DRW50

Yes. The main difference is that Cotton's stories did not rely so much on stereotypes of gay men sleeping around, being beaten up, being miserable and isolated. He's still on the show. He's a popular character, although he isn't on that much, in part due to John Partridge's busy schedule. I think he has had less than a half-dozen scenes with the Beales for all of 2010.

That must have been wonderful. My grandmother didn't like to talk too often about things like that, although she probably listened to a few radio shows. I was always most fascinated by the thought of these young or fairly young women having to wear old lady makeup and wigs to be Ma Perkins. You could make a great movie or TV show out of that. If you're interested there is some more stuff on other radio soaps. Not as much as Rosemary but they do talk about some other radio soaps of different genres. You probably already know this but can you believe some professor or something, Berg, tried to kill the radio soaps by claiming they upset or caused distress in housewives and that's exactly what the Axis Powers wanted? I think what I like best about radio soaps is the idea that you can do anything. One of them, When a Girl Marries, had a story where the lead heroine was lured to an exotic locale by a disturbed man, and he kept her in a gorgeous bedroom, faked her death, then dyed her hair and tried to make her think she was his dead wife. The book talked about how this type of story was wish fulfillment for the female viewer at home because they could imagine themselves in these circumstances. They also said that the stories of men paralyzed, helpless, weak, was wish fulfillment, since most of the listeners had husbands who were in the outside world most of the day.

