How Did ‘The Facts of Life’ End?

Gerry Strauss March 13, 1:00 pm

Facts of Life Cast composite — Everett Collection

We took the good. We took the bad. We took them both, and there we had one of the greatest TV series of all time about growing up: The Facts of Life. One of the longest-running sitcoms of the eighties (airing for nine seasons from 1979 to 1988), the show was a spinoff of the already popular Diff’rent Strokes. It centered on Drummond family housekeeper Edna Garrett (zestfully played by Charlotte Rae) moving on to a new life as housemother at Eastland, an all-girls boarding school in Peekskill, NY.

THE FACTS OF LIFE, Nancy McKeon, Kim Fields, Lisa Whelchel, Mindy Cohn, Charlotte Rae, (Season 5, 1984), 1979-88.

Embassy Pictures/Courtesy: Everett Collection

Focusing on a wide array of issues that young women encounter while growing up (friendships, dating, peer pressure and more), the show initially boasted a cast of seven students (including a young Molly Ringwald!) who were the focal point of the show (and Mrs. Garrett’s wisdom). After the first season, producers felt that there were simply too many characters. They decided to reduce the primary cast to Rae and four students: the diva-like Blair Warner (played by Lisa Whelchel), jokester Natalie Green (Mindy Cohn), the young and impressionable “Tootie” Ramsey (Kim Fields), and tough-as-nails Jo Polniaczek (Nancy McKeon). Ratings skyrocketed, and the rest was history.

**Why Was The Facts of Life Cancelled?**

The Facts of Life‘s ending was gradual, as the show’s original premise and familiar cast started to naturally unravel over several seasons. Going back as far as the Season 4 finale (when Jo and Blair graduated), the show was forced to find a way to keep the girls together under one roof. The solution was Edna’s Edibles — Mrs. Garrett’s new gourmet food shop (she was quite the career-hopper!) where her four young friends decided to work.

THE FACTS OF LIFE, from left: George Clooney, Kim Fields, Nancy McKeon, 1979-88. ph:

Warner Bros./Courtesy Everett Collection

The show underwent several more key changes through Season 7, including transforming Edna’s Edibles into a cheesy gift shop called Over Our Heads (after a fire destroyed the original eatery) and adding George Clooney to the cast. Unfortunately, none of those changes could keep Rae on board, as she decided to depart the show after Season 8’s premiere to pursue other projects (thankfully, Mrs. Garrett got a happy ending, as she ended up moving to Africa with the man of her dreams).

While the retooled show (Cloris Leachman came aboard as Mrs. Garrett’s sister and replacement, while Mackenzie Astin added some youthful energy as a new employee at Over Our Heads) continued to hold its own in the ratings, the writing was on the wall for The Facts of Life. Despite being tentatively renewed for a tenth season, both McKeon and Cohn decided to end their time on the show, leading to the decision to end it once and for all.

**What Happened on the Series Finale of The Facts of Life?**

THE FACTS OF LIFE, Lisa Whelchel, Mindy Cohn, Cloris Leachman, Kim Fields, Nancy McKeon, foreground l-r: Charlotte Rae, Robert Mandan in Out of Peekskill: Parts 1 and 2' (Season 8, Episodes 1 and 2, aired September 27, 1986), 1979-88.

Everett Collection

A special two-parter — “The Beginning of the End” and “The Beginning is the Beginning” — gave viewers a chance to say goodbye to the past (and possibly say hello to the future.) By this time in the story, most of the show’s main characters had been positioned to move on in life. Natalie moved to New York, Jo got married, and Tootie went to London to attend acting school. Blair, meanwhile, discovered that the Eastland School was in dire financial straits, inspiring the once-selfish debutante to sacrifice her trust fund to save the school, which had now become co-ed. These episodes were essentially a pilot for a possible new version of the show that would upgrade Whelchel to Rae’s old role as the school’s central mentor and a whole new crop of students (played by future superstars Mayim Bialik, Juliette Lewis, and Seth Green) were even introduced.

While the proposed new spinoff wasn’t picked up by NBC, the series finale of The Facts of Life did eventually bring focus back to the four stars who’d grown from girls to women over nine seasons on our TV screens. Fueled by the lessons they’d learned from each other and ready to embrace new chapters in their lives, it was a truly happy ending for these characters that we’d grown to know and love. You did good, Mrs. Garrett!