The ladies plan a funeral for a fellow designer who is dying of AIDS.
Suzanne attends her high school reunion, where people shun her because she weighs more than she did in high school.
Charlene goes into labor, while the other ladies meet a dying 102-year-old black woman who tells them of her life experience as a woman of color in the South.
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Title: Designing Women (1986–1993)
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Outspoken feminist Julia Sugarbaker runs a design firm out of her Atlanta home, along with her shallow ex-beauty queen sister, Suzanne, divorced mother Mary Jo, and, naive country girl Charlene. Black ex-con Anthony helps deliver furniture for the business and voices his unique opinion on whatever the women are discussing. Episodes typically revolved around the work, personal, and love lives of these four women. Written by Kristen <mouse15@webtv.net>
Designing Women is a true classic show, certainly with its original cast, offering some of the best characters, chemistry, and scripts ever on television. The people behind the show were the Thomasons, good friends of Bill Clinton from Arkansas, and often, the show expressed their liberal point of view.
Julia, Suzanne, Charlene, Mary Jo etc., have now all passed into syndication where they can be enjoyed all the time. These wonderful actresses fleshed out their characters so were able to laugh, be appalled, and cry with them: Julia, the widow, outspoken with a good heart; Suzanne, her beauty queen sister, selfish, shallow, and lovable; Charlene, the patsy, pretty, sweet, and naive; Mary Jo, the divorcée, struggling with dating and motherhood, self-deprecating and funny. And what can be said about that supporting cast of Meshach Taylor as Anthony and Alice Ghostley as Bernice? Perfect.
Even though I laughed hysterically at many of the episodes, two stand out - one where, during freezing weather, Suzanne and Anthony are stranded at a fleabag hotel for the night; the other was when the girls went on some sort of camping trip and were ordered around by a counselor - I'm vague on the details, but I can still see the look on Charlene and Mary Jo's faces.
Like the Golden Girls, with the loss of one of the cast, in this case Delta Burke, the show suffered, although it was still funny with Julia Duffy and Judith Ivey. But audiences find it difficult to accept new characters as replacements, no matter how good. The chemistry was never the same. Nevertheless, even the later episodes make for great viewing.