Stars: October 2006 Archives

>Finally finishing the emptying out of my "Designing Women" reunion notebook from Wednesday night (see previous posts pt. one and pt. two). I think a lot of gay men, if they were really honest about it, would admit to having a little bit of Suzanne Sugarbaker in them. The world revolves around us, we tell it like it is, we sometimes struggle with our weight, we adore men, we have really big hearts and, well, at one point or another, we probably really did want someone to place a tiara on our heads.

That's why I think Suzanne is the perfect gay icon. But she wouldn't be if not for the beautiful actress who brought her to life and created one of the most memorable and funny characters in the history of television comedy: the dazzling Delta Burke.
That's not hyperbole. Check out Nick at Night reruns and see Delta as Suzanne and you will see the perfect melding of actress and character operating on all cylinders.

Until I was about a foot away from her, I didn't realize how stunningly beautiful Delta Burke really is. She is 50 years old, looks more than a decade younger, and that face is right up there with Elizabeth Taylor and Vivian Leigh at their most beautiful. A quite slim Delta was wearing a black knee-length dress and had her hair a flip that reminded me of Mary Tyler Moore and Marlo Thomas from their sitcom hey-days. I was glad to be sitting just a row behind Delta, one seat over, so I could kind of gawk without her noticing. I know I'm going on a bit, but I really was at a loss for words.

But during her years on "Designing Women" (I also loved her as Cherry Cherry on "Popular"), Burke was making terrific television and was the only one of the oh-so-talented leading ladies to receive not one, but two Emmy nominations for best actress in a comedy series.

It's ironic that CBS brass was reluctant to cast her in the part she was born to play and actually had another actress do a run-through with Dixie Carter, Jean Smart and Annie Potts. But Linda Bloodworth-Thomason had written the role of Suzanne for Burke and in the end, got her way.

"When she stepped on the stage, it was so apparent she was the missing part of the puzzle," Linda said at this week's reunion at the Museum of Television and Radio in Beverly Hills. She added that none of the show's four leading ladies were exactly comfortable admitting the similarities between themselves and their characters.
"Delta didn't want to be as aware of the fact that she was the center of her own universe but it came out over time," she said.

And what would "Designing Women" be without the odd, but beautiful relationship between Suzanne and Anthony (Meshach Taylor)? The ultimate Southern belle used to ask Anthony to wax her legs, drive her around, town and even help her get her wigs on right. And when they got stuck in a snowstorm and couldn't get seperate rooms, Suzanne sent Anthony to the van to sleep with a blanket and had the nerve to sweetly say: "Night night. Don't let the bed bugs bite." But, despite the impropriety, she finally allows Anthony share the room with her and their heart-to-heart talk allowed the audience to see another side of Suzanne. Of course a few seasons later she accidentally shoots Anthony, but that's a while other story.
"Meshach and I'd get on the road (for promotion) and sometimes they'd just put us in a suite together," Burke remembers. "It got pretty tight. I knew he had my back."

In the audience Wednesday night was actor Gerald McRaney, Burke's husband of nearly 20 years. They fell in love when he guest-starred on the show as one of her ex-husbands: "He came on and I started acting all girly," she said.

Linda addressed the turmoil on the set during the fourth or fifth season that resulted in Delta leaving the show. Burke was suffering from panic attacks and depression, conditions not well-understood in the late 1980s. It led to misunderstandings between her and Bloodworth-Thomason who said Wednesday: "Despite that little brohaha we had at one point in the show, I think [the mutual respect] grew and continues to grow." Linda said she and Burke "got into a little bit of trouble" because they never talked out their issues." But the two made up when Linda created a series for Delta in the mid-90s called "Women of the House" in which she reprised her character of Suzanne Sugarbaker and they have been thick as thieves ever since.
"She really did want that crown on her head," Linda said of Delta, who is a former Miss Florida in real life and played a fictional Miss Georgia on the show.
Burke said when former Miss America Mary Ann Mobley guested on a fifth-season episode, "I was really pissed when she came on with her crown. I should have at least made the top 10."
But all is forgiven, Burke will serve as a judge at this year's Miss America pageant.

Related links from the "Designing Women" reunion:
-The Dazzling Designing Woman
-Hilarious and Endearing by Design

John Stamos, whose "Jake in Progress" series I so enjoyed, is back on weekly TV in "ER" and is giving this still-compelling series a real boost. But what I'm really looking forward to seeing Stamos in is the A&E Network movie "Wedding Wars" set to air December 11 th at 9 PM.

Stamos, who somehow gets more handsome as he gets older, plays a gay wedding planner whose brother is getting married to the daughter of a conservative governor. The brolther works for his future father-in-law who is portrayed by James Brolin. The guv gives an anti-gay marriage speech which results in Stamos' character refusing to plan the wedding which results in a nationwide strike by gays and lesbians for marriage equality.

I've thought Stamos was mega-cool ever since seeing him as a drummer at a Beach Boys concert in 1987 in San Diego. Plus, he's an OC boy just like me. In fact, last year I profiled Stamos for Orange Coast Magazine and during the conversation, he told his make-up guy that I was currently single and they'd have to set me up with someone. When I mentioned that I was gay, Stamos didn't blink an eye and said, "Well, we're gonna have to find a guy for Greg to go out with."

Gay icon and well-known liberal Barbra Streisand lost her cool Monday night during her concert at Madison Square Garden, according to the New York Post. Streisand, a friend of Bill Clinton but no freind of the current administration, engaged in some President Bush-bashing. This led to a man in the audience shouting "What is this, a fund-raiser?"

