DRW50

Back when people could only respond through a letters page instead of a flame war. The Internet ruined us all That's the tone of this magazine though...most of the other soap magazines at this time were just busy getting soap actresses to say why they aren't feminists, and showing people playing the guitar.

This episode was tough to find on Youtube. I found it while looking for Margo's rape. It takes place right after the masterful scenes with Frannie and Darryl in Switzerland. Do you know who is playing Sean at this time and why they recast? He talks like Tonio. Strange casting choice.

The June 1992 episode that's up is solid from start to finish - even the Andy/Courtney stuff that always bored me. It's so tough to tell when John learned about Aaron but I guess he knew by this time. Does anyone know about what was going on with Susan Marie Snyder/Julie during 1991 and 1992? Based on story, she can't have appeared very often. Was she on recurring, or were they paying her for not appearing? And was Ben Hendrickson on a leave of absence and that's why Hal is gone for a lot of 1991 or 1992? Did Frannie ever find out about Jennifer? I am not done with 1992 yet so I guess I'll find out... Don't you think Scott and Margo have a lot of chemistry in this scene? I wonder if the show was thinking of going there. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWX7VZ07LkQ&feature=related

Yeah. I was surprised at how much she disliked the show, especially elements which I don't think they intended for people to take too seriously (like Phoebe). I do think she had a point about the "wrong kind" style of writing, but that wasn't unique to AMC even at this time, I don't think (wasn't this when Mona came into the Doctors). I wonder if Deborah, who seemed to like ATWT (which was more of the traditional show), based on other reviews, was annoyed because the press used the Nixon soaps like a club to beat ATWT and what it stood for. It's been said that AMC had poor production values during the 70's but that's the first time I'd heard mention of the directors. I do remember the AMC actors talked about how the director, Henry Kaplan, always wanted them to show more in their performance.

