mmm-Mmm! "You take the good, you take the bad..."
If you'd enjoyed 9 seasons of this guilty pleasure as I have this song would haunt you too. Or maybe it's the hair that wakes me in cold sweats in the night (oh Miss Mahoney why didn't they tell you?) Or that girl in the background with those horrible glasses?!
It was a different time when 15 year old girls smoked joints at a boarding school on prime time TV and tumbled over each other playfully in a field while Mr. Pervy Red Shirt watched on from afar. These girls needed help and guidance; they needed Mrs. Garrett.
"Girrrrls! Talk out your problems!"
The year before, however, Mrs. Garrett had not yet made her way from Manhatten to the Eastland School for Girls in the small town of Peekskill, New York. She was the maid for the rich Mr. Drummond and his daughter Kimberly on Diff'rent Strokes. The day after she began working for him though, he adopted two orphan boys from Harlem. Their mother had been his maid for many years. At the time it was controversial having this upscale rich man adopting two black boys.
The Drummond/Jackson Clan
Philip Drummond
A rich widower, played by Conrad Bain, and father of Kimberly and two adopted boys, Willis and Arnold Jackson.
Kimberly Drummond
Played by Dana Plato. She attended Eastland, but lived in Manhatten with her family. See more on Kimberly on the Sorority Sisters page on this blog.
Willis Jackson-Drummond
Older brother of the two, he was orphaned and went to live with "a white family". He was played by Todd Bridges.
Arnold Jackson-Drummond
The youngest of the clan and runtishly small, he was adorable with his catch phrase, "Whatchu talkin' about Willis?!" He was played by Gary Coleman.
Between cross-overs and spin-offs, the Diff'rent Strokes universe would grow. Such as when the family would go to Portland to visit Mr. Drummond's old navy buddy on Hello, Larry (with Kim Richards) or Mrs. Garrett moving to Eastland where the family would visit her from time to time. In a handful of episodes, various girls from Facts of Life would appear on Diff'rent Strokes, including the Facts pilot "The Girls School". Arnold would expand their universe farther by appearing in shows like Silver Spoons with Ricky Schroder and on Fresh Prince of Bel-Air with Will Smith.
