Dorothy (Bea Arthur), Rose (Betty White), and Blanche (Rue McClanahan) are three seniors who share a house in Miami. The main through line of this pilot is that Blanche has been proposed to by a man (Frank Aletter) who has only known her for a week. Rose has a negative gut feeling about the guy, but Dorothy doesn't want her to spoil Blanches' happiness. Meanwhile, Dorothy's mother Sophia (Estelle Getty) comes to stay after her retirement home burns down.
Four very talented ladies make the most of this script by Susan Harris that does a superb job of balancing some hilarious comedy with some poignancy. Indeed, there's something to be said here about the need to appreciate friends & family, as well as the need to remember all the good things in life. At her age, Blanche is worried that she won't have many more chances to be truly happy. But, as the theme song for this series so succinctly puts it, true friends will always be there for us, through the ups and the downs.
The dynamic between the characters is so well set up here, with Getty especially funny as the feisty 80 year old Sophia. Both she and Arthur have a real flair for delivering one-liners. In fact, Getty proved to be so popular with test audiences that she was quickly graduated from recurring guest star to full-fledged co-star, with the cook character Coco (Charles Levin) dropped from the series.
Good fun for classic sitcom fans, with a brief appearance from Meshach Taylor (as a cop), who subsequently went on to fame on the sitcom 'Designing Women'.
Eight out of 10.