Memo to Golden Girls:
Don't Let Success Become Excess...Please

Here, at last, was a series that starred three mature single women: two widows and a divorcee who, with the divorcee's 80-year-old mother, share a house in Miami. Here was a literate script with bright dialogue and amusing situations, acted to the hilt and beyond by a team of seasoned pros. And here was affirmation that women without men need not be lonely. The three find support in friendship, in the easy camaraderie around the kitchen table, over chocolate cheesecake--their weakness and their bond. No wonder it was the No. 1 show the week it opened and that it remained near the top for the rest of that season. And no wonder it won four Emmys, including one for best comedy series of 1985-86. Here was visual proof that a woman's life did not end when youth did. Far from being over the hill, these feisty, gutsy women are still clambering to its top.

Each character is a distinct foil for the others. Blanche (Rue McClanahan) is the far-from-faded Southern belle, breathlessly sexy, promiscuous--but in a nice way, a funny way. Rose (Betty White)-- who won her own Emmy as best actress--is sweet, vague and naive: her idea of wildness is running through the sprinkler without her bathing cap on. Dorothy (the marvelous Bea Arthur), with her inimitable voice, perfect timing and the formidable presence, is a force that holds them together. Less abrasive than her former persona Maude, she is practical and intelligent--the baritone voice of reason. Her octogenarian mother, Sophia (Estelle Getty), is a daffy invention: after a slight stroke that left her without the "censor" mechanism in her brain, she blurts out outrageously tactless truths to the others. In one scene Rose, who loves animals, says of the minks they are trying to breed commercially: "Do they have to be killed?" "No," says Sophia, "Many women like to wear minks who urinate."

So far, so good. These women shine; but not all that glitters is golden. Success has its built-in dangers. What was initially original may become a cliche; the breath of fresh air, a gale of gags. Overemphasizing what had been praised, straining for the mandatory laugh, the writers tend to lose creditibility and to turn characters into caricatures. Like the Red Queen in "Through the Looking Glass," who had to run fast in order to remain in the same place, they push hard to keep their place in the ratings. Blanche has to flutter her false eyelashes at every man, Rose becomes more dimly foolish, and Sophia has been turned into a sit-down comic, a kind of caustic Greek chorus. Only good old Dorothy has retained her center of gravity.

Although this series attempts to portray mature women with the affection they deserve, the characters in The Golden Girls are not always mature. The fine, alliterative title waffles, it plays both sides. It promises to present older women, who should be interesting because of their age and experience, but it holds on to "girls," not only in the title, but in situations more appropriate to young women. A girl of 20 might also have a blind sister, a nasty neighbor, a date with a midget. She is more likely to fear that she is pregnant without knowing who the father is than does the 50ish Blanche in the first episode of this season. Pregnancy is not exactly a geriatric concern.

This segment does attempt to face one problem of aging: menopause. But then it slips into adolescent confidences about menstruation, "the curse," in the kind of talk that might be overheard in a school-girls' dormitory.

It's great that the "girls" and "roomies," as they call themselves, are youthful and sexy; that is the point. But if they have not grown old, neither have they grown up. Except for Dorothy, they are middle-aged adolescents. They remain as they were in their youth. Blanche: at a point when she first "blossomed into young womanhood" (her words) and discovered the power of her breasts. Rose: as innocent as she was when she lived on a farm in Minnesota. Sophia: brought up in the doubtful company of Sicilian mobsters--as tough as she was then. Even their theme song, "Thank you for being a friend," sounds like Mister Rogers in his neighborhood.

As for "golden" in the title--does it mean they are in their "golden years"? But today women of 50 and 60 are considered merely middle-aged. Are they golden because they are fortunate: no money worries, no serious health problems, exciting weekly adventures? If the series were called The Golden Women, would anyone buy that? Try The Golden Men--ha! Men have been playing lovers even in their 60s and 70s; that's an old story. No pun intended. Women had not been given that option.

