Towards the end of the seventh season, Rae began to contemplate leaving the series. She wanted to spend more time doing theater as well as do some traveling. The producers of the show tried to persuade Rae to continue with "The Facts of Life" for at least another two years, but she felt her time on the program had run its course and decided to leave at the end of the 1985–86 season. Academy and Emmy Award-winning actress Cloris Leachman was signed as her replacement. In order to help with the transition, Rae agreed to make her last appearance on the show in the two-part eighth-season premiere "Out of Peekskill". In that episode, Edna Garrett would marry, leave Peekskill with her new husband (played by Robert Mandan), and they both would move to Africa to work in the Peace Corps. In that same installment, Leachman would be introduced as Mrs. Garrett's sister, Beverly Ann Stickle, who would attend the wedding and then with Mrs. Garrett's departure, she would then take over as a mother figure and friend for the girls. Rae and Leachman were very good friends having known each other since they were students at Northwestern University. Leachman inherited Rae's top billing in the cast and her character remained for the show's last two years. The part of Beverly Ann was quite similar to Leachman's character of Phyllis Lindstrom on "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" and "Phyllis" from the 1970s. The cast change from Rae to Leachman did not seriously affect viewership. The series continued to garner healthy ratings until it ended in the spring of 1988. NBC wanted to renew the show for a tenth season, but cast members Nancy McKeon and Mindy Cohn wanted to move on to other things.