The Golden Palace

Blanche, Rose, and Sophia sell their Miami house and purchase The Golden Palace, a hotel in the city; the women meet hotel manager Roland, his foster child Oliver, and hotel chef Chuy Castillos. The women learn that the previous owners had fired much of the staff to make the hotel appear profitable, and the hotel has no money to hire new employees. Furthermore, the ladies have only one week to make the hotel's bank note payment, which is dependent on satisfying a group of travel agents booked for the hotel. Sophia and Rose are upset at Blanche for getting them into the situation, but Blanche convinces them that they can operate the hotel and make the business a success. Chuy wants to continue serving Mexican food at the hotel, while Sophia wants to start serving Italian food instead. Chuy quits in frustration, but later asks for his job back, and he and Sophia agree to work together; the women manage to get through the week after hosting the travel agents, making enough money to keep the hotel for another month and hire more staff.

Rose makes a deal with the producer of a talk show to have a guest on the program stay at the Golden Palace for free, in exchange for an ad acknowledging the hotel. However, they learn that the program will be focusing on murderers who are set free, which includes their new hotel guest, Gordon M. Cosay. Blanche, Rose, and the other hotel employees are nervous about having Cosay stay at the hotel, and they try to keep him happy, as he is easily upset and frequently yells. Roland eventually confronts Cosay and helps him realize that he appears weird to people, convincing him not to yell; when the program airs, the hotel employees are surprised to learn that Cosay is actually a psychiatrist, and they are upset when he recommends the Golden Palace as a quiet, stress-free place for former murderers to stay. Meanwhile, Roland and the other employees are upset that Blanche keeps trying to oversee all aspects of the hotel, and that she wants decisions to be approved by her. Blanche later realizes how much she needs Roland to help operate the hotel.

While looking through the hotel guestbooks, Blanche discovers that Rose's boyfriend Miles Webber was a frequent guest at the Golden Palace until the ladies purchased it; as Miles has frequently been cancelling his dates with Rose lately, Blanche concludes that he has been cheating on Rose. Later, Rose confronts Miles and ends their relationship before he can explain himself. However, Roland clarifies that the Miles Webber who frequented the hotel was a different man and not Rose's boyfriend, which causes tensions between Rose and Blanche. Miles and Rose reconcile, although he has recently fallen in love with another woman, a waitress named Fern. Not wanting to ruin Rose's friendship with Blanche, Miles decides to tell Rose about Fern, revealing that Blanche happened to be right about him. Although Miles still loves Rose too, she decides to break up with him, and later reconciles with Blanche. Meanwhile, Sophia discovers that Oliver has been charging guests who want to retrieve their missing items from the hotel's lost-and-found.

Rose befriends a disoriented elderly woman named Vivian, who is lost and believes that Rose is her daughter Charlene. Rose lets Vivian stay at the Golden Palace, ignoring advice to contact the police. For the past six years, Rose has regretted putting her own mother in a retirement home, and she feels she can now make up for it by not letting Vivian wind up in a police shelter, as Vivian reminds Rose of her mother. Meanwhile, a new Chinese restaurant, also called the Golden Palace, has opened in Miami, causing confusion between the two businesses. Sophia takes advantage of this by accepting food orders from people who mistakenly contact the hotel. Chuy hires his friend, a woman named Dr. Fong, to help prepare the food, which is then delivered by Oliver. Roland discovers the scheme and forces the group to give their earnings to the real Golden Palace restaurant. Roland and Blanche also convince Rose to contact the police to help locate Vivian's family; when the police arrive at the hotel, they initially take Sophia by mistake, believing she is Vivian. Eventually, Vivian is reunited with her daughter, Charlene. Meanwhile, Roland is hesitant to have a talk with Oliver about sex.

