‘Murphy Brown’s’ Farewell to Dewhurst

When stage and screen star Colleen Dewhurst died in August, the news hit especially hard in the production offices of “Murphy Brown.” Two days after her death, Dewhurst won her second consecutive Emmy for the CBS series, on which she occasionally portrayed Avery Brown, Murphy’s steel-willed mother.

“We were in the process of closing a deal with Colleen, because she was going to return to the show in January,” executive producer Diane English said last week. “We were going to remarry Murphy’s parents. It was going to be great.”

Instead, in tonight’s episode of “Murphy Brown,” Avery Brown will follow the path of her real-life counterpart.

“Colleen Dewhurst was such a presence on the show,” said English, who decided with partner Joel Shukovsky several hours after learning of Dewhurst’s death to write a goodby episode and rush it into production.

“With Murphy now pregnant, it would be pretty much impossible to always pretend that Avery Brown was on the phone somewhere and we’d never see her again for the life of the series,” English said. “And for us on the show, we felt we needed to do something to bring closure to the situation, because we were all so close to Colleen and fond of her.”

Dewhurst had appeared on “Murphy Brown” once a season since the series began three years ago. Because Dewhurst’s character was so popular, and ratings were higher than usual on the nights she appeared, English was planning on having Dewhurst around more this season.

“We had a whole arc for her parents,” English explained. “The first season we met her mom. The second season we met Mom and Dad and saw what their relationship was like. Last year, the episode Colleen won the Emmy for, she and Murphy confronted their loneliness as single women.

“And this year we planned to get Bill (Darren McGavin) and his wife back together again. They were going to carry on a wild affair in Murphy’s house. It was something we were all looking forward to, but unfortunately it will never happen now.”

Part of English’s challenge in writing tonight’s episode was walking the fine line between respect for Dewhurst and the outrageous comedy that “Murphy Brown” audiences expect.

“We had to deal with not only the death of a character, but the death of a real person,” English said. “So we came up with the story that Murphy’s mother passed away very suddenly. But she’s very much with Murphy for the next 24 hours, because in the event of her death this woman orchestrated her own funeral, including gifts to Murphy and a letter to Murphy. And all these things arrive throughout the episode.”

English said that Dewhurst is a significant loss to “Murphy Brown,” largely because she was such a perfect mother--and potential grandmother--for her pregnant daughter. English recalled Dewhurst’s very first rehearsal for the series: “She said to me, ‘I’m having so much fun. Comedy is the thing I always wanted to do, and it was the thing nobody would let me do, because of the way I looked and my voice and my image. People didn’t think I’d be terribly good at it.’

“And those were exactly the same things Candice Bergen said before her first rehearsal. They had that in common. She will be very missed.”