‘My Many, Many Husbands’: Celebrating the Fabulous Real Rue McClanahan Behind Blanche on ‘Golden Girls’

Blanche Devereaux walked into The Golden Girls as if she owned the room. She was flirtatious, glamorous, witty and never shy about her love of men. Whether she was chasing romance, delivering a razor-sharp comeback or pretending not to notice the realities of aging, Blanche quickly became one of television’s most unforgettable sitcom characters.

But according to Golden Girls Forever author Jim Colucci, the actress who made Blanche iconic—Rue McClanahan—almost didn’t play her at all. “They knew older, talented women were out there and not getting work, so they’d be eager to do the show,” Jim explains. “They thought, ‘Why not take our pick of them?’ They started this really exhaustive search of women of that age and caliber and, ironically, ultimately came down to two of the most obvious choices—Betty White and Rue McClanahan.

“They picked Betty White first and they cast her as Blanche, kind of going along The Mary Tyler Moore Show lines in terms of character,” he continues, “and by the time Rue got offered a chance to come in and audition, she had her heart set on Blanche. They said to her, ‘No, that’s Betty’s role. If you want to do this show at all, you’d better read for Rose.’ Having lost out similarly in Soap by holding out for a character that she didn’t get, Rue said, ‘All right, I don’t want to lose out again. I’ll read for Rose.’ It was only a little bit into the process when the pilot’s director, Jay Sandrich, saw Rue read as Rose and said, ‘I’m going to ask you to do something unconventional. I’m going to ask you to go into the other room and study the Blanche lines and see what you can do with that.’

“Rue was like, ‘Okay!’ She happily did that and then they broke the news to Betty that they really wanted to recommend the switch. To Betty’s credit, she acquiesced, and so history was made really at the last minute there, too.”

Why we love Blanche Devereaux

Fortunately for television audiences, Rue ultimately landed the role she wanted, creating one of The Golden Girls’ most unforgettable characters. Blanche Devereaux may have been, as noted above, glamorous, flirtatious and full of confidence, but beneath the charm and Southern sass was a character with surprising depth. These are some of the reasons audiences continue to love Blanche:

She had unmatched confidence: Blanche walked into every room as if it belonged to her. Her confidence was magnetic, funny and endlessly entertaining.

Her Southern charm was irresistible: Blanche’s Georgia roots shaped everything from her accent to her manners to her storytelling, making her instantly distinctive.

She delivered some of the show’s funniest lines: Whether flirtatious, dramatic or completely exasperated, Blanche always knew how to land a laugh.

She embraced her sexuality unapologetically: Blanche was groundbreaking in the way she openly celebrated romance, desire and attraction without shame.

She was far more vulnerable than she let on: Beneath the bravado was a woman deeply concerned about aging, loneliness and losing her desirability.

Her friendship with Dorothy was comedy gold: Blanche’s confidence constantly clashed with Dorothy’s sarcasm, creating some of the funniest exchanges in sitcom history.

She had a huge heart: For all her vanity and flirtation, Blanche deeply loved her family and friends and showed up when they needed her.

She was bold and fearless: Blanche said what she wanted, pursued what she wanted and rarely apologized for being herself.

She proved glamour and heart can coexist: Blanche wasn’t just stylish and funny—she was layered, human and unforgettable, which is why she remains one of television’s most beloved characters.

Getting to know the real Rue McClanahan

Blanche and Rose became so inseparable from Rue McClanahan and Betty White that picturing them reversed feels downright surreal. Jim certainly sees the switch as one of the most important decisions in the show’s history.

“All in all, there are so many facets to the casting of this show. There was the character that they thought would be hard to get who turned out to be the first one they got and who had to be aged up because she had the attitude but not the necessary look,” he says of Esetelle Gerry’s portrayal of Sophia. “Then there was the actor they wanted from the stage directions who came in at the last minute because they had to talk her into it [Bea Arthur]. Then there were the two roles they thought, ‘Let’s look all over creation for them so we can go unorthodox,’ and they went with orthodox, perfect choices.”

What made Rue McClanahan’s performance so remarkable is that Blanche could easily have become a one-note character. On paper, Blanche was the flirtatious Southern belle obsessed with beauty, romance and male attention. In less capable hands, the role might have been reduced to little more than punchlines about sex and vanity. But Rue brought something deeper to the character, balancing Blanche’s confidence and flirtation with vulnerability, insecurity and surprising emotional depth.

Jim got to experience Rue’s wit and personality firsthand with Golden Girls Forever, a conversation that was born out of the fact that he was interviewing her for the Television Academy’s Archive of American Television. Part of his deal was that, because the Archive interview is about a celebrity’s entire career, thus limiting the amount of time he could spend on The Golden Girls, he would be allowed to follow her into makeup or getting touch-ups so that he could pepper her with more questions.