Guest star: Anne Haney as Vivian

The hotel's insurance company declines to renew its policy following a mishap in which Rose covered the hotel pool while unaware that people were still in it; the hotel is hosting a convention of lawyers, and Rose has booked the remaining rooms for a group of judges from Jacksonville, Florida. Because Rose has accidentally overbooked the hotel, she, Blanche, and Sophia agree to share a room, while Roland, Chuy, and Oliver share another, they also convince one of the lawyers, Mr. Burrows, to share a room with one of the judges. However, the hotel employees realize that the Judges of Jacksonville are actually a biker group, and Burrows threatens legal action if anything should happen to him while staying with his roommate, a biker named Angel. Burrows later checks out of the hotel without any complaints. Meanwhile, the hotel hires a second chef named Rubin, the man who had sex with Chuy's now-estranged wife. Chuy and Rubin had been friends since childhood, and Chuy eventually forgives Rubin.

Rose believes that Roland is lonely and should have a girlfriend, and she convinces Blanche to compete with her in finding a woman for him. Rose finds a woman named Joanne, whom Roland likes. Blanche learns that Roland had an ex-girlfriend named Trisha and decides to have her fly to Miami to see him, thinking that Roland still likes Trisha. However, Blanche learns that Trisha is overly affectionate and obsessed with Roland, who had lied to Trisha about moving elsewhere to become a priest, in order to end their relationship. Roland eventually tells Trisha the truth that he is not in love with her, and she accepts it. Meanwhile, Sophia is upset that Chuy is chosen instead of her to go on a television program for a cooking segment.

Guest stars: Kim Fields as Trisha, Monte Landis as Mr. Ricchuitti

Dorothy visits the Golden Palace for the first time and reunites with Blanche, Rose, and Sophia after four months. Dorothy is shocked at how hard Sophia is working at the hotel, although Sophia does not consider this to be an issue. Dorothy contacts her husband Lucas and decides that Sophia should come to live with them in Atlanta, she believes Blanche and Rose are overworking Sophia, who is left to choose between staying at the Golden Palace or moving to Atlanta with Dorothy. Unable to choose between her daughter and the two women she thinks of as daughters, Sophia takes her belongings and runs away from the hotel. Meanwhile, Chuy is initially excited to finalize his divorce with his wife after eight years of marriage. However, he feels lonely afterwards, so Roland encourages him to begin dating. During a drunken night, Chuy marries a woman named Beverly and buys her a new car. Chuy, wanting to make the marriage work, rejects his friends' concerns that he and Beverly barely know each other.

Special guest star: Beatrice Arthur as Dorothy

Blanche, Rose, and Dorothy search for Sophia throughout Miami, they learn from a cab driver that Sophia asked to be dropped off at Shady Pines, the retirement home that she had despised. Upon arriving there, the ladies are surprised to see how nice Shady Pines has become after it was rebuilt following the fire. Despite the amenities, the ladies convince Sophia to return to the hotel, where she ultimately decides to stay rather than move with Dorothy to Atlanta. Sophia wants to remain active at the hotel, as she felt old when she was being cared for at Shady Pines. Dorothy accepts Sophia's decision. Meanwhile, Chuy is upset that Beverly will not have sex with him yet, and his work suffers as a result of his unhappiness. A man named Ramone visits the Golden Palace to congratulate Chuy on his marriage to Beverly, whom Ramone loves. Ramone vows to kill Chuy if he mistreats Beverly. Upon learning of this, Beverly realizes that Ramone loves her. Beverly tells Chuy that she only married him to make Ramone jealous, and that they were not really married, as their priest was actually a men's room attendant. Chuy is happy to have the relationship ended, as he realizes he does not love Beverly.

Special guest star: Beatrice Arthur as Dorothy

Guest stars: Bertila Damas as Beverly, Carol Leifer as Meredith, Miguel Sandoval as Ramone

Blanche is attracted to a handsome man, Nick DeCarlo, who has been staying at the hotel. However, she loses interest when she learns he is a gigolo; when Nick is unable to pay his hotel bill, Blanche agrees to let him work it off in the kitchen with Chuy. Following the death of Blanche's blind date, she accepts Nick's offer to accompany her to a dance, despite his occupation. Blanche and Nick fall in love with each other, convincing him to end his line of work. After Nick works off his hotel bill, he decides to return to his hometown in Indiana, to work in his brother's hardware store. Blanche convinces him to stay at the hotel by financially supporting him, despite him saying he is uncomfortable with her doing so. Nick eventually decides to return to Indiana and work for his brother, then return to Blanche when he has saved up enough money to support her. Blanche agrees to write him a check to help him get settled in Indiana. However, Rose researches Nick and learns he is a con artist, as his hometown does not exist, she forces Nick to give the check back to Blanche, while not revealing that he was using her, so as not to upset her. Meanwhile, Vincent Vale holds a self-help seminar at the hotel. Chuy and Roland participate in the seminar, which includes walking over hot coals.

