Edna Garrett
"So Mrs. Garrett's been working on ya," Jo states to Blair shortly upon her arrival in the second season, instantly recognizing the role Mrs. Garrett played in the lives of these girls. The matronly type you want to tell your secrets to and cunning enough to know how to coax them out of you, she's clever and shrewd, and somehow always manages to guide everyone in the right direction while learning a few facts of life herself. She's instantly likeable as warmhearted, jovial and fair, but perhaps what is most cherished for me is her sometimes shrill voice when screaching at the girls!
Al Burton, Production Supervisor, noted "Charlotte Rae was an instant smash!" while appearing in the first season of Diff'rent Strokes as the Drummond's housekeeper. So they spun Charlotte into her own series where Mrs. Garrett became a treasured icon.
Onscreen we saw Edna Garrett as Housekeeper, Housemother, Dietian, Caterer, and owner of Edna's Edibles, then kitchy shop Over Our Heads, before getting married and moving to Africa to rejoin the Peace Corps. She has an ex-husband, 2 sons, a sister, Beverly Ann, and is now widowed and looking for love.
Blair Warner
"I just had another one of my brilliant ideas" epitomizes how Blair sees herself. Not a mirror goes by unnoticed, she describes herself as perfect, and why not? She's gorgeous with great hair, straight A's and filthy rich....(old money)! "Good news about me is getting repetitious!"
But the rich snob with the warm heart almost never was. The part had been written differently but the producers liked Lisa Welchel's condescending tone and completely rewrote the character around her reading. "Lisa came up with her character. No one directed her [to do the reading that way]," recalls Casting Director, Eve Brandstein.
Blair's early aspirations to be an artist fell away to college where she became a lawyer, but not before a brief cameo at Senior Sombrarro's, "I hate my life," and her stint as new Head Master at Eastland after purchasing the bankrupt school. When last seen she had married a hotel tycoon with the same last name, "I didn't even have to change my monogram!"
Dorothy 'Tootie' Ramsey
"There's gonna beee trouubble!"
Its perfectly fitting that 22 years after we first meet this snoopy, gossipy child on rollerskates that she ends up with a successful talk show. And skillset aside, that was not her dream."I don't need to think! I'm gonna be an actress."
Kim Fields reveals "I was the only black girl that had auditioned for the show and I was kinda runtish in terms of my size and I just thought what am I doing here?" But the show wanted her so much they came up with a rather interesting solution to make her look closer in age to the other girls, put her on rollerskates...ALL THE TIME! Which really, was kind of odd. "You try coming down some of those steps on rollerskates. Oh the joy of children's hospital," Kim remembers with the laughter that can only be found with time. While Kim enjoyed life on a long-lasting sitcom, her alter ego, Tootie, struggled constantly, yet her determination was admirable.
"What you got against money?!"
From the precocious child teaching her friends to play poker, she grows into the voice of morality, often meddling and getting overexcited when making her point. She is a loyal friend and a romantic at heart, marrying her childhood sweetheart and having a daughter. Now widowed, she has returned to her first love: the Theatre.
Natalie Letisha Sage Green
"Nat, that's to your bedroom!" Tootie offers while Natalie takes the muscled groceryboy on a "shortcut". Ah yes, Natalie loved the boys, her face lighting up whenever one was near enough to touch! Passionate about words, Natalie uses her wit and humour to be liked and sees life as a playground for learning what it takes to be a writer.
"STOP LAUGHING AT YOUR OWN LINES!!" Mindy recalls of the notes the producers would hand her after takes. "I just remember being in the rehearsal hall and the director saying, now Mindy, if you can just go upstage...and i must have looked... I went deaf dumb and blind" describes Cohn of her first day on set. "They just picked her up out of a school! How did that happen?! Where's your classes? Where's your actor's training?" laughed Kim Fields, Mindy Cohn's costar. Lisa Welchel jokes "...where you could tell she had just been plucked from a school is when she'd then laugh at her lines or say them while smiling," Eventually this quirk just became a part of Nat's personality and the producers stopped giving Mindy notes.
From her early days as Editor of the school paper, Natalie would undergo some hardships during her years at Eastland and those to follow, shaping her to be the writer she aspired to be. With a trail of boyfriends and crap jobs, Natalie eventually became a successful journalist and engaged to Harper, a sexy cameraman she'd met through work.
Joanna Marie 'Jo' Polniaczek
"Its the neighbourhood you rich folks drive through on the way to the airport" describes scholarship student, Jo, of her Bronx roots after arriving at the preppy boarding school. Right from the beginning she discovers the joys of tormenting Blair, and a beautiful friendship of love and animosity is born. Always ready to run when things get hard she learns more than anyone to trust and stand her ground.
Diving into the second season after the show's revamping, Nancy McKeon wowed the producers in her audition. Easily showing vulnerability and a spunky strength she became the perfect foil for rich girl, Blair. Nancy remained with the show until the end, but at the beginning of the 6th season she walked out over contract disputes and an amicable resolve was found, writing Jo out of two episodes.
Jo's dream of owning her own garage isn't exactly how she ended up. Always with a part time job and typing papers for cash her careers brached from political activism, working with communities, teaching children and eventually becoming a cop. She is married to musician, Rick, and has a daughter, Jaimie.
