Julia Sugarbaker is a fictional character in the long-running television series, Designing Women. She was played for the show's run by actress and singer, Dixie Carter. Dixie, a lifelong Republican, found it hard to play the very left-leaning character and so made a deal with the producers. For every rant that Julia had, Dixie was able to sing a song in other episodes. Designing Women was a U.S. television sitcom that centered around the working and personal lives of four women in an interior design firm in Atlanta, Georgia. ... This article is about the actress. ...

Chracter

Julia is the daughter of Derek and Perky Sugarbaker. She is the sister of Clayton (her half-brother) and Suzanne. Decidedly more artistic and prone to speak her mind, she supposes herself to be more well-read and more knowledgable than her sister. Whereas Suzanne has been married three times in her life, Julia was married once.

Julia's husband, Hayden McIlroy, had died, prior to the start of the show, and she decided to open a desigining business. She had hired a top-notch decorator, Mary Jo Shively, a divorced mother of two; she also asked Suzanne to join in the business; then hired her husband's former secretary, Charlene Frazier Stillfield to be their office manager.

Julia's pride and joy is her son, Payne, named after her paternal great grandfather. He gives her fits on occasion, but she dearly loves him.

The Terminator

Julia has a tendency to speak her mind, and at times it can be very forceful. This tendency of giving off rapid fire and well-worded spiels gave her the nickname "the Terminator". The targets of these very verbose arguments include politicians, newspaper reporters and other varied and sundry bigots whom Julia cannot stand.

Her most venomous was toward a doctor who had a tendency to be rather arrogant and not very wise in the ways of medicine. She informed him that she was filing charges against him. The reason? He had told Charlene to not worry about a lump in her breast! It turned out that Julia and Suzanne had a friend who was treated by that same doctor.

Despite her tendency to go off on one of her rants; and her tendency to not see both sides of an issue, Julia is a warm person and a good friend.