Special guest star: Barry Bostwick as Nick DeCarlo

Roland's parents, George and Louise Wilson, visit the hotel with the announcement that they are getting a divorce. Blanche tries to mediate problems between them, but is unsuccessful, as they have been unhappy with each other for the past 20 years. Roland accepts that his parents want to move on with their lives. Meanwhile, the hotel hosts local radio disc jockeys Bill and Milton for a comedy night. Sophia convinces them to pull one of their well known pranks during the event, with Rose as their target, telling them that she is stupid enough to believe the prank. During the event, Milton is locked in a tank of water, and Rose must answer Bill's various questions in order to have Milton released before he drowns. However, Rose is too late, and Milton is said to have drowned; when Milton comes to the hotel dressed as a ghost to scare Rose, she shoots him, to Sophia's horror. Rose and the other hotel employees then reveal to Sophia that she is the true target of the prank, as Milton is alive and well; the comedians believed that Sophia was deserving of a practical joke, as they considered her to be vindictive after she suggested the prank to them.

Special guest stars: Tim Conway as Milton, Harvey Korman as Bill

Blanche has booked the hotel for a group of southern women known as Daughters of the Traditional South, although Roland, as a black man, objects to the group staying there as he believes they are bigoted toward black people. Roland further objects to a Confederate flag that Blanche has hung on the front desk to welcome the group. Roland views the flag as a symbol of prejudice toward black people, but Blanche tells him that the flag was her grandfather's and that it represents only good family memories for her growing up in the south. Roland decides to quit his job at the hotel over Blanche's refusal to remove the flag, although she eventually realizes that he was right about it, and that her memories are not as happy as she thought, they reconcile, and Roland stays at the hotel. Meanwhile, a couple checks into the hotel under the name of Mr. and Mrs. Smith, although Rose realizes the man used an alias and is cheating on his wife. Rose dislikes the idea of people staying at the hotel solely for sexual activities, but Blanche and Roland tell her that it is not their job to judge the guests. Nevertheless, Rose repeatedly annoys the Smiths enough to check out of the hotel.

Guest star: Charles Napier as Mr. Smith

During Christmas time, the Golden Palace has booked a therapist, Dr. Norman Charles, and his seminar group of recently divorced patients who are traumatized by Christmas. Charles intends to help his patients get over their bad memories by having them stay in a Christmas-free environment, so Roland and the ladies reluctantly remove all Christmas decorations from the hotel to accommodate them. Chuy is pleased by this, as he has several bad Christmas memories. Later, Chuy has a dream in which the ladies appear to him as ghosts who teach him the joys of Christmas. Rose is the Ghost of Christmas Past, Blanche is the Ghost of Christmas Presents, and Sophia is the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come. Upon waking up, Chuy realizes how much he loves Christmas, and he manages to convince Charles' patients that the holiday is not bad.

Miles keeps calling the hotel and leaving messages for Rose, leading her to believe he wants to get back together with her. Meanwhile, a woman named Fern decides to have her wedding at the hotel, and Rose agrees to help plan it. Rose and Fern bond while planning a cow-themed wedding, although Rose later learns that Fern is marrying Miles. At Rose's insistence, Miles and Fern still have their wedding at the hotel, as Rose wants to see Miles get married so she can have the closure necessary to move on with her life. Meanwhile, Roland and Blanche learn someone has been stealing money from the hotel. Rose, Sophia, and Chuy are interrogated, but Roland ultimately realizes that Blanche is the culprit. Roland tells Blanche that the hotel's revenue is not her personal money to spend, and that what she has been doing is considered embezzlement.

