Who Is Stu on 'Sweet Magnolias'? Man at the Middle of the Drama

Spoiler alert: This article contains spoilers for Season 2 and the beginning of Season 3 of Sweet Magnolias.

Serenity, S.C. should be just a sweet, small town as the name implies. If you’re watching Sweet Magnolias, you know that just isn’t the case in this show. The romantic drama follows three BFFs: Maddie Townsend, Dana Sue Sullivan, and Helen DeCatur. Their gal pal group is affectionately called the Sweet Magnolias.

Season 3 of the show is already a dumpster fire and it just started. We pick up with this Stu character who started quite the drama the prior season. Stu didn’t enter the show until Season 2, Episode 8, but now it seems like he’s going to be a key figure for a while.

Everything starts innocent with Stu who is played by Dave MacDonald. He meets Maddie and Cal when they’re at a black-tie charity event. He even sweetly asks Cal to sign a baseball card that he has. Stu is a huge fan of Cal.

Cal’s baseball career will always hold a special place in Stu’s heart. In fact, one game was more important than the others.

“That game is so important to me. Dad’s been gone almost a year now,” Stu explains to Cal. “That was the last game I went to before he got sick. So I kind of think of it as a gift from the heavens. From you.”

Maybe Stu is too sweet for his own good. He seems to absolutely adore Cal, so when things go wrong for the baseball player, Stu gets involved.

Cal is actually fired from his job as Serenity High School’s baseball coach. The decision to fire him came down to local politics. Since the Sweet Magnolias wanted to recall Mayor Lewis, his wife, Mary Vaughn, stepped in and sacked Cal.

When Stu finds out about this, he’s clearly upset. He finds Cal at Sullivan’s and tries to explain that he has Cal’s back in all of this. However, his delivery is a bit too intense and a bit too emotional, especially in defending someone that he barely knows.

Cal notices just how visibly upset Stu really is and tries to calm him down, but Stu just starts asking who he will have to fight.

“People need to be talking about how we get you your job back. Hey, buddy. I’m trying to help you,” Stu pleads.

Dana Sue even a has to call the cops because of the whole situation. Before the police can arrive, Cal starts to forcibly remove Stu. The issue is Cal has a past arrest in assault and battery.

“You’re way over the line. A two-minute conversation doesn’t make us friends. I want you out of here now,” Cal tells Stu.

Season 3 is now centering around the legal implications of this event. Thankfully, Helen is a very good attorney, so they have someone to help them sort through it all. The aftermath is unraveling and we’ll be watching every moment.

Sweet Magnolias is available to stream on Netflix.