Rue McClanahan dies

[suebee]

Three out of four of the "Golden Girls" are gone now.They gave us some ground-breaking television, and a lot of laughs. Rue McClanahan will be greatly missed. (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_obit_rue_mcclanahan;_ylt=Ahcxk3PGULjBnzUs2qOpBL .s0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTNxZ2l2bWFuBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTAwNj AzL3VzX29iaXRfcnVlX21jY2xhbmFoYW4EY2NvZGUDbW9zdHBv cHVsYXIEY3BvcwM4BHBvcwM1BHB0A2hvbWVfY29rZQRzZWMDeW 5faGVhZGxpbmVfbGlzdARzbGsDZ29sZGVuZ2lybHJ1)<<<link


I'm going to go look for some of my favorite clips. Perhaps we could post some of them here in "Blanche's" memory.

[Linus]

RIP Rue. :(

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[Spirit Dancer]

RIP Rue :rose:

[Rook]

She was my favorite..
Besides Bea Arthur...
I liked her in "Maude" as well...

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R.I.P Rue (f):candle:

:mohawk:

[Sam]

RIP
We seem to be losing strong names this year.

[Rook]

I believe Sophia and Blanche were the first ones to broach the "Lebanese/Lesbian" Skit..lol..
I loved that Ep.

[Gemme]

When I saw this blurb on the front page of ao-hell, I felt my stomach drop a bit. Such a sassy lady. She will be terribly missed.

[scootebaby]

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[DamonK]

I saw this immediately when I opened Mozilla. Then like Gemme, my heart and stomach dropped.

I loved Rue in Golden Girls and many other shows.

RIP Rue

[gotoseagrl]

Oh no :( GG is an all time favorite.

[suebee]

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[Delish]

RIP
We seem to be losing strong names this year.


It looks like it's going to be another "Death Of The Stars" summer *sigh*
RIP Rue!!

[suebee]

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[always2late]

When I saw this blurb on the front page of ao-hell, I felt my stomach drop a bit. Such a sassy lady. She will be terribly missed.


I feel the same. This so saddened me when I read it. Sigh. RIP Rue (f):candle:

[SnackTime]

I loved her in Golden Girls! I also loved her in the movie "Back to You and Me" with Lisa Hartman Black.

RIP Rue!

[gotoseagrl]

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i never get tired of this show - one of the very few i own on DVD.

[Diva]

Sassy.
Bodacious.
Perky.
Flirty.
Sexy.
Dirty.

My hero.


Shake heaven up, Rue! Shake it up, baby!

[Miami]

Somewhere up in Heaven, Rue's making St. Peter's job REALLY interesting.... LMAO RIP girl, we'll all miss you.

[~Bo]

It's so sad. She was only 76. Wayyyyy too young. :(

R.I.P. Rue (w)

[Miss Scarlett]

Sigh...:watereyes:

[waxnrope]

oh damn, what a loss. I loved her and that show.

[Rook]

As much as I'm loving these GG eps centered around Blanche on vagvision{Thanks!!}...
I'd like to see other shows she did that were just as Good....
Kinda like Bea Arthur & Estelle Getty{Maude, All in the Family, Sordid Lives, Touched by an Angel, The Golden Palace etc *not to mention Movies*}

[AtLast]

Rest in Peace, Suga'.

[Soon]

Rue McClanahan: An Appreciation Of The Original Jezebel (http://jezebel.com/5554762/rue-mcclanahan-an-appreciation-of-the-original-jezebel?skyline=true&s=i)

Rue McClanahan—who passed away today—is best remembered for her Emmy-winning role on The Golden Girls. Blanche Devereaux was a notch in the bedpost of sex-positive feminism because—for the first time—a self-involved, slutty, older lady was endearing, not repulsive.


In McClanahan's 2007 memoir My First Five Husbands…And the Ones Who Got Away, she wrote:

People always ask me if I'm like Blanche. And I say, 'Well, Blanche was an oversexed, self-involved, man-crazy, vain Southern belle from Atlanta—and I'm not from Atlanta!'

Unlike other actors who portrayed beloved iconic pop culture figures, Rue really related to her character. In fact, Rue was initially offered the part of Rose on GG, but when she received the pilot script she instantly knew that she and Blanche "were made for each other," which is a funny thought, considering that the character was often referred to in the dialogue—mostly by Estelle Getty's character Sophia—as "slut," "Sheena, Queen of the Slut People," and (my favorite) "slutpuppy." But Rue loved it. Writing about her time on GG, she says:

I decided right away that Blanche would laugh whenever Sophia shot a poisoned arrow her way…After all, putting up with that sot of thing was, as Blanche breezily put it, 'the curse of every devastatingly beautiful woman.'

And perhaps it was that choice of self-acceptance and confidence that made her character so lovable. In the stiflingly conservative sexual and political climate of the late '80s—during which some felt that the AIDS epidemic was a punishment for sexual promiscuity—a 52-year-old woman saying that she related to a fictional character who shamelessly and genuinely enjoyed her active sex life and spoke frankly about condoms was progressive to say the least. In fact, she felt so strongly about the part, that she agreed to begin shooting the series with a salary based on her previous project (Mama's Family), which she says was tens of thousands less than that of Betty White and Bea Arthur.

One of Rue's favorite exchanges from the series is also telling of her own admitted free spirit:

ROSE: Is it possible to love two men at one time?
BLANCHE: Set the scene. Have we been drinking?

In 1987, she won an Emmy for her role as Blanche, and gave one of the most notorious acceptance speeches in the history of the awards show:

My agents told me I'd never work on TV, that I wasn't photogenic. My mother told me life was a lot of kicks and a lot of boosts... I won't mention who gave the kicks, but you know who you are—and you'll be in the book.

Although McClanahan's career spanned more than half a century—acting in films and Broadway productions—she didn't find mainstream success until she hit primetime TV in 1972 on Maude, a seminal show in the canon of pop cultural feminism, starring Bea Arthur. Playing title character's best friend Vivian, Rue portrayed a sort of silly woman who—with the help of Maude—found liberation from traditional gender roles. Later, on Mama's Family, Rue played a "spinster" freelance journalist.

In her real life, Rue had married five times (as chronicled in her memoir), was a staunch democrat, and was one of the first celebrity spokespeople of PETA. She always had a love of animals.

In the first season of GG, Dorothy gets mad at Blanche about something, and spits, "You, Blanche, are a self-serving, amoral, backstabbing Jezebel."

As someone who made no bones about enjoying her life as a gay-friendly, animal-loving, sex-positive, imperfect woman, we can only hope we grow up to be half the Jezebel that Rue McClanahan was.


http://cache.gawkerassets.com/assets/images/39/2010/06/340x_rue6310.jpg

[CrankyOldGuy]

RIP Girls...(Rue, Bea, Estelle)


PS - new Betty White (http://www.tvland.com/prime/shows/hot_in_cleveland/index.jhtml?xrs=SEM_HIC_0064&gclid=COKL1YvHi6ICFch_5QodsFqaTQ) show!