A 'Desperate Housewives' Writer Claims Staff Avoided Eye Contact With This Leading Lady

A screenwriter who worked on Desperate Housewives says one member of the main cast contributed to what is often rumored to have been an icy environment on set of the once-popular ABC show. Patty Lin broke down her experience working on season one of the drama series in her new memoir, End Credits: How I Broke Up With Hollywood.

According to Page Six, Lin says the set of the show, which ran from 2004 until 2012, was a hostile one. “The writers weren’t barred from the set, but we weren’t exactly welcome,” Lin writes. “Usually we’d only see the cast at table reads, where we’d sit quietly in the back and try not to make eye contact with Teri Hatcher.” Though Lin didn’t elaborate on why the writers were so keen to avoid Hatcher, it’s not the first time the star has found herself at the center of accusations about her behavior on set.

Stewart Cook/Variety/Penske Media via Getty Images

An explosive Vanity Fair cover in 2005 revealed that tensions were high between members of the cast and crew — particularly between Hatcher and her co-stars Eva Longoria, Felicity Huffman, Nicolette Sheridan and Marcia Cross. The cover was published alongside a coverline that read, “You wouldn’t believe what it took just to get this photo.”

In the story, an ABC employee was quoted as telling a member of the photo crew, “Whatever you do, do not let Teri go to wardrobe first,” claiming the other women were sick of her getting the good clothes first. When Hatcher arrived early and got first pick, the same employee allegedly said, “This is a problem. I’m getting text messages from Eva. Everything is not fine.” Vanity Fair claimed Cross would later storm off set and yell an expletive-filled rant at the employee after seeing what Hatcher was wearing for the shoot.

In 2012, the show’s creator Marc Cherry claimed, “There was a problem going on between Nicollette Sheridan and Teri Hatcher,” alleging that Sheridan, who played Edie on the show — a character who often had conflicts with Hatcher’s Susan — “told [him] that Teri Hatcher was the meanest woman in the world because of how she was acting.”

It was also heavily rumored that Hatcher was the unnamed troublesome actor Cherry mentioned in a 2019 letter he wrote in support of Huffman during her legal woes surrounding her involvement in the college admissions scandal. “Everyone tried their darndest to get along with this woman over the course of the show. It was impossible,” he wrote in defense of Huffman’s character. “And things went from bad to worse. Felicity still insisted on saying, ‘Good morning’ to this actress, even though she knew she wouldn’t get a response. I found out about this and asked Felicity about it.”