DVD REVIEW: GOLDEN GIRLS, THE – LIFETIME INTIMATE PORTRAIT

The Pitch

“Take the E! True Hollywood Story, triple the estrogen and throw in four cranky old broads.”

The Humans

Bea “the snappy one” Arthur, Betty “the dumb one” White, Rue “the slut” McClanahan and Estelle “the old, snappy one” Getty

The Nutshell

The Golden Girls: A Lifetime Intimate Portrait Series is four separate biographies on each of our favorite senior citizens. Think A&E’s Biography but not as good. Lifetime interviews the stars, their friends, inserts clips of the show and viola!

The Package

Nothing beyond the four portraits. I thought they’d at least have some bonus features (ads to buy the series on DVD at least) – but no. You can pick an individual Golden Girl to watch, or Play All. That’s all of your choices.

My wife loves The Golden Girls. If she sees it on Lifetime she will click over and I’m stuck watching senior slapstick for the next half hour. Honestly, the show has its moments. This disc, however, does not.

I don’t know why this disc exists as a separate entity. I guess there may be a few people that would buy this for $14.99… but how many? If Warner Home Video wanted to say “Thank you for being a friend…” they would have made each portrait a bonus feature on any one set of The Golden Girls DVDs (reviewed here: Season 1, Season 2 and Season 3). If they wanted us to feel like they are our pal or confidant they could have bundled this disc with one specific season. But as a stand alone? Do people really want to know too much more about Betty White’s animal love?

The disc portraits are rather bland too. Each segment is occasionally interesting, but ultimately doomed to boredom. Lifetime didn’t do much to make their lives overly interesting, and as a result the viewer doesn’t care much either.

That’s sad because if I get attached to a TV character I become attached to the actor as well. Ultimately, as their career grows, I care more about the actor than just the character. I wanted to come away with a better appreciation for these actresses after watching this disk, but that didn’t happen. After watching I cared for the TV personas these women created far more than the actual actresses.