Julia, Mary Jo, Charlene, Suzanne, and Anthony will soon have a second life on the stage. The New York Times reports that a “Designing Women” play will open this summer at Fayetteville, Arkansas’ TheaterSquared. Linda Bloodworth-Thomason — who created the source material, the groundbreaking ’80s/’90s sitcom of the same name — penned the production.
The story of four women running an Atlanta design firm with the help of their handyman, “Designing Women” ran for seven seasons, from 1986-1993, on CBS. Dixie Carter, Jean Smart, Delta Burke, Annie Potts, and Meshach Taylor starred.
The new play will place “Designing Women’s” characters in contemporary times.
“What I really wanted to do was take those women as we last saw them and set them down right now,” Bloodworth-Thomason told the Times. “They’ll have the same history, be the same people, have the same attitudes, the same philosophies,” she said, “but they’ll be talking about #MeToo and the Kardashians, and Donald Trump, and all that’s going on right now.”
The play will run at TheaterSquared from August 12-September 13, before stints at Alabama Shakespeare Festival and Dallas Theater Center. No director has been confirmed yet.
The original “Designing Women” picked up three Outstanding Comedy Series Emmy nods, and a best comedy writing nomination for Bloodworth-Thomason. Burke scored two best comedy actress noms, and Taylor one for best supporting actor in a comedy.
“Designing Women” didn’t shy away from serious subject matter, and featured episodes about women’s rights, domestic abuse, homophobia, and racism. The Season 2 ep “Killing All the Right People” took on the stigma surrounding AIDS.
“It was way ahead of its time on all sorts of issues,” TheaterSquared’s executive director Martin Miller told NYT, “whether it’s gay rights, reproductive rights, sexual harassment, gun control — a whole host of things that continue to be profoundly relevant.”
Following the allegations of sexual misconduct that came out against former CBS head Les Moonves, Bloodworth-Thomason penned a Hollywood Reporter piece detailing the culture he created at the network. Post-“Designing Women,” her career at CBS followed a pattern: she would work on a pilot, get excited about it, and Moonves would seem enthusiastic but ultimately pass on it. “It would have been so easy, not to mention honorable, to simply tell me he was never going to put a show of mine on the air. That was certainly his right. But instead, he kept me hopping and hoping,” Bloodworth-Thomason wrote. “When I finally realized he was never going to put a show of mine on the air, I left. It was never really about the money anyway, I just wanted to work. People asked me for years, ‘Where have you been? What happened to you?’ Les Moonves happened to me.”
“Women of the House,” “Hearts Afire,” and marriage equality doc “Bridegroom” are among Bloodworth-Thomason’s other credits. Prior to the play, she tried to get a TV reboot of “Designing Women” off the ground. No word on whether that project is still moving forward.