Thanks for telling us about all that, Eric. I'm sure it must have felt like your own secret pleasure finding all those old soap operas from radio. It's a shame that these things are now a forgotten artform. Here's some stuff about Rosemary which was in the From Mary Noble to Mary Hartman book. Rosemary Dawson and her "ebullient" younger sister Patti were raised by their mother, whose husband had walked out on her 16 years earlier (naturally she never thought of moving on with another man). When Rosemary's mother want to take in a confused young war veteran, Rosemary is not sure. She feels the house is too small, she thinks a stranger being in the house will upset her and Patti. Then Dr. Jim, who suggested the idea to begin with, tells Rosemary about her mother's reaction. "Jim Cotter, if I can do anything in the world to help any man who's gone through shell fire - who's come back confused and lost and perhaps terrified inside at all that he's done - at all that he's seen - Jim, I'd give my right hand to take care of him. I'd consider it a privilege...I'd consider it the greatest privilege I ever had." <pause> "That's what your mother said, Rosemary. That's why I love her - that's why I'm proud to know her...That's why I'm mighty grateful to count myself one of her friends." When Rosemary hears this, then she agrees to letting the vet stay in her home. Rosemary started out as "indispensable link, sympathetic ear, and helping hand," but then got into the big romance with Bill Roberts. After that settled down, Rosemary reemerged as helper and friend. Bill was a war vet and a reporter. They met around the time Rosemary and Joyce had a falling out. Joyce was in love with her boss, Dick Phillips, who often cheated on his wife Emily. Dick insisted to her that his marriage was over and he will ask her for a divorce. He puts it off and puts it off, lying to Joyce that his wife has the flu, but finally asks her. Emily, his wife, still loves him, and the viewers are asked to agonize over whether Joyce should marry a man whose wife still loves him. Emily comes to Joyce's boardinghouse late at night to tell her she's agreed to divorce Dick because now she sees Dick can only truly be happy if he's with Joyce. The next day at work, Joyce is full of shame. Joyce gets over her doubts and decides to go forward. She confides in Rosemary, who is shocked by Joyce's selfishness, especially when Joyce admits Emily still loves her husband. Rosemary continues to try to push her friend. Rosemary continues over and over, saying someday Joyce will know she broke Emily's heart. Joyce responds: "That's very dramatic, Rosemary, and very silly to say. It isn't true at all. Maybe he broke her heart long ago - maybe she didn't know how to hold him - maybe she didn't love him enough - maybe lots of things, because I don't believe any man would play around with other women if his wife was everything to him. You know that, Rosemary. You know there wouldn't be room for anyone else - any room in his heart, I mean, for anyone else if his wife were everything to him." Rosemary says all she can say if Joyce should get out of Dick's life immediately, and for always. Joyce is sorry they have to part this way, but she won't listen to any more of Rosemary's warnings. Rosemary repeatedly tells her boyfriend Peter Harvey, about this. When Peter suggests she stay out of it, Rosemary says, "It's any woman's affair, when you see a marriage being broken up." The show basically says that Rosemary is so unforgiving because her heart is still unawakened. Peter tells Joyce, "You'll find people who have lived, Joyce, deeply and completely, are the most tolerant people. They're the ones who understand. They don't go around judging someone else. They know too well how easy it is to do some of the things you've sworn you'd never do. They know how weak human beings are - how susceptible to temptation, and instead of condemning them, they forgive them." Rosemary soon meets Lieutenant Bill Roberts when she's standing at the street corner staring at the bus he's on. She says "What's happened to me?" The announcer says: "Yes, what's happened to Rosemary Dawson, as she is standing there under the streetlamp, gazing after a departing bus, with a vague feeling as she sees it disappear bearing off Lieutenant Roberts that a part of her has been torn away?" When Joyce thinks back to when she first met Dick, Rosemary finally understands. Rosemary apologizes to Joyce for her intolerance and says she now understands. She would rather die than lose Bill. They talk endlessly about their happiness and how no one else in the world understands and how it's like a ray of sunlight in a gray world and how their bodies almost seem too small to hold such happiness. Unfortunately, Joyce does not get her happiness. Emily, in Reno getting her divorce, is killed in a car crash. In spite of no note being found, many believe she committed suicide. Dick is upset and rushes to arrange her burial. Months later, he returns to Springdale, married to another woman! While Bill has made Rosemary happy, Bill has also found happiness, as he is now "freed from fear." This is some dialogue from when Rosemary and Bill Dawson declared their love for each other. They also talk about when Bill reveals that he has amnesia and is afraid to be with Rosemary because he doesn't know what might emerge from his past. He tells her mother he wants to leave town to protect her. "I'm just somebody that the tide washed in to your shore." Her mother reluctantly agrees. In time he recovers his memory -- some of his first memories are of his daughter. A few days after Rosemary and Bill get married, they luxuriate in their happiness. Rosemary says "It's just like the frosting on your birthday cake - it's just like seeing your Christmas stocking when you open your eyes on Christmas morning." Rosemary and Bill talk about whether her family will be jealous or upset that she spends most of her time with Bill, but he says that's to be expected of a recently married couple. Rosemary says she now realizes that you don't start to live until you're married. Life has no meaning. Rosemary worries about protecting Bill and his genius. Bill is NOT so supportive of Rosemary's desire to work. Finally they decide that since they live with her mother and Rosemary doesn't have to do housework, they will both work until they have their own home. Finally, some years later, they do, and she quits her job. After they marry, Rosemary worries when Bill