Special guest star: Harold Gould as Miles

Oliver wants to see a wrestling show, and Sophia wants to borrow a car to go downtown; they both are denied, leading them to steal a guest's car for a drive. Oliver's mother, Paula Webb, arrives at the hotel after getting out of rehab and is ready to take back her son. Roland tells her that Oliver is busy spending time with one of his foster grandmas. Oliver and Sophia are pulled over by a police officer for driving too slow; they are returned to the hotel, and Oliver goes home with Paula. Meanwhile, the Golden Palace is hosting a 16th birthday party for the daughter of a banker. Roland and Rose are eager to make the party a success, as the girl's father holds the bank note to the hotel, they are upset with Blanche for spending time with her boyfriend Ernie rather than helping to plan the party. Rose accuses Blanche of abandoning the hotel and believes she cannot handle the responsibility, but they later reconcile.

Taylor, a man who Blanche was attracted to in college, visits the Golden Palace. Taylor had previously chosen Blanche's college roommate over her, so Blanche tries to win him over when he visits the hotel, but he ends up falling for Rose. Blanche secretly sabotages one of their dates, allowing Blanche to take Rose's place with Taylor while Rose does hotel work. Rose learns Blanche sabotaged the date and eventually confronts her. Later, the women go on a date together with Taylor, who upsets Blanche by continuing to express his attraction to Rose. Blanche later realizes how many female friends she has lost due to her competitive behavior for men, and she and Rose reconcile. Meanwhile, a relationship expert known as The Love Doctor is holding a couples seminar at the hotel, and Sophia wants to participate, so she convinces Roland to accompany her. Later, she reveals that she wanted Roland to participate in the seminar so he could work out issues with his own love life.

Roland, Brad the hotel pool maintenance man, and Chuy make up the members of a successful volleyball team. Roland, the team captain, wants to win a volleyball championship trophy. Chuy, who is a poor player, is upset about always being left out of the game by Roland. Rose later joins the volleyball team, and Roland agrees to let Chuy play as well. However, Rose and Chuy play poorly. Rose decides to become a volleyball cheerleader instead, and when Brad injures his ankle, Roland decides to put Chuy back in the game. However, Chuy loses the championship for the team, and Roland criticizes him for it, they later reconcile after Roland apologizes. Meanwhile, after Blanche meets with a bank employee and flirts with him, Rose and Roland make her realize that her behavior toward men could be considered sexual harassment, prompting her to try acting more professional with men. Lawrence Gentry, the owner of an adjacent hotel, complains that the Golden Palace parking lot occupies a portion of his hotel's parking lot. Blanche dresses in a business suit and tries to remain professional when meeting Gentry, despite their attraction to each other, they devise a solution by having the two hotels share the parking spaces, and they later decide to begin a relationship.

Special guest star: Ricardo Montalbán as Lawrence Gentry

The Golden Palace is preparing to hold a stand-up comedy competition. Blanche's son, Matthew, visits the hotel with the announcement that he has temporarily quit his job as a stockbroker so he can try stand-up comedy. Matthew intends to participate in the hotel's comedy show, but Blanche does not want him to do so, as she believes he has made a mistake by quitting his job, she eventually decides to support Matthew's career choice. Meanwhile, Rose falls in love with Bill Douglas, a hotel guest who looks identical to her late husband Charlie. After dating for a while, Rose reveals to Bill why she initially became attracted to him, and he decides they should end their relationship, believing Rose only loves him for his appearance. Rose denies this, and she does not want him to end the relationship because she will feel like she has lost Charlie again; because Charlie died suddenly, Rose did not have a chance to tell him goodbye. To placate her, Bill has Rose tell him goodbye as if he were Charlie. Sophia's friend, comedian George Burns, sings a song during the comedy night to cheer up Rose following the break-up.

