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50 free Desperate Housewives trivia questions with answers. Eight seasons, 180 episodes and one dead narrator who never stopped talking. This Desperate Housewives quiz covers all of it: Mary Alice's blackmail note, the season-long mysteries from the Applewhite basement to Alejandro's cover-up, the four leads and the neighbors who came and went, and the flash-forward endings the finale gave Susan, Lynette, Bree and Gaby. It also digs behind the camera: the backlot street that used to be The Munsters' block, the six networks that passed on Marc Cherry's script, the Emmys, the Golden Globes, the Nicollette Sheridan lawsuit and the writers' strike that cut season 4 short. Casual fans will get the early ones; the expert tier is for people who remember which house had no interior. Every answer has been checked against a primary source, mostly the Wikipedia articles for the show, its episodes and its characters, and each question shows its citation. Play it solo, or use it as a ready-made round for a trivia night.
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Q 01Before playing Susan Mayer, which of the show's leads was best known as Lois Lane on Lois & Clark?
Teri Hatcher
She also played Bond girl Paris Carver in Tomorrow Never Dies, and a 1995 photo of her in nothing but Superman's cape was reportedly the most downloaded image on the early internet.
Q 02Which actress plays the perfectionist homemaker Bree?
Marcia Cross
Cross had originally read for the narrator's part before Marc Cherry insisted she try Bree instead.
Q 03Which actress plays Gaby, the former model?
Eva Longoria
She was the first lead cast, and admitted at her audition that she had only read her own part of the script, which Cherry called 'such a Gabrielle thing to say.'
Q 04Who provides the voice of the late Mary Alice Young, the show's narrator from beyond the grave?
Brenda Strong
Fans came to recognise her in coffee shops by voice alone, and she earned two Emmy nominations for the narration in a category normally dominated by cartoons.
Q 05What is the name of the fictional town where the show is set?
Fairview
The town sits in an equally fictional state, and the show never pins it to any real region of the country.
Q 06What shocking event in the pilot episode sets the entire series in motion?
A neighbor's suicide
The women only start digging into their friend's secrets after they find a blackmail note among her belongings.
Q 07What does new neighbor Mike Delfino claim to do for a living when he arrives on the lane?
Plumber
The trade is a cover: he is really a private investigator hired to find out what happened to his missing ex-girlfriend.
Q 08How far forward did the story jump between the end of season 4 and the start of season 5?
Five years
Marc Cherry later said the leap 'worked well' because it let every character start from scratch.
Q 09Which actress plays Renee Perry, Lynette's old college friend who moves onto the lane in season 7?
Vanessa Williams
She won an NAACP Image Award for the role in 2011 and another for the final season.
Q 10What does Susan do for a living?
Children's book illustrator
Her first book was called Ants in My Picnic Basket; the other three jobs belong to Edie, Lynette and Bree respectively.
Q 11In which weekly timeslot did the show air for its entire run?
Sunday at 9 pm
It kept that slot for all eight seasons, and the finale in the same slot beat both the Survivor reunion and Celebrity Apprentice.
Q 12Marc Cherry was best known for writing and producing which sitcom before creating the show?
The Golden Girls
He also created three short-lived sitcoms of his own, none of which lasted more than a year.
Q 13Which actor plays Orson Hodge, the man Bree marries in season 3?
Kyle MacLachlan
Orson is the driver who ran Mike down in the season 2 finale, and he later serves prison time for it at Bree's urging.
Q 21Which former First Lady told a 2005 dinner audience, 'Ladies and gentlemen, I am a desperate housewife'?
Laura Bush
The line came during a comedic speech at the White House Correspondents' Association dinner, at the height of the show's first-season buzz.
Q 22How does Edie Britt die in season 5?
Electrocution
She crashes into a power pole moments after uncovering her husband Dave's secret, and Nicollette Sheridan later narrated one episode as Edie's ghost.
Q 23Where do Lynette and Tom end up living after the series finale?
A New York penthouse
Lynette becomes a CEO and the couple grow old with six grandchildren; the other homes belong to Bree and to Gaby and Carlos.
Q 14Which of the four leads won the 2005 Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series?
Felicity Huffman
The same year she earned an Oscar nomination for Transamerica, and Cherry called it a 'horrendous error' that Longoria was the only lead not nominated.
Q 15Which Oscar-nominated actress played Betty Applewhite, who keeps someone locked in her basement?
Alfre Woodard
Her house was the old Munsters home on the backlot, remodeled once the crew stopped avoiding it.
Q 16Dana Delany turned down the role of Bree three times, then joined the cast in season 4 as which character?
Katherine Mayfair
Critics credited her arrival with the show's season 4 rebound; her character's family was that year's central mystery.
Q 17The murder of whose stepfather, Alejandro, is the cover-up that drives the final season?
Gabrielle
Carlos kills him in the season 7 finale, and Bree soon receives a blackmail note eerily like the one sent to Mary Alice.
Q 18What was the total number of episodes across the show's eight seasons?
180
Season 4 was the shortest at 17 episodes because of the 2007–08 writers' strike.
Q 19On what date did the two-hour series finale air?
May 13, 2012
It was Mother's Day in the United States, and the finale wrapped with a wedding, a birth and a death.
Q 20Kathryn Joosten won two Emmys for playing which resident of the lane?
Karen McCluskey
She was still billed as a 'guest actress' by the Emmys in 2010 even after being promoted to the regular cast.
Q 24Who sent Mary Alice the blackmail note that drove her to take her own life?
Martha Huber
Paul Young later strangles her in a rage, and it is her sister who arrives on the lane to find out what happened.
Q 25What was Lynette's cancer diagnosis at the end of season 3?
Hodgkin's lymphoma
She hid the chemotherapy under wigs, and her estranged mother Stella moved in to help, marijuana brownies and all.
Q 26Marc Cherry conceived the show while watching news coverage of which criminal case with his mother?
Andrea Yates
When he asked how a mother could be that desperate, his mother replied, 'I've been there.'
Q 27Which musician composed the show's Emmy-winning opening theme?
Danny Elfman
The regular episode score is by Steve Jablonsky, and ex-Police drummer Stewart Copeland scored the third episode.
Q 28The show's fictional town lies in which equally fictional part of America?
Eagle State
The production designer aimed for a street that was 'neither a red state nor a blue state' but 'a pink state.'
Q 29Most of the show's episode titles are taken from the lyrics of which composer?
Stephen Sondheim
'Something's Coming', 'Free' and the finale's title are all songs of his.
Q 30What is the title of the series finale?
Finishing the Hat
It was the 180th episode; 'One Wonderful Day' was the first-season finale instead.