Golden Girls: Best & Worst Relatives Of The Main Characters

The Golden Girls had plenty of relative visits, and most of them were the worst. Yet, some weren’t so bad, either. In fact, a few were the best.
Though The Golden Girls featured four distinguished women living alone in Miami, their house was an incongruous den of activity with parents, siblings, and children coming and going all the time. Some of them contributed to the most warm-hearted and hilarious moments on the series, and some of them were responsible for the most dramatic episodes filled with fights, grudges, and competitions.
As motley an assortment as Blanche, Dorothy, Rose, and Sophia were, their relatives were equally as colorful. Some of them were the sort to be invited out onto the lanai, and some of them were best kept like Stan – on the other side of the door.
Best: Dorothy’s Uncle Angelo
Dorothy’s Uncle Angelo appears the most out of any relative on the series, perhaps because he lives rent-free in an apartment owned by Stan’s uncle, and is therefore closed by. Whenever he’s involved in an episode, there’s sure to be merriment and jocularity.
Uncle Angelo loves Dorothy as though she were his own, and he knows exactly how to talk to his obstreperous sister Sophia. His Old World charm is actually charming, and he has none of Sophia’s hostility, only a zest for life (and the beautiful Filomena).
Worst: Sophia’s Sister Angela
Picture it; Christmas, 1955, Francesca Regusso’s Christmas party. Angela perceives her sister Sophia has kissed her husband Carmine under the mistletoe, which leads to a huge fight that drives a wedge into the siblings’ relationship for decades. Sophia denies the event never happened but Angela won’t let it go.

Angela never wants to hear her sister’s side of things, and even when Dorothy flies her in from Sicily to surprise Sophia on her birthday, all the two women do is fight, with Sophia getting in some pretty cutting digs. Try as they might, the two women are oil and water.
Best: Blanche’s Brother Clayton
Clayton is Blanche’s youngest sibling whom she calls “baby brother,” which is part of the reason she treats him like a child despite the fact he’s grown and married. Feeling infantilized, Clayton doesn’t know how he can break the news he’s gay to his sister, whose old-fashioned notions around the LGBTQ+ community have prevented him from being honest with her.

Eventually he visits Blanche to tell her his marriage is over and he’s finally ready to live his life on his terms, but it takes time for her to accept it. Even bringing his fiancé Doug doesn’t inspire a positive response from her. Clayton was part of important storylines that proved how ahead of its time Golden Girls was.
Worst: Blanche’s Sister Virginia
Virginia and Blanche have the most acrimonious of relationships, with the two sisters fighting over everything from toys and clothes, to boys and the affection of their father Big Daddy. The only reason Virginia even comes to visit her sister in Miami is because she needs a kidney transplant.
The two can barely tolerate each other, with Virginia blaming Blanche for not coming to Big Daddy’s funeral, but eventually Blanche decides she can’t let her sibling die before they can have a chance to behave as true sisters.
Best: Sophia’s Daughter-In-Law Angela
Dorothy’s brother Phil isn’t a character audiences ever see onscreen, but he’s mentioned consistently throughout the series by both Dorothy and her mother. Eventually Phil dies of a heart attack while in the women’s dressing room of a department store, causing his mother shame and embarrassment.

After Dorothy gives a moving eulogy at his funeral Sophia, unable to accept the part of him that loved to wear women’s clothing, goes to her daughter-in-law Angela to understand Phil better. When she asks his widow how she could remain married to him through the years, Angela reminds her he was a good man, and his choices were a part of who she loved. This gives Sophia the release she needs to be able to mourn her son.

Worst: Blanche’s Niece Lucy
When Blanche’s niece Lucy comes to visit her in Miami, the girls think it’s like seeing double. Lucy is the spitting image of her Aunt Blanche, and just as raunchy. No sooner has she set her bags down than she’s seeing a doctor she puts on the plane for dinner, rather than spending time with Blanche.

Soon she’s done with the doctor and on to another gentleman caller, and eventually the merry-go-round of dinner dates is too much for Blanche to take. She tries to assert her concerns, but it takes Lucy a long time before she realizes spending time with family is where she’ll find her self-worth, not in the arms of men who don’t care about her.

Best: Rose’s Sister Lily
Rose has nothing but happy memories of growing up in a robust Norwegian household with eight siblings, and when her sister Lily comes to visit she’s elected to reconnect with someone who can corroborate her St. Olaf stories. By the time Lily visits Rose, she’s struggling to adapt to late-life blindness and all the difficulties that come with it.
Though Lily appears only once in the series, she makes a big impact. She’s open and candid about adjusting to life as a woman with a disability, in contrast to feigning positivity just for her sister’s comfort. At the end of her stay, she decides to go to a school to learn how to navigate the world while blind.
Worst: Rose’s Cousin Sven
Just when fans didn’t think someone from St. Olaf could be any more of a bumpkin, in comes Sven Lindstrom, Rose’s cousin from St. Olaf who like Rose, doesn’t seem to know what to make of modern living. To show his gratitude for the women’s hospitality, he even offers to go out and kill their dinner for them.

Sven basically becomes one big lumbering punchline about the incompetence of country people, who proves to be incredibly naïve and gullible. Blanche uses him to make one of her boyfriends jealous and poor Sven actually believes he’s fallen in love with her.
Best: Blanche’s Father Big Daddy
Curtis “Big Daddy” Hollingsworth loomed larger than life for his five children, but Blanche was always his Georgia peach. He appears in several episodes of the series and shows a fondness for cigars, brandy, and string ties. To be able to meet the man who shaped Blanche Devereaux was a rare treat for fans.

Despite loving her father unconditionally, Blanche disapproves of several of his choices; becoming a country music singer, and also marrying a much younger woman after her mother passed away.
Worst: Dorothy’s Sister Gloria
Dorothy’s younger sister Gloria seems to have everything Dorothy doesn’t; a caring husband, a wealthy estate, and a fancy home in California. She constantly wants Sophia to come and live with her in the Golden State, but she knows Sophia will never leave her favorite daughter, Dorothy.

After losing all her money to bad investments, she comes to Miami seeking support, and finds it in the arms of Stan. Dorothy is deeply hurt by their brief romantic interlude, even if she never imagined herself getting back together with Stan.