Today’s the day: happy 40th anniversary to The Golden Girls!!! The show premiered on NBC on September 14th, 1985 and was an instant hit that’s been making us laugh ever since. I feel like that’s almost an understatement given how popular the show still is. NBC started airing daytime reruns of the show in 1989 and it went into syndication the following year, which means that The Golden Girls has been on television continuously for 40 years. That’s gotta be some kind of record! A whole new generation of fans discovered the show in 2017 when it started streaming on Hulu, and viewers watched nearly 11 million hours of Dorothy, Rose, Blanche, and Sophia during the COVID-19 lockdown in 2020.

When I started this blog in 2018 I had no idea where it would take me (I’m in a book!), and I didn’t even consider the possibility that I would still be writing about The Golden Girls in time for its 40th anniversary. Today, as always, The Golden Girls continues to be a constant source of comfort and humor in an ever more serious and divided world. I think if the Girls could solve crises from AIDS to immigration and nuclear disarmament and everything in between back in the 80s with some cheesecake and hugs then today’s leaders could do the same. Seriously! The fact that we’re still dealing with so many of the same issues 40 years later is a big part of why The Golden Girls maintains its popularity. We may have seen each episode hundreds, perhaps even thousands of times, but it’s truly a comfort like no other.

I had hoped to have a more creative post ready to celebrate this milestone, but it’s taking a bit longer than I anticipated to put together. So in the meantime here are some fun articles to read and relive your favorite moments and memories from the show.

The Golden Girls Turns 40! 7 Surprising Revelations from Behind the Scenes of the Iconic Sitcom

Most longtime fans of The Golden Girls will be familiar with the “surprising revelations” in this article from People, but it’s always fun to go down the road and back again with a little behind the scenes hot goss. Plus, since People is Blanche’s favorite “serious news magazine,” they did go the extra mile to include quotes from people like Lyn Greene, who played young Dorothy, and others from the show to drop some fresh insight.

‘The Golden Girls’ at 40: Here are the 5 best episodes, according to one of the show’s writers

The lovely Stan Zimmerman, a writer, director and producer on The Golden Girls, shared his picks for the 5 best episodes of the show with the LA Times. A few of them just might surprise you!

“I hear some beautiful stories of how, especially in the LGBTQ+ community; this was a show that they could sit down with their grandparents and all laugh at together,” he said. “When you laugh at something, it kind of opens your heart and your mind at the same time.

New book explores groundbreaking magic of ‘The Golden Girls,’ 40 years after it first aired on TV

Last but certainly not least, Taylor Cole Miller, one of the editors of The Golden Girls: Tales from the Lanai, was featured on WGN’s Weekend Morning News show to chat about the book and why the show is still so relevant and beloved 40 years later. I love that their article says the book was “written by professors,” which I am not, but I’ll take it!

Here’s to 40 more years of friendship, laughter, and cheesecake with The Golden Girls!