gets an attractive female research assistant (nothing happens.) She also has to track down his lost daughter, and is even kidnapped by underworld figures, while all he can do is stay in the hospital and wait for her to call. They mention Rosemary in the context of religion in the radio soap. When Rosemary gets back from a near-fatal trip to New York after a con man tricked her into thinking he could reunite her with husband who'd been gone for quite a while and then tricked her into mortgaging her home and giving him her money, she expresses her happiness at being back in Springdale with her family. She asks if she can say grace. Religion is also mentioned after Bill and Rosemary get back from their wedding, and Rosemary's mother asks to say grace. The book also talks about Rosemary's final months. Rosemary had had a miscarriage, but they all but adopted two young siblings, Anna and Lonny Cisare. Bill is now editor of the Banner and has deposed Springdale's crime boss. The young hoods who had roamed the streets under the crime lord's command are now hanging out at a Boys' Club Bill started. Anna, after spending a long time believing she was unworthy of love, marries the assistant editor of the paper and quickly falls pregnant. Lonny gets involved with an older woman, Monica, who is very hot but is bad news. Bill and Rosemary think they've talked him out of the relationship, but he continues to see Monica on the sly. By the time they realize this, Monica has convinced him to withdraw the Boys' Club funds, marry her, and run away to Florida. The money was very substantial, since Mr. Van Vleck, publisher of the Banner, gave them $5,000 to build a gym. Lonny, Monica, and a friend leave in Lonny's old jalopy. Rosemary and Bill are very upset, but as the night - which lasts for weeks on the radio - goes on, they begin to argue. Bill feels they should give up on Lonny, but Rosemary can't and won't. Lonny proves Rosemary right after driving on and on through a blizzard. He stops at a gas station and mails the money back. While Monica and her friend are asleep, he turns the car around so they can face the consequences of their actions. When Monica wakes up and realizes what he's doing, she grabs the wheel, and they skid into a telephone pole. At the hospital, Monica, who is out of it, talks about Lonny's theft -- Rosemary and Bill are respectively confused and outraged. Then the cops show up to arrest Lonny for killing a man in a hit and run right before the accident. Rosemary eventually proves Lonny's innocence - Lonny was buying gas at ten minutes past two, forty miles from the accident that took place at two. Lonny is set free, but learns Monica has died of her injuries. Lonny decides he has to leave town for a new life. Bill and Rosemary reconcile when a new neighbor, Diane Thompson, tells Rosemary that she is using Lonny to replace the baby she miscarried. Rosemary realizes she cannot obsess over a young man who is not her son and decides to be happy she and Bill will have the house to themselves. They leave for a week of bliss at the Hotel Dalton. Diane invites them to a dinner being given in her honor thrown by a group called Little Mothers that worked with teenagers. Rosemary is impressed. Rosemary and Diane become close, but strange telegrams arrive that upset her. She isn't in when Rosemary phones her, even though she's been seen to enter the hotel. An ugly man confronts her and calls her Goldie. On the last day of the Roberts' vacation, Diane asks them to meet her in the hotel lobby so they can all return to Springdale together, but instead she weeps alone in her room and asks them to go on without her. Mr. Wilson, an ad man who once worked with Bill, asks Bill to write a series of articles for a national magazine. He will be doing good for young America, because this is an expose on narcotics. Bill will work closely with the narcotics squad. Bill soon starts getting threatening phone calls. He won't back down. He is helped by a gorgeous young researcher, Mercy Ainsworthy. Rosemary immediately becomes jealous. Her only confidant is Diane. Then Diane's brother Ray arrives with his five year old daughter, Betsy. Rosemary starts to take care of her. They get along with Ray, although Bill, when he visits, resents Betsy's constant presence. Ray is shady and when he's alone with Diane he twists her arm, he blackmails her with information about her past. He's in Springdale to spy on Billy. He gives info that enables the big drug pusher, Smitty, to elude the narcotic squad's pursuit in Chicago. Meanwhile, the Banner publisher is upset by Bill's neglect of the paper. Ray's employers have told him to get a job as a test pilot and to make contact with some people in Portland, Maine. And Betsy's toy panda, with a zipper in its back, might be used to hide heroin. At this point, the show learned they were going off the air. The drug story was not resolved. Bill decides Springdale and the Banner is too small for his vision and he wants to move upwards. Rosemary isn't sure how to react. Lonny returns from New York a month after his departure. He's found peace and wants a small town life. He accepts the invitation of Betty Gray to her senior prom, and they fall in love. They go visit his sister's new baby and decide to get married. Mercy tells Robert go move to New York, and he does. Rosemary says she will support him no matter what. Larry, the assistant editor who married Lonnie's sister, warns Bill that Mr. Van Vleck won't keep the Banner going if Bill isn't there, but Bill says he's going. Larry gets the money to buy out Mr. Von Vleck and runs the paper himself, with Lonny as his partner. Bill decides he wants to stay in Springdale after all. Lonny and Betty marry in Rosemary's house, the reception at Betty's parents' home across the street. Everyone is thrilled for them. Rosemary and Anna and Lonny got a little house as a surprise for Betty. Just as Rosemary and Bill settle down for the night, Mercy arrives to try to get Bill to change his mind. Rosemary realizes the decision must be Bill's and leaves him alone with Mercy. She goes to see her mother and stepfather. Bill shows up to tell her that the most important thing in his life is her and he will never risk that. The next day, Rosemary tells Larry that Bill wants to work as the editor of the Banner again, Larry has wanted Bill to come back, and agrees to never let Bill guess that she came up with the idea. He offers Bill the third equal partnership in the Banner.

