'Facts of Life' stars reunite to surprise Drew Barrymore for her birthday
The stars of "The Facts of Life" reunited to surprise Drew Barrymore on her birthday.
Lisa Whelchel, Nancy McKeon and Mindy Cohn all stopped by “The Drew Barrymore Show” to celebrate the host's 49th birthday on Feb. 22.
"Oh, my God, do you know what a gift this is for everyone? I mean, you are our life!" an emotional Barrymore told the actors, who presented her with an authentic monogrammed "The Facts of Life" cast and crew bag filled with baked treats.
Barrymore, a self-professed super fan of “The Facts of Life,” then revealed how much the series, which aired from 1979 until 1988 on NBC, helped shape her life.
“I think for those of us who also didn’t grow up in a traditional mother-father or two-parent household — and I love my mom and my dad; I love our dynamic, wouldn't change a thing — but I saw myself with you guys because you were raising yourselves, you were raising each other, and Mrs. Garrett was, like, at the helm of that," she said, adding, "It made more sense to the life I was living than any other environment."
“The Facts of Life,” which also starred Kim Fields as Tootie, followed a group of young female students and their housemother, Edna Garrett (the late Charlotte Rae), at the Eastland School, a fictional private all-girl boarding school in New York.
Barrymore recalled that the show premiered during a time when many other TV programs revolved around traditional families.
"Television (was) a lot on heavy family and I didn’t relate and I didn’t identify, didn’t see myself there," she said.
Watching "The Facts of Life," said Barrymore, taught her how to be self-sufficient and also how to cultivate friendships.
"What I was learning was to be a strong, independent female who could take care of themselves and value female friendship and know that there was someone there who was watching out for them, Mrs. Garrett," she said.
"You gave me a blueprint that made my life feel better to me in every sense of the word," she added.
Barrymore's "Facts of Life" reunion comes more than two years after Whelchel, Cohn and Fields showed up for ABC’s “Live in Front of a Studio Audience” reenactment of a 1982 episode of their sitcom in December 2021.
Though Jennifer Aniston, Allison Tolman and Gabrielle Union portrayed Blair, Natalie and Tootie during the live episode, Whelchel got things started by donning an Eastland School uniform to sing the show's catchy theme song.
This article was originally published on TODAY.com
