When the creators and producers of NBC’s The Golden Ladies started the hunt for the 4 actors who would make up what grew to become the present’s unforgettable solid, they began with the function of the aged and spunky Sophia Petrillo. Because it turned out, they have been instantly shocked by Estelle Getty’s interpretation of the half in an audition that was so good, they might later recall, it was scary.
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Estelle Getty had a background in theater
The actor who would come to play Sophia Petrillo was native New Yorker Estelle Getty. Her expertise was principally in theater, however that didn’t cease her from auditioning for the tv comedy, based on Jim Colucci’s Golden Ladies Perpetually: An Unauthorized Look Behind the Lanai. The present’s producers Susan Harris, Paul Junger Witt, and Tony Thomas “focused first on the character they thought would be hardest to find: feisty octogenarian Sophia Petrillo.”
Getty wasn’t well-known by any means but as an actor. She was “primarily a stage actress in local production in Queens, New York, a late bloomer who had only recently scored her most noteworthy role playing the mother to Harvey Fierstein’s Arnold Beckoff character in the actor/playwright’s off-off-Broadway Torch Song Trilogy.”
Colucci added that when the stage present started touring the West Coast, Getty “landed some small Hollywood roles, including a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it appearance in Tootsie (costarring Doris Belack, who played her future TV daughter Gloria).”
Getty’s ‘Golden Girls’ audition for Sophia Petrillo shocked producers
Colucci famous that the present’s producers at first envisioned the character of Sophia as “a big, fat Italian mama with a bun.” Getty at the moment was 61 years previous and anticipated to audition for the function of Dorothy. At studying she can be studying for the much-older Sophia’s function, she took on the problem. “Age and ethnic she could do,” Colucci wrote. “She had played those things before.”
Thomas remembered watching Getty’s first audition. His different two co-producers have been away for the day and so solely he bought to witness the actor’s good efficiency.
“Estelle came in to see me,” Colucci reported the government producer’s recollection. “And it was actually frightening. You don’t expect to hear the words jump off the page that way. It was like, ‘Oh my God, this is everything we wanted!’”
‘The Golden Girls’ solid lastly bought their ‘Sophia’
Thomas, the truth is, was satisfied their search for Sophia was over and was decided that his colleagues have Getty audition as many occasions because it took to see it his manner.
“He set up a callback for Estelle to come in to see his fellow producers,” the creator wrote, including that Thomas advised Harris and Witt: “If you don’t like her, have her do it again. Don’t let her out of the room until you’re satisfied, because she’s the one.”