‘All in the Family’ star Sally Struthers says Betty White once ’embarrassed’ her’

“All in the Family” star Sally Struthers is opening up about her “unpleasant” experience with the late Betty White.

During a recent appearance on the podcast “Let’s Talk About That! With Larry Saperstein and Jacob Bellotti,” the 77-year-old actress recalled her time on the popular American sitcom, before the topic turned to Bea Arthur and then White.

The actress shared that “now that (White) is gone,” she will speak out about her negative experience with the TV legend. White died in December 2021 at the age of 99, just weeks short of her 100th birthday.

“I know everyone loves her. They love her so much,” Struthers said on the podcast. “They signed a petition to have her guest host on Saturday Night Live. I know all that, I didn’t have that great of an experience with her.”

Struthers revealed that White once “embarrassed” her while discussing a new show. (CBS Photo Archive/Getty Images; Herb Ball/NBCU Photo Bank)

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She explained that she found White to be a “very passive and aggressive woman,” recalling the time she met White at her home to discuss testing a new game show they were working on.

While they were working, Struthers recalled that White asked “her housekeeper to bring a plate” of snacks for everyone to enjoy while determining “what worked for the game show and what didn’t.”

“Then the plate was placed in the middle and I thought it was a cookie,” Struthers said. “So I reached for a cookie and she said in front of everyone, ‘Oh, I wouldn’t do that if I were you, honey. You don’t need cookies.’ I was completely embarrassed in front of the rest of the room and I thought, ‘Oh my God, that’s not cool.’”

This isn’t the first time someone has commented on Struthers’ weight. Earlier in the podcast, she recalled a moment she shared with “All in the Family” creator Norman Lear after he told her she wasn’t the funniest person when she auditioned for the role of Gloria Stivic on the sitcom.

Lear told Struthers that she was cast as Gloria because she had a “fat face” like O’Connor. (CBS via Getty Images)

When she asked Lear why she was cast if he didn’t think she was the best person for the role, he told her that when deciding who would play Gloria, he and the producers thought it would be better for the longevity of the show if the character was more of a “mama’s girl or daddy’s girl” type.

“We thought Archie would be a big deal to American audiences with his bigotry and his social smut,” Lear told her, recalling her saying. “So we thought we could soften him if he had feelings for his daughter and she could be a daddy’s girl. So we hired you because, like Carroll O’Connor, you have blue eyes and a fat face.”

“So I reached for a cookie, and she said in front of everyone, ‘Oh, I wouldn’t do that if I were you. You don’t need cookies.’ I was completely embarrassed in front of the rest of the room and I thought, ‘Oh my God, that’s not cool.’”

— Sally Struthers

Struthers won two Emmy Awards for her portrayal of Gloria and played the character for nine seasons on CBS, from 1971 to 1979.

While the “Gilmore Girls” actress found it difficult to get along with White, she was good friends with fellow “Golden Girls” star Bea Arthur, sharing that the two of them would often run into each other while shopping in Brentwood and Arthur would “erase everyone we ever knew.”

Arthur and Struthers first met when Arthur guest starred as Maude on “All in the Family.” (CBS via Getty Images)

The two first met when Arthur guest starred on “All in the Family” as Maude, the cousin of Jean Stapleton’s Edith Bunker. Struthers laughed as she recalled Arthur being “dirtier than a drunken sailor” and making everyone laugh during rehearsals, saying she “put all sorts of dirty words in her lines to shock these men.”

“Bea Arthur came in and she was a force of nature,” Struthers shared. “Arthur’s performance as Maude impressed Lear and other network executives, and they thought, ‘We should give her her own show.’”

“And then we got ‘Maude,’” Struthers said, referring to Arthur’s hit show that ran on CBS for six seasons. “So that’s how ‘Maude’ happened, and because of ‘Maude,’ that’s why she got ‘The Golden Girls.’”