Suddenly Susan Information

Suddenly Susan is an American television sitcom that aired on NBC from September 19, 1996 until December 26, 2000. The series was created by Clyde Phillips and stars Brooke Shields in her scripted television series debut. Shields plays Susan Keane, a glamorous San Francisco magazine writer who begins to adjust to being single, and who learns to be independent-minded, after being taken care of all her life. The series was developed by Gary Dontzig and Steven Peterman, who also served as executive producers during the first three seasons, and was produced by Warner Bros. Television.

Synopsis

The show takes place at The Gate, a fictitious magazine which is based in San Francisco. Among the magazine's employees is Susan Keane (Brooke Shields), who always has been cared for by someone else. However, when she realizes that she and her wealthy, vain fiancé, Kip, are not meant for each other and that there's more to life than just being known as the "s" in "The Kip Richmonds", she abruptly leaves him at the altar. Now, she's suddenly just Susan.

Susan's boss, Jack Richmond (Judd Nelson), the rebellious brother of Susan's former fiancé, Kip, assigns Susan to write a regular column about being suddenly single. Susan's coworkers include photographer Luis Rivera (Nestor Carbonell), boyish rock music reporter Todd Stites (David Strickland), restaurant critic Vicki Groener (Kathy Griffin), and, in later episodes, investigative reporter (and Susan's old enemy) Maddy Piper (Andréa Bendewald). Susan's grandmother and confidant, Nana (Barbara Barrie), stands as a loving pillar of encouragement in Susan's otherwise hectic life. Susan's parents also appeared a few times each season, as played by guest stars Swoosie Kurtz and Ray Baker.

Besides the task of putting together a magazine and focusing on the lead character's life, Suddenly Susan also focuses on the private lives of many employees in the show.

Original pilot

In the show's original pilot, written by Billy Van Zandt and Jane Milmore and based on a dramatic script by Clyde Phillips, Susan worked at a publishing house editing children's books. After breaking up with her live-in boyfriend Ted (Brian McNamara), Susan finds herself "single" for the first time in years. Concurrently, Susan faces even greater challenges at work when her boss Eric, (Philip Casnoff), assigns her the task of working as an editor with Charlotte (Elizabeth Ashley), a hugely successful and highly opinionated romance novelist. Thankfully, always on hand to provide support is Susan's grandmother, Nana (Nancy Marchand); her co-workers; acerbic best friend Marcy (Maggie Wheeler), and Neil (David Krumholtz), who has a crush on Susan.

The main office set retained most of its features when it became The Gate in the show; the most noticeable difference was that the elevator was to the right. The actual location for the exterior shots of the office was the Newhall Building at 260 California Street in San Francisco. The building, designed by architect Lewis P. Hobart, was built during 1908-1910 and enlarged in 1917.

A cardboard cut-out of Elizabeth Ashley which is featured in the pilot appears throughout the first three seasons of the show - it can be seen briefly behind Susan's desk, near the filing cabinets along the back wall. Brian McNamara later went onto play the part of Cooper Elliot, who took Susan to Italy at the end of season one. Nancy Marchand played Nana in the pilot; however, the part later went to Barbara Barrie.

Death of David Strickland

See David Strickland for more information David Strickland committed suicide in a Las Vegas hotel room on March 22, 1999. Strickland's death was incorporated into the show's third season finale, which was turned into a tribute to his character, Todd Stites. In the episode, Todd is gone missing and Susan spends the episode desperately attempting to find him. As the episode progresses, Susan learns about a number of good deeds that Todd had done around his neighborhood that she never knew about. Interviews with the supporting cast also appear throughout the episode, with each character sharing their personal experiences they had with Todd before his disappearance. As the episode comes to an end, Todd's favorite song, "Praise You" by Fatboy Slim, plays outside in the street as Susan and her co-workers sit in a circle praying for Todd's well-being. At last, the phone in the middle of the room rings, but the camera cuts away before the news of Todd's fate can be revealed. The episode ends with an archive video footage of Strickland and its titles: "The Gods of comedy looked down upon you and smiled".

Fourth season and cancellation

At the beginning of the fourth season, both Judd Nelson and Andrea Bendewald left the show; series developers and executive producers Steven Peterman and Gary Dontzig also left the series, and the show replaced almost its entire writing staff (with the exception of new co-showrunner Maria Semple, who joined the series the previous season). The show was revamped and The Gate was transformed into a men's magazine by new owner, Ian Maxtone-Graham (Eric Idle) and relocated from its trendy uptown offices overlooking the bay, to a dingy former warehouse in Chinatown. In tow, Ian brought along his own team of workers; executive assistant and Navy veteran Miranda Charles (Sherri Shepherd), sports writer Nate Knaborski (Currie Graham); and freelance photographer Oliver Browne (Rob Estes). Faced with new challenges, Susan suddenly had to prove herself all over again.

Airing between Seinfeld and ER in its first season, Suddenly Susan was a ratings success, attracting approximately 17 million viewers per episode, despite mostly unfavorable critical reviews. When the show was moved to Monday nights at 8:00 p.m. (against the Top 30 hit Cosby) in the second season, the show experienced a large ratings fall, sliding from #3 to #71 in one year, bringing in less than 11 million viewers. The ratings failed to bounce back, and in its final season, the show barely ranked in the top 100, prompting NBC to pull it from the prime-time lineup with four episodes left unaired in June 2000. This final quartet of shows aired in marathon form during the NBC All Night block from 2:00 to 4:00 am (EST) on the morning of December 26, 2000.

Ratings history

Season	Network	Season premiere	Season finale	Rank	Viewers (in millions)
1	NBC	September 19, 1996	May 8, 1997	#3	16.5
2		September 22, 1997	May 18, 1998	#65	7.9
3		September 21, 1998	May 24, 1999	#81	9.5
4		September 20, 1999	June 27, 2000	#94	6.6

^{^}End of the series' original broadcast run. Last four episodes were aired five months later.