discussion with her, where we really do get to more Designing Women's stories and we solve all the deep problems of misogyny.

Susan Lambert Hatem: Okay, well, maybe not really, Sharon, but we talk about them. And the first step to solving a problem is identifying it. Seriously, if you loved part one, you're really gonna love the second half of our in-depth interview with Linda Bloodworth-Thomason. Please join us.

Sharon Johnson: Hey, we want to hear from you. What's the 80s ladies driven TV show that you remember or have heard of and would like for us to cover?

Susan Lambert Hatem: Tell us your thoughts at 80stvladies.com.

Sharon Johnson: And please help us make the show by going to patreon.com/80sTVladies. As always, we hope 80s TV Ladies brings you joy and laughter and lots of fabulous old and new shows to watch, all of which will bring us closer toward being amazing ladies of the 21st century. See you next time.

Amy Englehardt: 80s TV Ladies, so sexy and so pretty. 80s TV Ladies, steppin’ out into the city. 80s TV Ladies, often treated kind of sh#*ty. Working hard for the money in a man’s world. 80s TV Ladies!

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