Wisteria Lane Tidbits: 2 Dozen Things You Didn't Know About Desperate Housewives

Desperate Housewives, the hit ABC comic soap opera, was fêted as part of the PaleyFest 2009, the annual festival honoring the best of television. The cast and creative team gathered at the Cinerama Dome in Hollywood on April 18 to talk about the 5-year-old show.

Left to right, Neal McDonough, Doug Savant, James Denton, executive producer Bob Daily, creator Marc Cherry, Eva Longoria Parker and Teri Hatcher

This was Desperate Housewives' second trip to the PaleyFest. It was honored in 2005 during its first season, but was brought back this year because of a much hailed creative revival that happened this season when the show jumped ahead 5 years in the storytelling.

Here are some of the tidbits shared:

1. Creator Marc Cherry said the 5-year jump was done to get the plotlines back to smaller problems for the residents of Wisteria Lane. He wanted to focus on small, real, relatable problems like the show used in its first season. Cherry said he hadn’t liked the melodramatic, “soapy” nature the plots began taking on as the show progressed.

2. Cherry initially wanted to do a 10-year jump, but then he realized, “Oh, I have actresses.” Co-executive producer Bob Daily liked the idea of a jump, but pushed for a 1-year jump. So, they compromised with the 5-year jump.

3. On the question of killing off the character of Edi Britt, Cherry says he always intended to kill off a major character in the 5th season. He said, “I have a desire to keep you guys engaged. Creatively, my writers and I were running out of ideas.” He spoke highly of Nicollette Sheridan, but said, “I have to feel free to make the show as much like real life as possible.”

4. Cherry has promised actress Kathryn Joosten that he will never kill off her character of Mrs. McCloskey. Several years ago, he was chatting with Joosten who commented about how upset she was that writer Aaron Sorkin had killed off her popular character of Mrs. Landingham on The West Wing. To comfort her, Cherry impulsively said he’d never kill Mrs. McCloskey. Immediately afterwards, he realized that he’d never made such a promise before. However, now that he’s made that promise, he intends to keep it.

5. Cherry is contractually committed to the series through Season 7. Whether he continues beyond that will depend on contract negotiations with the network.

6. Teri Hatcher, who plays Susan Mayer, says she loves her character so much, she’s in for the run of the show no matter who’s in charge.

7. Eva Longoria Parker, who plays Gabrielle Solis, said her staying would depend in large part on Cherry remaining involved.

8. Cherry says it was in Season 2 that he really learned how to do his job. He’d been unemployed prior to the start of the show, so he meticulously plotted out Season 1. When Season 2 came along, Cherry says he didn’t plot out the shows as carefully and made some decisions without thinking them out fully. Because he was unhappy with how Season 2 turned out, he hired Bob Daily as his showrunner starting in Season 3. Cherry says Daily acts as his Jiminy Cricket.

9. Doug Savant, who plays Tom Scavo, is the cast member who most dislikes doing shirtless scenes. Cherry and cast members reported that Savant will squawk about having to do shirtless scenes and tries to put them off until the very last minute.

10. Eva Longoria Parker is game for anything; no matter what the plot calls for, she’s eager to give it a try. She didn’t even mind playing the less glamorous Gabrielle during the first half of this season because she hates wearing make-up and red nail polish in real life. However, she admitted that the frumpy Gaby storyline was painful to play at times because it brought up childhood memories of being an ugly duckling and her family calling her, “The Ugly Dark One.”

11. Cherry opted to script Gabrielle’s children as overweight and address it in the storyline because he feels it is important for parents to deal with such issues early on. Cherry said that as someone who’s struggled with his weight his entire life, the longer the issue is ignored, the harder it is to conquer.

12. Cherry was good friends with personal trainer Doug Blasdell, who was featured in the reality series Work Out. In fact, Blasdell was living at Cherry’s house – he was staying there temporarily following a breakup with his boyfriend – when he died of salmonella poisoning. For the 100th episode which dealt with how the unexpected death of handyman Eli Scruggs (played by Beau Bridges) affected all the Wisteria Lane residents, Cherry imagined it as his tribute to the helpful, caring and outgoing Blasdell.

13. Teri Hatcher brought baked goods to her audition and encourages others to do the same as a way to stand out.

14. James Denton and Teri Hatcher never screen tested together even though their budding romance as Mike Delfino and Susan Mayer was a major plot point when the series premiered. In fact, the two had never even met until it was time to do their first scene together. Shooting that scene, Cherry was relieved that the sparks started flying, saying, “Thank God. They have chemistry.”

15. Cherry calls Mike Delfino his mystery action hero since the character is always tied to whatever mystery storyline is happening on the show. “Mystery is in his DNA,” says Cherry.

16. Gale Harold, whose character of Jackson Braddock was abruptly written out when Harold was in a severe motorcycle accident, will be back in the May 3 episode and Cherry reports, “Gale Harold looks better than when he left.”

17. The show toyed with the idea of bringing in Mike Delfino’s younger brother during season 4 and having Harold play the part. When that story idea didn’t pan out, they created the part of Jackson for Harold.

18. Orson Hodge was only intended to stay on Wisteria Lane for one season. However, by the end of his first year, portrayer Kyle MacLachlan was enjoying being on the show and asked Cherry to keep the character on. The same week Cherry learned that Marcia Cross, who plays Bree Hodge, was pregnant in real life, so he changed the story plans to accommodate the two actors.

19. On the question of bringing back actors whose characters have been killed off – either by casting them as evil twins or resurrecting their characters from the grave – Cherry said he is not a fan of using that soap opera staple (a la Bobby in the shower on Dallas). He prefers to use flashbacks and bring the actors back that way.

20. The network was concerned about last season’s plotline that gave Lynette Scavo cancer, fearful of it getting too dark. But Cherry assured them it would be a funny cancer storyline emphasizing the gallows humor.

21. Next season, Kathryn Joosten will have a love interest. When asked who she’d like to see Mrs. McCloskey paired with, Joosten jokingly suggested the Scavo twins.

22. Cherry hopes to bring Nathan Fillion back as Dr. Adam Mayfair in a future season. They wanted to keep Fillion much longer but he was contractually obligated to start work on the Castle series and they had to write him out.

23. A major character from the first two seasons will show up in the last 5 minutes of the season finale.

24. After the panel concluded, some actors bolted quickly while others hung out to sign autographs. Those remaining the longest were Kathryn Joosten, Kyle McLaughlin, Neal McDonough and James Denton, none of whom left until they posed for every picture and signed every autograph.


All photos by James F. Mills