“And she was a good sport about that,” he points out, “but the problem is that at the end of a five-hour archival interview where you talk about your whole life, first of all you’re exhausted and you get a little cranky. Then I was doing a novice interviewer thing—so it’s my fault—where, because the Archive gives you like 40 pages of questions to ask these people, we were having to cut questions for lack of time. I just tried to keep speeding up and ask multiple things at one time. Like, ‘Rue, when you did this TV movie and this one and this one and this one, which one’s your favorite?’ When you talk that fast to somebody who’s been talking for five hours, Rue started to get snippy with me. You can see that in the interview. But I view that as a fun memory, because I see that she had patience with me being an idiot and yet she indulged me many times during that day.

“When she’d see that something was related to Blanche, she’d kind of do the voice for me. At one point, she talked about her many, many husbands in real life and went into Blanche and said, ‘My many, many husbands.’ She was making it fun for me and we’re, again, in her living room, so what could be more fun for a fan than that opportunity?”

Jim believes part of The Golden Girls’ enduring appeal is that each woman represented something recognizable and relatable, regardless of age. “There’s an adage that’s an oxymoron in Hollywood: the more specific you make a character, the more general the appeal. And I think what that means is when you hang some character traits on a character that we all can identify as either ourselves or someone we know and love, it makes us believe that character. If you’re just trying to make a character all things to all people—we’re not even going to say what age this person is and we’re not going to give him or her any identifying characteristics—that’s not interesting to anybody.”

Viewers may not all know a flirtatious Southern belle from Atlanta, but they recognize the person underneath—someone who wants to feel attractive, wanted and loved. “And even for younger people, we have that power as humans of empathy and we can identify, ‘Oh, that Dorothy is like my friend and she’s funny like my friend.’ And so it always connected with people younger than the girls themselves were.”

How to watch MeTV’s ‘The Golden Girls of Summer: Best of Blanche Week’

Monday, June 22

10:00 pm ET/PT—“Second Motherhood”: Blanche is caught off guard when a man she’s dating proposes marriage—but the relationship comes with an unexpected complication: two young children.

10:30 pm ET/PT—“End of the Curse”: Blanche is stunned when she begins to believe she may be pregnant.

Tuesday, June 23

10:00 pm ET/PT—“Joust Between Friends”: Tension builds when Blanche accuses Dorothy of stealing her responsibilities at work.

10:30 pm ET/PT—“The Actor”: The girls compete for the attention of a handsome and famous actor.

Wednesday, June 24

10:00 pm ET/PT—“The One That Got Away”: Blanche gets a second chance at romance when she reconnects with a man from her past.

10:30 pm ET/PT—“Scared Straight”: Blanche’s brother Clayton struggles to reveal that he’s gay and instead claims he slept with Rose.

Thursday, June 25

10:00 pm ET/PT—“That Old Feeling”: Blanche finds herself unexpectedly falling for her late husband George’s brother.

10:30 pm ET/PT—“Triple Play”: Blanche takes a job selling cars and quickly turns it into an opportunity to meet men.

Friday, June 26

10:00 pm ET/PT—“Mrs. George Devereaux”: Blanche dreams that her late husband George has returned, stirring powerful emotions.

10:30 pm ET/PT—“The Case of the Libertine Belle”: Blanche hosts a murder mystery party that leads to one of the funniest and most beloved episodes of the series.

Rue McClanahan fast facts

• Rue McClanahan is best known for playing Blanche Devereaux on The Golden Girls, one of television’s most beloved sitcoms.
• How old was Rue when she played Blanche? She was 51 when she started the show and 59 when the spinoff The Golden Palace ended.
• Before The Golden Girls, Rue starred opposite Bea Arthur on Maude, where the two actresses developed the chemistry that would later carry over into their scenes as Blanche and Dorothy.
• Rue’s chemistry with Betty White, Bea Arthur and Estelle Getty helped turn The Golden Girls into a cultural phenomenon that continues to attract new generations of fans.
• Rue McClanahan won an Emmy Award in 1987 for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series for her performance as Blanche Devereaux.
• After The Golden Girls ended in 1992, Rue continued playing Blanche Devereaux in the follow-up series The Golden Palace.
• Long before television fame, Rue built an impressive stage career and appeared in the Broadway production of Jimmy Shine, starring alongside Dustin Hoffman.
• Blanche Devereaux became one of TV’s most iconic characters thanks to Rue’s ability to balance comedy, glamour, vulnerability and emotional depth.
• Although Blanche was famous for her confidence and flirtation, many of Rue’s strongest moments on The Golden Girls revealed the character’s fears about aging, loneliness and self-worth.