Nellie Andreeva

Desperate Housewives creator Marc Cherry will keep his promise from several years ago to make a cameo in the dramedy’s series finale. “I’m going to do a Hitchcock, and the hair and makeup people will go through more hell that day than they’ve ever gone through with this cast,” Cherry said during the Desperate Housewives TCA session, adding later that he hasn’t decided what character he will play. Cherry refused to give any hints about how the long-running dramedy will end but said that the final act in the last episode will be the way he had envisioned it in his head for the past 7 1/2 years. After eight seasons, Cherry felt “it was time” for the show to end and rules out a Desperate Housewives movie in the future: “I ran into Michael Patrick King at the airport and congratulated him on that whole Sex and the City phenomenon. But in the case of that show, they did only 69 episodes. The advantage for him is that they hadn’t really plumbed the depths of those characters. After eight years, boy, I think we’re done. That’s not a bad thing, I just feel very satisfied with where we are,” Cherry said, adding, “And I’m just never sending any of these gals to Dubai, that’s all I’m saying,” a jab at the largely panned Sex And The City movie sequel. After keeping it light with jokes throughout the panel, Cherry turned serious at the end, closing the proceeding with a heartfelt speech about Desperate Housewives coming to an end. Here it is:

People keep asking me if it’s bittersweet, and I go, “No.  It’s completely sweet,” because I’m smart enough to know, when I started this ‑‑ this is my 23rd year as a professional writer ‑‑ there’s no such thing as a job that goes on forever.  All good things come to an end.  And I was SO fucked. I was in ‑‑ like a $100,000 in debt to my mother.  I went through years without an interview for a job.  No one thought I was anything.  I had friends that didn’t even call for a while.  And then, like, I write this script because it was my attempt to show people that I was a better writer than maybe they thought, and all hell broke loose.  And right from the start, I knew it was going to be a roller coaster, but I’m smart enough, and the way my mom brought me up, I was humane enough to go, “It’s all good.  Even the bad stuff is good.  Even those days when I’m exhausted” ‑‑ and for those of you who saw me, I’m, like, 50 pounds thinner than I was the first season because I was stuffing carbs into my face constantly to write because I was writing so much of that first season.  That’s why I was so thankful when folks like (exec producer) Bob (Daily) came along to take some of the burden off me ‑‑ that even during the bad times, it was fantastic.  Even, like, when some other show comes along and it’s the hot new show, I’m like, “Good for you.  Go with it, babe.”  This is how this industry works.  It’s like life.  To everything there is a season.  Our seasons are coming to an end.  And so I just ‑‑ for all of us, we’re just so grateful for the ride we’ve had because not many people in this business get to experience what we have all collectively experienced.  So that’s how I feel, is just grateful and looking forward to the next chapter.

TV Editor Nellie Andreeva - tip her here.