Certainly age is no barrier to sex or fun or beauty. In a brief, sequined sequence, Blanche and Rose tap dance at Dorothy's hospital bedside, showing their lovely legs. But the scene is totally unbelievable.

The writing, on occasion, gets out of control. It tries to be sophisticated, up-to-date, "with it." No words are minced. Dorothy confesses she married because she was four months pregnant. Some of Blanche's lines would never pass is spoken by a young woman. It's as if age has given her permission for bawdiness; that is its shock value. It seems to be a test of how far the writers can go.

I am not suggesting that actual problems and infirmities of aging are the stuff of comedy, or that older women must be prim and proper, but that realism can be as funny as farce.

The writers obviously strive for balance, which turns into a teeter-totter of contrasts, such as the very tall Dorothy and her dimunitive mother, the tiny terror, Sophia. Even the actresses' hair is a contrast in colors: gray, blonde, chestnut and white. The tone vacillates between cynical and sentimental, naive and pungent, true and false. Real truths, honestly observed, alternate with absurdity. An aging woman looking into a mirror sees, instead of her own, her mother's face--and hates it. True. Sophia assures them she can tell when a man is dead: "I lived in a retirement home; death visited there more often than children." True. But a scene in a psychiatrist's waiting room, where a crazy patient mutters about Martians, is as unlikely as the segment in which the three women are mistakenly jailed as elderly prostitutes.

Often, for the sake of a laugh, a character is lost. Rose, regretting that in her youth on the farm she was not chosen Butter Queen, says: "I've kept those bitter butter memories too long."

Sometimes the laugh lines verge on the macabre. A lover dies in Rose's bed. "There's a married dead man in my bed," she says. Elsewhere, Rose tells the story about the funeral of a farmer who had been accidentally shredded in a farm vehicle by his wife. She says, "It was a very small coffin."

Although the girls are often less golden than brassy, there is a nice, warm feeling of caring among them. (Someone called the series "Miami Nice.") In spite of minor conflicts, bickerings and petty jealousies, selflessness triumphs before the final commercial. But what keeps surfacing is the well-timed insult. A very thin line separates the funny from the nasty. Dorothy's ex-husband appears in one episode. When Blanche reminds Dorothy, "You yourself said the man has the personality of a dial tone," that's funny. When Dorothy says to his face, "You are truly one chromosome away from a potato," that's nasty.

Because the characters of all four women are so firmly defined, they become predictable. Novelty is manufactured in constantly surprising situations, which tend to become further removed from reality. Yet they are anchored to the real world of the kitchen and the supermarket, those two great levelers, and we see some of the baggage they have brought to their many years of living. Children, grandchildren, former spouses and places of work appear or are alluded to. Dorothy is a schoolteacher, Rose a "grief counselor," Blanche works in a museum but spends most of her time flirting and going to bed with men. Sophia sits and sharpens her barbs.

But where is the wisdom their years have earned? I have watched many of the segments; I have not seen them all. I may have missed those that answer my question.

One thing is sure: no matter how far-fetched the episodes, they are superbly acted, even when the actors are required to speak lines unworthy of them. These are four performers whom we applaud for their talent, not for mere longevity and survival, which too often is the case with loyal American audiences. The four play skillfully against each other like so many ping-pong champions. Dorothy can say: "Fiddle-de-dee"--and does--and it's hilariously funny.

Funny too, is the hospital scene, where the surgeon is unavailable because he has been subpoenaed in a malpractice suit, and the priest enters the wrong room to administer last rites. And very funny is the appearance of Burt Reynolds at their door to invite Sophia, whom he had met the night before, to lunch. While the three women gape in astonished envy, he asks Sophia, who had apparently apprised him about Blanche: "Which one is the slut?" All three raise hopeful hands.

There is so much fun in The Golden Girls, I wish that each episode were as good as the best. I wish the characters would always ring true. I wish the writers would ignore their success and stop short of overdoing a good thing. Is that too much to ask?