From the July 1974 Daytime TV Stars. Deborah Channel reviews AMC. It's Gregorian Chant, Pretending To Be Bach The basic dramatic conflicts and plot core of All My Children are usually satisfying and well-constructed; the only problem is, however, that these elements are terribly conventional and at least three or four years behind the broad, rapid, and important creative developments that have happened on other serials. It is almost as if Agnes Nixon, the creator and over-seer of All My Children, were still struggling with the mechanics of Gregorian chant, while the rest of soapland has advanced to Bach, and occasionally even Beethoven. Where most other serials - learning their lessons from the overall disaster that happened in soapland three or four years ago, when creativity in the writing and producing of serials had dropped so low that millions of viewers were simply giving up on them and turning to the game shows (awful as they are) - have stopped using "devices" such as the obligatory murder trial in which the heroine or hero is threatened and then exonerated, or the return of a husband after being assumed dead, or the fabricated conflicts between a rich family and a poor one, Mrs. Nixon chooses to run these worn out, useless plot talismans into the ground on All My Children. Interetingly though, even Mrs. Nixon's mentor, the late Irna Phillips (who, along with the Hummerts of radio, had practically invented all those old devices, such as the amnesia victims who stumbled in and out of her radio serials), eventuall thought it prudent to abandon, in her own writing, the old-fashioned techniques that Mrs. Nixon still refuses to let go of. Of course much has been written about All My Children's "relevance" in using many references to the Viet Nam war, filming a double-amputee Vietnamese boy saving the life of Phillip Brent (Nicholas Benedict), speeches by Ruth Brent (Mary Fickett) against the cruelty of war. Very admirable. But this is like packaging a Gergorian chant LP in a jacket decorated with a Jackson Pollock painting. Mrs. Nixon's product is still in need of a real creative overhaul, and real relevance, not the decorative kind. For example, the serial's obsession with focusing on the wealthy Tylers, especially Phoebe Tyler, and their continual concern over marrying their children "into the right families" is no longer a typical dilemma of twentieth century America, and is therefore unreal and irrelevant. Society today is concerned with interracial and interethnic problems, rather than intereconimic ones (which were interesting to writers like Henry James fifty years ago, but not today). Trying to justify dinosaurs like the Tylers with contrasting "contemporary" story lines such as that of Phillip Brent's troubling re-aclimation to Pine Valley after his return from Viet Nam (which is just a rehashing of the old amnesia-victim device) is merely embarrassing camouflage of the truth of All My Children's real vintage. While Mrs. Nixon does not display much creative vision with Children, she at least knows how to tell a story. Her invention of the character of Nick Davis (much like her invention of Steven Frame when she ws writing Another World) was sheer felicity. Her instinctive understanding that the combination of heel and incorrigible romanticist is always of great interest to an audience - and especially so when the heel is played by an actor with as much talent as Larry Keith - shows that Mrs. Nixon at least knows her viewers. His great love, Ann Tyler, is also a well-executed, involving character, played with delicatesse by the marvelous Judith Barcroft. The story of the star-crossed lovers Ann and Nick, although it has been going on for years, and although there seems to be little interest on the part of the writers to explore the real source of the barrier which keeps them from finding the happiness that they seek, is nevertheless continually compelling. The other story lines range from lukewarm to catatonically uninteresting. Charles Frank and Susan Lucci do an excellent job of portraying the romantic antagonists of Jeff and Erica Martin, considering the poverty of dialogue and storyline that they have to cope with. Erica comes off like the Evil Queen in a fairy tale: beautiful but deadly, neurotic but together enough to be more cunning than anyone else in the story. She parades about in beautiful clothes, getting involved in murder conspiracies, leaving her serpentine words all over Pine Valley to haunt all the good people, while poor Jeff - struggling to get free of her so that he can marry the spotless Cinderella of the story, Mary Kennicott (well played by Susan Blanchard) - must endure months and months of a murder trial, after Erica's New York boyfriend is bumped off by some unknown fiend. Jeff and Mary are all good; Erica is the demon incarnate. This is all bona fide Soap Cliche; but even so. It might work better if the dialoguers and plotters (Mrs. Nixon has overall control, but this sort of work is done by sub-writers under her direction) were to give these fairy tale people more substance, more dimension in their interrelationships. Jeff, as written, seems duller than pea soup, for he does little more in the story than defend himself from the tyranny of others. Erica is hardly more interesting, although she is a shade more laughable. Supposedly Pine Valley has never been menaced by a more loathsome human being, but all I see is an actress doing her best to prance around, look glamorous, and appear menacing with such remarks as, "Oh, Mary, what a beautiful engagement ring Jeff gave you...but you know, the one he gave me was much bigger!" However, what I find much more patently offensive about All My Children than some of this one-dimensional writing is the show's direction. This is highly unusual, for on every other serial the work of the directors is at least as good, and normally much better, than the day to day dialogue writing. Yet on All My Children the directors seem to do their best to destroy any script interest they find. Actors are encouraged not to talk to one another, but to declaim, to announce their feelings, as in the old silent movies. Every time Bill Mooney, as lawyer Paul Martin, must say something, it's as if he were in a courtroom; when he talks to his wife Ann, or father-in-law, Dr. Tyler, he doesn't just talk, he addresses a jury. There's so much shouting going on on All My Children that occasionally I have trouble trying to pick out what the characters are really trying to say to one another. Another offensive example of the above is Ruth Warrick's incredible portrayal of Phoebe Tyler. I simply can't believe that a fine, experienced actress like Ruth Warrick has by herself, without coersion, chosen to caricature her role - not simply play it. On camera, she wiggles and giggles and gsticulates as if she were playing in a parlour game. With every line, she finds it necessary to throw her arms about spastically and underscore every other word she says with kindergarten monotonousness. Recently, when Ann, her daughter, was close to death after a terrible car crash, I saw not a hint of true grief in Miss Warrick's acting, only a lot of absurd writithing on chairs and dreary semi-orgasmic hysterics. Granted, Phoebe Tyler is supposed to be a silly woman, but even silly women show real sadness when their offspring are on the verge of death. Judging from the way other actors on All My Children are directed, my only conclusion is that Miss Warrick has been seduced into this God-awful freak show she puts on as a "grand dame" by either the directors, or the producers, or both. Some actors, however, seem immune to this self-destructiveness that the directors impose upon the rest of the cast. Ray McDonnell and Mary Fickett, as Dr. Joe and Ruth Martin, always handle themselves with good taste. They know how to do "re-cap," have their pacing honed down to a fine art, and are wonderful to watch. Occasionally Miss Fickett is thrown off by some of the other "declaimers" in the cast, but Mr. McDonnell is never. It also seems to me that Frances Heflin, who plays Mona Kane, manages to cope well with the same declaimers - allowing her voice level to rise unnaturally (for television), in order to keep her pacing on a par with theirs so as not to destroy scenes, but also somehow managing to temper all of the distracting shouting with a real urgency that she conjurs. Eileen Letchworth, as Margo Flax, also does a fine job in the face of poor direction. Among the other shouters, announcers, and silent-movie declaimers on this show are Francesca James (Kitty Shea Davis), Hugh Franklin (Dr. Charles Tyler), and, unfortunately, the new arrival, Nicholas Benedict (Phillip Brent), who is perhaps too young and inexperienced to resist the general repulsive and hysterical mood that the management of this show wishes to encourage. It may be superfluous, but I'll point out that such unsubtle acting may be suited for certain kinds of grade-B crime and horror movies, opera, and legitimate theater (musical pastiches for example), but certainly not for television. Any first year student majoring in radio and television learns that the least little bat of an eye-lid or breath of a performer is magnified ten times in its effect on the audience by the cameo effect of the video camera. Occasionally, switching from nicely-paced shows like Another World and As the World Turns, to All My Children, is a little like going from a quiet Virgin Island beach to the wilds of Siberia. I must admit, however, that the Nick Davis and Ann Martin story is strong enough to make me endure some of that cold weather now and then.

Thelma's first appearance. I always liked Thelma. Jenny O'Hara is such a great actress. She's fun here. Love when she says Jane thought she'd get along with Lucinda because they had both been married about the same amount of times! Did Jane marry Ambrose? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WS0osjkHhhk&feature=related

I'm not sure. The media adores her, and she is very good at pushing buttons and getting people to overlook just how extreme she is.

