‘Desperate Housewives’ Writer Says Show Was ‘Schlock,’ Everyone Avoided Making Eye Contact With Teri Hatcher
Desperate Housewives delivered no shortage of drama, both on and off the screen. The soapy ABC series was known both for its juicy plotlines and feuds among the cast. The on-set tension even extended to those who weren’t in front of the camera, according to writer Patty Lin, who worked on the show in its first season.
‘Desperate Housewives’ writer can’t understand why the show was so popular
Lin was a seasoned television writer who’d previously worked on Freaks and Geeks and Friends when she landed a job on the “darkly funny” Desperate Housewives in the spring of 2004. Hollywood was buzzing about the show, which had been created by Marc Cherry. Lin accepted the gig without a second thought, despite some early “warning signs,” she recalls in her new memoir, End Credits: How I Broke Up With Hollywood.
Despite high hopes for the show, Lin quickly grew frustrated with the dysfunctional working environment. She also didn’t like Cherry, who was “an awful boss … demanding, unprofessional, and not very nice.” Crafting scripts was chaotic and “wildly inefficient,” leading to an inferior end product, she recalls.
“[A script] would get turned over to production, usually just before the table read and sometimes just before the first day of shooting,” Lin writes.
“It’s a miracle that any episodes of Desperate Housewives ever got made,” she adds.
Those episodes that were produced just weren’t that good, according to Lin.
“The quality that had attracted me to the pilot – the dark humor – was lost in the slapdash, assembly line approach to what was supposed to be a creative process,” she writes. “We were putting out schlock. The fact that it became the hottest show on TV, won multiple awards, ran for eight years, and earned more revenue than God still boggles my mind.”
Everyone avoided making contact with a key ‘Desperate Housewives’ cast member
As a writer, Lin had little to no direct contact with the Desperate Housewives cast. But one of the show’s stars still managed to make a bad impression.
“The writers weren’t barred from the set, but we weren’t exactly welcome,” she writes. “Usually, we’d see the cast only at table reads, where we’d sit quietly in the back and try not to make eye contact with Teri Hatcher.”
The writers weren’t the only ones who were walking on eggshells around Hatcher, who played Susan Mayer on the show. The actor also didn’t get along with her Desperate Housewives co-stars, according to reports.
During a Vanity Fair photo shoot in 2005, Marcia Cross allegedly refused to pose next to Hatcher. The Lois & Clark actor also clashed with fellow cast member Nicolette Sheridan. The Edie Britt actor told Cherry that Hatcher was “the meanest woman in the world,” he said when called to testify in Sheridan’s wrongful termination lawsuit in 2012 (via E! News).
Teri Hatcher wouldn’t comment on ‘Desperate Housewives’ drama
By the time Desperate Housewives reached its final season, no one could ignore the rift between Hatcher and the rest of the show’s cast. By that point, Hatcher was physically distancing herself from her co-stars during filming breaks, according to TVGuide. However, the actor declined to address the rumored feud.
“I will never disclose the true and complicated journey of us all, but I wish everyone on this show well,” she told TV Guide via email. “Marc created out of thin air a majestic street called Wisteria Lane with its picket fences, its flowers always in bloom… and four really complementary characters … Those four characters and the actresses who played them seemed to meld together in a way that harkens the phrase ‘once in a lifetime.'”
End Credits: How I Broke Up With Hollywood is out now.
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