There’s a story that’s circulating around the internet today that perennial Golden Girl Bea Arthur cold-called a TV Guide reviewer about some pretty unfavorable reviews of the classic television show. According to an interview with Mort Nathan and Winifred Hervey in Frontiers Magazine, Arthur was calling in response to a TV Guide piece that questioned whether the show was declining in quality since its first year.
From the magazine:
Nathan: TV Guide had done a piece on the show: “The Golden Girls—Is it still as good as it was the first year?” And they asked random people what they thought of the show, and this one housewife said she didn’t think the show was as good and that Bea Arthur’s character wasn’t as interesting. They mentioned her by name—Mrs. Betty Johnson, Sioux Falls, Iowa. So Bea reads this at lunch and then gets on the phone and asks information for this Betty Johnson’s number. And she calls her. And she picks up, this TV Guide woman, and Bea says, “This is Bea Arthur, and I want to talk to you about what you said in TV Guide.” The woman was horrified. She said she was misquoted. “I didn’t mean it. Is it really you? I love the show. I take it back.” And Bea goes, “That’s what I thought. OK, that’s better.”
Hervey: And then Bea said “That person’s going to go tell everyone that I called her, and no one’s going to believe her.”
As a kid, I loved Golden Girls–I can’t explain it. I just did. It tickles me to know that Bea freakin’ Arthur commanded such a presence that she could cold call and just about strong-arm a reviewer with so few words. Oh, and then she pulls a Bill Murray, too, saying nobody’s going to believe her.
Amazing. Simply amazing.
(via Vulture)
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