Designing Women

- Season 4

(1989)

Suzanne's pig Noelle has run away, so to console herself, she buys maternity gifts for an expectant Charlene. When Anthony injures his back carrying a 200 pound antique table down the stairs, and he learns his insurance has been canceled, Suzanne lets him stay at her house to recuperate. However, her idea of generosity proves to be more than Anthony can bear. Meanwhile, Mary Jo tries to impress a snobby rich acquaintance from high school by saying she lives in one of her wealthy client's houses.

Julia receives a request to spend the night with Donald Stillman, a former classmate dying of a rare form of lymphoma. She barely remembers him, and there are no photos of him in the school yearbooks, so when she and Donald go out to dinner, the other ladies and Anthony go to the same restaurant in case he turns out to be a maniac.

On the eve of Charlene's baby shower, an official from the Miss Georgia pageant bears the bad news that Suzanne will have to relinquish her crown due to a clerical error.

While camping in a rural area, a family of hillbillies in a nearby bar asks the ladies to dance. J.D., Bill, and Reese's jealousy leads to a fight.

Anthony becomes a contractor, and to impress his yuppie girlfriend he is eager to finish a job on which the ladies have had to deal with unscrupulous contractors who cut corners.

Charlene's cousin Mavis coaches the ladies for an upcoming talent show, where they will be playing the Supremes. When Charlene goes back to pick up something she lost, she notices Mavis's husband brutally abusing her. Meanwhile, Julia is appalled by Suzanne's suggestion on how to make them look more like the Supremes.

Bernice's niece, Phyllis McGuire, tries to have her aunt declared incompetent in order to get her possessions.

Sugarbaker's is hired to decorate the Governor's mansion for its annual ball. Anthony receives an invitation to the ball, but Suzanne is dismayed when she doesn't. After decorating the "Abbott banister" at the mansion, Julia is persuaded by the others to do something silly and winds up with her head stuck in the banister, which cannot be cut due to its historical significance.

Julia and Suzanne experience a series of mishaps on a trip to Japan to visit their mother and to pick up Suzanne's new car. Meanwhile, Anthony and Mary Jo cast votes in a call-in poll unaware that each call costs money.

To make up for the "ding" she left on Mary Jo's car, Suzanne tries to help her meet men with advice from a self-help book.

Suzanne attends her high school reunion, where people shun her because she weighs more than she did in high school.

Mary Jo is forced to clip coupons and work at Burger Guy because her ex-husband Ted is late on his child support payments. After Julia persuades her to accept a personal loan, Mary Jo asks an emergency favor from her, Anthony, and Bernice when Burger Guy is short of help.

Charlene is due on the first of January; if hers is the first baby born in the decade she wins a new car.

Charlene goes into labor, while the other ladies meet a dying 102-year-old black woman who tells them of her life experience as a woman of color in the South.

The ladies are hired to redesign a house for a man as well as his condo - where he keeps his mistress.

While Olivia is looking for a nanny, Suzanne is physically harassed by anti-fur protesters while modeling one.

Because Suzanne promised a nasty woman named Mrs. Fricke that their job would be done by a certain date or it's free, the women need a new van to deliver it by midnight. Despite Julia's misgivings, they go to a car dealer with the intention of trying to manipulate them into a bargain, but the dealer beats them at their own game.

When Anthony's girlfriend Vanessa gets a temp job at Sugarbaker's, she sees him going out with his yuppie girlfriend Lita and feels jealous.

Julia learns that her son Payne is graduating early from college and getting married to his pregnant girlfriend the next day. At the wedding, Julia gets drunk, performs an outrageous rendition of "Sweet Georgia Brown," and wakes up the next morning in the same room as Payne's 22-year-old roommate Scott.

A tornado traps the ladies in the house with Daddy Jones, who takes a liking to Bernice, and the milquetoast husband of a customer, who decides to let loose in an increasingly bizarre evening.

The ladies vie for a bowling alley contract in order to undercut a group of obnoxious male designers who try to act macho in order to dispel the stereotypes of male designers.

An exhausted and overworked Charlene believes Bill is having an affair. When he tells her he's being sent on a classified mission, she doesn't believe him. The other ladies hear their fight over a baby monitor. Concerned, they set up a surprise rooftop dinner for two at the soon-to-be-demolished hotel where they had their first date.

Suzanne wants a female friend to accompany her to a charity ball for which she was given tickets. So she calls up Eugenia Weeks, her former competitor in the Miss Georgia pageant who gave Suzanne her batons, who is now a TV weather forecaster. When the ladies meet her, Suzanne is the last one to figure out that Eugenia is a lesbian.

Suzanne receives a letter from the INS saying that her maid Consuela's work permit has expired, and unless she can qualify for a green card or US citizenship, she will be deported. Suzanne doesn't think Consuela can pass the test, so she pays Anthony to impersonate her.

After Julia and Charlene take Mary Jo to their church, she and the minister meet and start dating. She feels nervous because she doesn't feel she can be herself while dating a clergyman.

Various scenes are shown in flashback which features each of the women in some of their strongest performances. Some of the song routines are also shown.

Anthony is about to graduate from college, and he is nervous about his commencement speech. Bernice buys him a Jeopardy home game to study with, but the ladies become so engaged in it that Suzanne plans to take the book of clues in the night when Julia's not around. She does that, but when Anthony comes in just afterwords, she thinks it's a burglar and shoots him in the leg.

Suzanne invites everyone, including Anthony, for a weekend at a fancy health spa at her expense. While Julia and Mary Jo try to gain weight, Suzanne and Charlene suffer on the stringent plan to lose weight. Suzanne also plots to get even with Mary Jo and Julia for making her and Charlene feel dumb by challenging them to a game of Trivial Pursuit to which she has memorized all the answers.