Guest stars: Eddie Albert as Bill Douglas, Bill Engvall as Matthew Devereaux

The Golden Palace holds a grand reopening celebration to improve business. A local news team has been invited to the hotel to cover the event, and Rose has arranged for food critic Gerald Davenport to review the hotel's restaurant. Chuy despises Davenport for previously giving him a bad review; when Davenport is found dead, Chuy worries that he may have accidentally put rat poison in Davenport's meal. The news team arrives, and the body is hidden in the kitchen's walk-in freezer; when city health inspector Mr. Tucker arrives unexpectedly at the hotel, Blanche distracts him while Rose stuffs the body in a large suitcase to covertly transport it elsewhere. Rose abandons the suitcase in the lobby in order to distract the news team. Roland, unaware of the body's location, delivers the suitcase to hotel guest Mr. Mitchelson, who owns a chain of travel agencies. Later, Roland, Blanche, and Rose sneak into Mitchelson's hotel room and retrieve the body. However, they are forced to drop the body down a laundry chute when the news team approaches. Ultimately, Mitchelson and the news team see Davenport's body; the hotel employees pass him off as an unconscious drunk man and promote a new designated driver program for restaurant customers. Mitchelson recommends the hotel to his fellow travel agents, and the employees later learn that Davenport died of a massive coronary.

Blanche's latest beau Bobby Lee, a rich Texas cattle baron, asks Blanche to marry him, with the condition that they have a child together. Blanche agrees to attempt in vitro fertilization, all the while worrying that she is too old to have children in spite of advances in science and that Bobby Lee will leave her if she can't get pregnant. Blanche has an anxiety dream in which the whole hotel staff (including Chuy and Roland) is pregnant except her. Frantically she calls upon her daughter Rebecca, who herself had a child via artificial insemination, and tries to convince her to donate an egg cell to her. Rebecca refuses, stating that she is tired of her mother pinning her self-worth to her sexuality and not to herself. Blanche finally agrees, but ultimately Bobby Lee learns that he is sterile and could not father a child anyway. Realizing that both of them wanted a baby for the wrong reasons, Blanche and Bobby Lee agree to resume their former casual relationship.

Charlie Sardisco, a professional race-dog trainer, takes a room at the hotel. Charlie catches Blanche's eye, while Rose becomes enamored with his racing greyhound and Sophia, who is trying to earn cash for a ticket to California to appear on The Price is Right, wants to bet on the dog. Rose learns that the greyhound has lost her last few races and will be put to sleep if she loses her next one. Rose, horrified, steals the dog and hides her, causing Sophia to lose her bet at the track; when they learn about the greyhound's fate, Blanche and Sophia stand in solidarity with Rose, but eventually they are forced to return the dog to Charlie. Instead of euthanizing the greyhound, however, Charlie relinquishes it to Rose, who finds it a home through an organization that rehomes retired race dogs. Meanwhile, Chuy befriends Roland's recently divorced mother Louise, causing Roland to suspect they are dating; when Roland learns that Chuy and Louise have been seen visiting a hotel together, he confronts them, only to find out that Chuy invited Louise to a support meeting for divorced people. Louise tells her son she is not ready to date again and that she and Chuy are only friends.

Blanche's mysterious monthly trips to Chattanooga, Tennessee have the staff guessing that there's a special man in her life, until her mentally disabled brother Tad (Ned Beatty) shows up unexpectedly at the hotel, having taxied from his institution in Tennessee. Rose and Sophia are shocked that Blanche never mentioned her second brother after all these years; the staff goes out of their way to be kind to Tad, with Rose forming an especially close bond that causes Tad to declare he is in love with her. Blanche, upset, plans to send Tad back to his institution, until Rose confronts her and accuses Blanche of being ashamed of Tad. Blanche is forced to admit that she has felt ashamed of Tad all these years, but watching Rose's tenderness toward him makes Blanche decide that she wants to be more involved in Tad's life, inviting him back to the hotel for more visits in the future.

Roland and Chuy are excited to plan a bachelor party booked at the Golden Palace and scheme to hire an exotic dancer, while Blanche and Rose are stunned to learn that Stanley Zbornak, Dorothy's ex-husband and Sophia's former son-in-law, is presumed dead; the three women try to work through their complicated feelings toward the man. However, Stan secretly approaches Sophia and admits that he faked his death to avoid prison for tax evasion and plans to flee the country. Sophia tries to tell the others, who assume Sophia is in denial. Roland and Chuy learn at the last minute that the bachelor party was really a bachelorette party, forcing Roland to provide the entertainment. Stan secretly visits Sophia a final time, with both admitting that in spite of their difficulties, they loved one another, his exit leaves Sophia in tears, while the others assume she has finally accepted his death.

Note: Last appearance of Herbert Edelman as Stan Zbornak.