TLDR: Rue McClanahan and Bea Arthur played best friends on television twice, a decade apart, on two completely different shows. By the time The Golden Girls needed real chemistry, the two women had already spent six seasons building it, and McClanahan herself had already survived far more off screen than most of her characters ever let on.
Eddi-Rue McClanahan was born February 21, 1934, in Healdton, Oklahoma, and raised in nearby Ardmore, the daughter of a building contractor father and a beautician mother.
She made her stage debut at age four in a local production of The Three Little Kittens, and by high school she was winning a gold medal in oration while acting in every school play she could find.
She graduated cum laude from the University of Tulsa in 1956 with a degree in drama and German, then trained further under acting teachers Uta Hagen and Harold Clurman before making her professional stage debut in a 1957 production of Inherit the Wind.
Norman Lear noticed her stage work more than a decade later and cast her first in a guest role on All in the Family, then as Vivian, Maude’s lifelong best friend from college, across six seasons of Maude from 1972 to 1978.
That years-long working relationship with Bea Arthur laid the real foundation for the dynamic the two women would later bring to a Miami living room.
McClanahan made her Broadway debut of her own in 1969 opposite Dustin Hoffman in Jimmy Shine, and won an Obie Award the following year for her off-Broadway work in Who’s Happy Now.
She Survived a Marriage She Later Called Genuinely Frightening
McClanahan married six times, a fact she wrote about with real candor in her 2007 memoir, My First Five Husbands… and the Ones Who Got Away. Her first marriage, to actor Tom Bish in 1958, produced her only child, son Mark, before ending after just seventeen months.
Her third marriage, to restaurateur Peter DeMaio from 1964 to 1971, was the one she later described as the hardest.
She told People that DeMaio was “very hot-tempered” and that she’d “never known anyone like that,” admitting she was genuinely afraid of him, and that her own marriage counselor told her plainly, “I’ve only advised this once in my career, but I advise you not to stay together.”
She stayed anyway, until she noticed her son Mark, then 13, growing increasingly withdrawn and afraid of DeMaio too. Mark eventually told her he’d move back to Oklahoma to live with his grandparents if she didn’t leave, and that was what finally ended the marriage.
She Turned Blanche Into an Actual Business
Before The Golden Girls, McClanahan spent two seasons playing Aunt Fran on the sitcom Mama’s Family, a role written out of the show before she joined the cast that would define her.
She leaned fully into Blanche Devereaux’s most famous trait once she got there, eventually launching her own custom lingerie line based directly on the character’s silk robes and nightgowns.
In 2005, well after The Golden Girls ended, she returned to Broadway to play Madame Morrible in Wicked, proof her stage career never actually stopped running alongside her television fame. She also kept working in film, appearing alongside Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau in the 1997 comedy Out to Sea.
Her Final Years Were Defined by Real Health Battles
McClanahan was diagnosed with and successfully treated for breast cancer in June 1997, afterward becoming a genuine advocate who lectured cancer support groups on aging with resilience.
In November 2009, she underwent quadruple heart bypass surgery, a serious procedure for a woman already in her mid-seventies, and was reportedly taking a powerful anticoagulant medication in the months afterward to help prevent further complications.
While still recovering from that surgery, she suffered a minor stroke in January 2010 that temporarily affected her ability to walk and talk.
Friend Betty White reported by March that her speech had returned to normal, a recovery that made what came next feel even more sudden.
A Massive Stroke Ended Her Life Months Later
Rue McClanahan died at New York-Presbyterian Hospital on June 3, 2010, at age 76. The exact cause was a massive brain hemorrhage, a severe stroke unrelated to her earlier recovery, and one that came while she was still officially separated from her sixth husband, Morrow Wilson, whom she’d married on Christmas Day 1997.
Off screen, she was a committed animal rights activist, a strict lifelong vegetarian, and a longtime supporter of PETA, as well as an outspoken advocate for gay rights and marriage equality.
You can read more about the rest of the Golden Girls cast in our full guide to the show.
Rue McClanahan, Frequently Asked Questions
Did Rue McClanahan know Bea Arthur before The Golden Girls?
Yes, they worked together for six seasons on Norman Lear’s Maude, with McClanahan playing Vivian, Maude’s best friend, from 1972 to 1978.
What health problems did Rue McClanahan have?
She was treated for breast cancer in 1997, underwent quadruple heart bypass surgery in November 2009, and suffered a minor stroke in January 2010 while recovering from that surgery.
How did Rue McClanahan die?
She died on June 3, 2010, at New York-Presbyterian Hospital, at age 76, from a massive brain hemorrhage.
How many times was Rue McClanahan married?
Six times, a fact she wrote about in her 2007 memoir, My First Five Husbands… and the Ones Who Got Away. She described her third marriage, to Peter DeMaio, as genuinely frightening.
Did Rue McClanahan have children?
Yes, one son, Mark Bish, born in 1958 during her first marriage to actor Tom Bish.
