The Unofficial Facts of Life Web Site
Your guide to the most popular series of the 1980's.
This site is dedicated to one of my favorite shows, the Facts of Life. Probably it's one of your favorites too, since you're here. So relax and enjoy; this site was created for you.
General Information
The Facts of Life originally began in 1979, spun off from an earlier popular series, 'Diff rent Strokes'. The premise was that Mrs. Garrett, former housekeeper to the Drummonds, would move to Peekskill, New York, where she would be a house-mother to a group of girls at Eastlake School, where Kimberley Drummond attended an exclusive all-girl boarding school. Actually, Kimberley (played by Dana Plato) only appeared in a couple of episodes of the show, as it was never planned for her character to stay at Eastlake. Thus, Mrs. Garrett was left at Eastlake private girls' school by herself to take care of 7 girls. During the pilot of the show, the school was called Eastlake, but before episode one aired, the name had suddenly changed to Eastland. This is one of the odd things about the show, that they had a tendancy to change things with no notice to the viewer, and so it leaves one with some burning questions. More about those burning questions later.The Girls
As I said, the original premise of the show was that Mrs. Garrett was hired to tend to the needs of seven wild girls, and would act as housemother to them. The girls were: Blair, a spoiled snob; Sue Ann, the all-American girl; Nancy, a hopeless romantic; Cindy, the tomboy of the group; Tootie, the black girl; Natalie, the wry chubby girl; and Molly, the youngest. After the first season, most of the girls were cut from the cast, sadly. The large cast was whittled down to just four of the original 11 regulars, although all of the Eastland girls appeared in a few episodes in later years. Molly was seen only in flashbacks after 1980, but Cindy, Sue Ann, and Nancy were only gradually pulled from the series. I believe that the producers decided to whittle down the cast because of monetary concerns; they felt that it would cost too much to maintain paying 11 actors, so they dropped all but four, Blair, Natalie, Tootie, and Mrs. Garrett. Oddly enough, they added a new girl, Jo, and during the fourth season added a fifth girl, Alexandria, who didn't last long.Character Sketches
I eventually plan to have pages dedicated to each member of the large cast of the Facts of Life. The links below will guide you to a few of them.
Mrs. Garrett
Alexandria
Blair
Cindy
Jo
Molly
Nancy
Natalie
Sue Ann
Tootie
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