The perfectionist Streisand is famous for her carefully choeographed shows (even her chatting between songs with the audience is scripted). But she went waaaay off script with this reply: "Why don't you shut the f- - - up. If you can't take a joke, why don't you leave and get your money back."

The man got up and left then Streisand apologized to the audience.
"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have lost it," she said before continuing the show.

"I was surprised," concertgoer Nancy Heller told The Post. "She yelled at the guy. She actually said the f-word."

My take? Well, sometimes, ya gotta just say what's on yer mind.

Writer Dennis Hensley (The Screening Party) interviewed the talented John Leguizamo for The Advocate recently to ask about his forthcoming memior "Pimps, Hos, Playa Hatas, and all the Rest of My Hollywood Friends: A Life." Big chunks of the interview didn't make it into print due to space limitations so Hensley posted it in its entirety on his terrific blog, Driven to Distraction.
Here are some highlights:

DENNIS HENSLEY: Your book’s very honest. Did you struggle with how much to reveal?

JOHN LEGUIZAMO: When you’re writing at home, you’re like, “I’m going to tell the truth.� Then, when you start letting it out of your hands, the panic hits. Still, I hope people get some laughs out of it and that they can understand me in a deeper way and not just in an “E! True Hollywood Story� kind of cheesy, sleazy way.

DH: Gay audiences got their first big dose of you as ChiChi Rodriguez in Too Wong Fu Thanks for Everything Julie Newmar. You claim your eyebrows haven’t been the same since.

JL: I used to have thick eyebrows. Now, they’re hyphens. If you look at Patrick Swayze and Wesley Snipes you’ll see that their eyebrows are weirdly thin on both ends.

DH: You shot that film in the tiny town of Loma, Nebraska. Did you encounter any homophobia?

JL: No, they welcomed us. I’m a Latin man so when I travel across America, I’ll always have the Deliverance radar that somebody is going to come at me. But they saw all this going on and they wanted to be a part of it.

DH: You turned down the part of Tom Hanks’ boyfriend in Philadelphia, which Antonio Banderas ended up playing. Why?

JL: Because it wasn’t funny. I really wanted to do funny things back then and it wasn’t like this show-off part. There was no flash. It was just the beautiful lover and that was it.

DH: Have attitudes in Hollywood changed since you were starting out when it comes to playing gay?

JL: Actors always want to play gay. Not leads, usually, but everybody else does because it’s always the most interesting part. It’s either the part that will get the most laughter or the most pathos. It’s always the best part.

DH: You recently played a gay man reuniting with his old school friends in The Groomsmen. Did you base your character on people you know?

JL: Yeah, I did. I heard my character got huge applause at the San Francisco Gay Film Festival. People said that I didn’t portray him as mincing. I didn’t want to do any of the stereotypes -- the fashion sense and witty quips. I wanted him to be like a regular dude, like some people that I know. And he had the issues with his father, which was pretty interesting to me, for obvious reasons.

In the new issue of Vanity Fair, coverboy George Clooney tells the mag about his perfect solution to the never-ending curiosity and speculation about his lovelife: he will simply date everyone..including LEO!

"Here is my theory on debunking photographs in magazines, you know, the paparazzi photographs,� he says in the October issue. “I want to spend every single night for three months going out with a different famous actress. You know, Halle Berry one night, Salma Hayek the next, and then walk on the beach holding hands with Leonardo DiCaprio."

Those are some pics I'd like to see!

While Cher is selling off her belongings, another Oscar-winning 60-year-old gay icon is busy working. That was a very upbeat Liza Minnelli greeting giddy fans outside "The Today Show" on Thursday morning before sitting down for an interview with Meredith Viera, the best thing to happen to morning television since Jane Pauley. Liza hadn't slept a wink since she had been up until the wee hours filming an episode of "Law & Order: Criminal Intent." Minnelli plays a former beauty queen whose daughter, an aspiring beauty queen, was found murdered on Halloween night. She described the role as Patsy Ramsey, "only crazier!" The episode, called ''Masquerade,'' is filming now and will air in November. Liza, the star of "Cabaret" and "New York, New York," has found steady work on the small screen including a few seasons on "Arrested Development" in a hilarious recurring role.

Viera is so cool. Toward the end of the chat, she asked Liza about her soon-to-be ex, David Guest, whose silly spousal abuse case was kicked out of court. Says Liza: "The word dismissed never sounded so good." But the three-time Tony Award winner declined to comment further on the strange dude she married.

"the guy wears sunglasses indoors! That shoulda been your first clue!" Viera told Liza, sounding much like her old self from "The View." Liza cackled and could be seen giving Viera a playful scolding slap on the knee before giving her a big hug as the show was going to commercial.
Love both those dames.

The priceless Cher, winner of an Oscar, an Emmy and a Grammy and loved by gay men everywhere, put more than 700 of her belongings up for auction and they fetched over $3.5 million, more than double pre-sale estimates. Up for auction at the Beverly Hilton Hotel were more than 700 of her paintings, furniture, works of art, pieces of clothing and jewelry to the highest bidders.
The top clothing item? A rock and roll costume designed by Bob Mackie which sold for $60,000. It had been estimated at between $2,000 and $3,000.
Other big ticket items were Cher's 2005 black Bentley which sold for $204,000 and a "Gothic Revival" brass bed from the star's Malibu home took in $84,000.
The auction was held at Sotherby's and run by Julien's Auctions. Part of the proceeds from the two-day sale will be donated to charity, and Cher will use some of the proceeds to redecorate her Malibu mansion.
"Today every single lot found a buyer, a true testament to Cher's fan base and longevity as a performer and star," says Julien's Auctions President Darren Julien.