I was reading in a Daytime TV Stars about unpopular stories and ending them due to wanting to appease viewers, and they talked about ending the Bob/Kim/Jennifer saga and needing to "punish" Bob and Kim. I knew that they had killed the baby, but apparently they even had Bob hit by a car! I hadn't heard about that (or I had forgotten it). Wow.

Wow that's wonderful. I've never seen this. Jeff was recast after this wasn't he? David Ackroyd has one of those interesting types of faces that don't photograph that well.

Was this when Bill Bauer was returning? Perhaps they wanted to emphasize a distant name dying and one returning.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2011/06/michele-bachmanns-strategist-husband-called-gays-barbarians-who-need-to-be-disciplined-audio-1.html

Here's a more direct quote. "It was probably the most unprofessional show I had ever worked on. The day before it was canceled, I had given in my notice that I was leaving. They kept us working till all hours of the night, re-doing scenes, re-taping. Now when I was playing Patti Tate on Search for Tomorrow I was used to things being done right the first time. But what was worse was that the show was too immoral for a daytime audience. After one scene in which a married man was shown naked in bed with a woman who wasn't his wife, I went to the producer and I said that this is horrible."

I wish some of Barbara Rodell's Leslie was available. I have read in more than one early 70's soap magazine that "thousands" of viewers wrote in angry letters when GL brought Lynne Adams back as Leslie. Rodell herself says this in one interview. They also mention, in a July 1974 Daytime TV Stars, about unpopular stories wrapped up, that Leslie's trial for the murder of Stanley Norris was supposed to go on longer, but fans wrote in talking about how sick they were of the story, so it was quickly ended.

1973 must have really hurt as about 4 soaps were cut at that time. I guess they at least knew the genre would go on (that's not happening today) but it must have hurt, and then as you said, the trend was younger and younger. Rodell said she'd never been out of work this long before, and that her unemployment benefits ran out in 6 weeks. After that she'd be a salesgirl at Bloomingdale's. The magazine added that she may have been kidding.

Yes, Len was also written out. I should say there is nothing but speculation from the magazine on why Patti was written out. The only official reason given was lack of story. For whatever reason the people at the magazine really disliked this era of Search (last year I posted a review they gave in 1976 where they again trashed the Ellis era, retroactively, although I don't think they named him). I do wish we could see it as I would like to see Kathy and also see the abortion story, as it sounds different from most abortion stories on soaps (no "scheming" woman, no "punishment"). Thanks for reading and responding. When I saw this stuff I thought you'd be interested!

There was a Leigh Lassen interview in a July 1974 Daytime TV Stars. They talked about how the show had fired Leigh in mid-1973, due to lack of story, but brought her back. The editor puts this down to the show's writer at the time, Ralph Ellis, not feeling Patti was strong enough compared to women like Kathy or Eunice, and they criticize Ellis for wanting to turn Search into a "Women's Lib mouthpiece." By this time Ellis was replaced by Ted Apstein. An earlier part of the magazine says Apstein was a West Coast writer and he and his family were doing the show.

I was reading a Daytime TV Stars from when Secret Storm ended. Jada Rowland talked about some of the things they'd had Amy do that were not true to her character (like being withdrawn and playing with dolls because Belle had stolen her husband). The show's last producer said he had been trying to get back to the old family drama of the best years of SS, by putting Valerie at the center of the show again. The magazine said Amy was getting back to her old self, and that the story with Laurie and Mark was good drama, but that it had let itself down again by doing the haunted house story and having Mark drink too much over his guilt at leaving the priesthood. They also spoke with Barbara Rodell, who was essentially begging for a job. She said that before Secret Storm was canceled, they'd called her and asked her to return as Jill Clayburne.

I think some of this has already been posted in another thread, by another poster, but I'm too tired to look properly... I was really surprised, when looking through a Daytime TV Stars on the end of RtPP, at how brutally honest Lynn Loring was about her experience. She basically said that it was one of the worst sets she'd ever been on, because they took so long to film and weren't professional, especially compared to Search. She said she had handed in her notice to quit before the cancellation was announced. She said she was offended by a scene of a married man being "naked" in bed with his mistress. She also admitted that the only reason she was hired was because of a desperate ratings-grabbing attempt, and that she thought it was stupid of the show to fire her predecessor (Julie Parrish), as she thought Parrish was wonderful. She also said she was disturbed by how people would come up to her and threaten her on the street, so perhaps she just wasn't used to playing a bad character.

That's part of when the last years (of the NBC run anyway) confused me. How much of it became about rape? Wasn't Luis also raped? And didn't Alistair rape Theresa again and again? Was this written as rape?

May 1956 TV Radio Mirror. This was one of their award issues. James Lipton was runner up for most popular daytime actor, radio and TV (radio was won by Sandy Becker, TV by Terry O'Sullivan).

James Kirkwood Jr. played Mickey Emerson, the central heroine's (Helen Emerson) son on Valiant Lady. His mother, Lila Lee, tried out for the role, but was turned down because they didn't think she looked old enough to be his mother!

April 1977 TV Day Stars

I thought Simone or her partner were raped.