@JohnCohen1 Wow - can't imagine the roles the other way. So iconic.

@DavidAGorder Crazy, right?

@JohnCohen1 @yashar We all end up with jobs we never intended to have.

@JohnCohen1 @yashar Wouldn’t the first reading have happened before they were hired

@JohnCohen1 @yashar Betty White had just played the bad girl, the marvelous Sue Ann Nivens, on Mary Tyler Moore. Rue McClanahan was the naive Vivian on Maude. They were being typecast & they knew it. And both were capable of more.

@JohnCohen1 @Sam38G It's not so crazy, White played a sexually liberated and outgoing woman on Mary Tyler Moore. The casting was actually very conventional. It's more surprising that they switched roles.

@JohnCohen1 @yashar And isn’t there a story about a portrait of Bee Arther?

@JohnCohen1 @TheGGForever That’s how rue convinced bea Arthur to do the show by telling her that she was going to play the vamp and Betty was going to play the nitwit

@JohnCohen1 @yashar I really wish the nostalgic fever that has been running rampant, was far back enough that we got a reboot of ‘The Golden Girls’.

@JohnCohen1 Betty had already kind of played that role as Sueann Nivans Smart move to switch

@JohnCohen1 That switch is also why Bea Arthur agreed to hop on. She didn't want to do another Maude-type character, especially opposite Rue McClanahan in another role similar to her "Maude" character, but when Rue and Betty swapped, that was enough for Bea to sign on as Dorothy.

@JohnCohen1 @Bowiegrrl1 I can see Betty White doing that role now but not then

@JohnCohen1 Have you not seen Betty on Mary Tyler Moore??? Sue Ann Nivens is a very Blanche-esque character. & Rue’s role on Mama’s Family was more similar to Rose than Blanche...

@JohnCohen1 I love this so much! 😲🥰

@JohnCohen1 That was based on their most famous previous roles. McLanahan had played an airhead on Maude, and White a nymphomaniac on Mary Tyler Moore.