Show Notes: Episode 11, The Facts of Life

*As always, make sure you hit our YouTube playlist for this episode!

*Unofficial statistic: 9 out of 10 clips interview clips featuring former Facts of Life stars feature the questioner asking about George Clooney.

*Wikipedia lists a staggering 7 backdoor pilots that Facts of Life introduced. All stayed in the backyard. That is to say, none of them got picked up as a series.

*The "bong" episode Mike mentions is Season 1, Episode 13's "Dope."

*"Brenda" in this episode does not have an IMDB page under her original name of Susan Blackstone...but she DOES have a page as "Susan Rinell!" She appeared several more times on fol and also appeared in St. Elsewhere, Silver Spoons, and E/R.

*Lionel Richie's "Hello" video featured a blind sculptress presenting the singer with a bust she made of him. The song went to number one. That alone is more number one pop hits than Jermaine Jackson had.

*Geri Jewell appeared in 12 episodes of the series. Her autobiography tells a different story about why she left the show. In her book, she claims the show did not renew her contract, and then later they offered her another episode but her new manager turned it down, calling it a slap in the face. She said she would have accepted it!

Wikipedia reports this on its Geri Jewell page but indicates Jewell left the series because she was pigeonholed as being in "very special episodes" on its FOL series page. I believe it likely that that's what they told her when they didn't renew her as a recurring character but that Jewell's autobio is correct on why she didn't return.

(To be honest, when I was younger, I found the character annoying--not because of her disability, but because of that Very Special aura the show gave and because I didn't care for her material (yet somehow I sat and watched 20-odd minutes of Facts of Life) and didn't appreciate her at all, despite my comments on this episode!_

*Jermaine Jackson was the original lead singer in the Jacksons, replaced by Michael. Later in the 70s, when the family left Motown, Jermaine stayed on the label and pursued a solo career.

*As of press time, BOTNS is unable to confirm a second appearance by Jermaine as a performer on Facts of Life.

*The Divison aired 2001-2004 on Lifetime. In addition to Nancy McKeon and Bonnie Bedelia, the show starred Taraji P. Henson and a pre-Mad Men Jon Hamm.