Thanks for telling us about Gerald's last story. I guess at least he had a happy ending. Looks like LIVING is done with the show already. http://www.atvnewsnetwork.co.uk/today/index.php/atv-today/4095-shortland-street-axed-from-living

The father reminds me of Doug. The ex wife has such big breasts she looks like she could topple over. Don't you love how Declan ALWAYS has that look on his face. I'm so glad that haircut on the daughter is fashionable again, it reminds me of a lot of great late 80s early 90s haircuts for young women. Remember April's sister on Dallas? Everything about his daughter seems like a throwback to much better soap days...

Christian was brought in specifically to NOT be Antony Cotton, but for his first year and a half that's basically what he was, with added weepy melodrama. Christian's early stories were about trying to figure out if mentally ill teenager Steven Beale was gay, then after Steven fled town because of all the horrible writing, he settled into the comic relief role in the Beale family. When he wasn't comic relief or a talk-to for BFF (when the writers remember -- they forgot for almost a year) Roxy, he was having stories over the miseries of being gay, from being gay-bashed by a trick to weeping over his mother's coldness and bigotry. He finally got his big story in summer 2009 when "Chryed" began, a story which has been very popular, although it's had a lot of black holes/gaps.

I'm glad you started this. If anyone wants to see it I will type up some stuff later on about radio soaps. Until then, here's a link to some stuff I scanned a few months ago. You can find a few Guiding Light radio episodes here. http://www.youtube.com/user/scifiradioguy

AW at the end of May, 1991. This episode has a lot of good scenes with Marley standing up for herself against Jake, who was very creepy and delusional at this time. I'm actually surprised they managed to redeem him. She also has a quick scene with Iris where she says she isn't inviting Iris to the engagement party because of her awful behavior at a party earlier that year, but then after they talk, Marley changes her mind. There are also a few flashbacks of Marley standing up to Jake. They serve as a good example of Ellen Wheeler managing, in her last year or so as Marley, to create a Marley who was close to finally being a character in her own right and not just Vicky's wan sister, and also managing to show the flip side to Vicky (Vicky being a strong woman with a lot of weaknesses, Marley being somewhat weak but sometimes very strong). I think that Ellen Wheeler was the best Marley but feel that Anne's is underrated. There are also some sweet Paulina/Grant scenes, even if they are hackneyed. Cali seems such a perfect fit as Paulina it's going to be tough for me to accept Judi as this version. I mostly remember Judi's as the later Paulina who was a very different character. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1csxxOx5zE&feature=channel

A WATN from the 9/15/98 SOD. Primedia Inc.

I'm glad Declan will be getting a family. I hope they do a better job bringing them in than most of the other new characters, and I hope that this girl is better than the Barton twits.

http://i176.photobucket.com/albums/w193/antparker/00277023-346682_500.jpg http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/mpd/permalink/m1P978FA9GNH6V Mary <3

Marc's a good actor who has had very poor writing from the start. What confuses me is why the hell they are going on about Jackson and Aaron being a successful team when for months they have had NO scenes involving any sort of relationship. They do not touch, they barely even talk.

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/soaps/s13/hollyoaks/news/a279385/hollyoaks-announces-underage-sex-plot.html I still can't believe we're supposed to think Amber is 12.

My idea: Nikhil Sharma nude model.

It's funny though because he has done barely anything with a number of the new characters he created (Ryan, the Sharmas).

From the 6/24/97 SOD. Primedia. I always thought it was odd that Rhonda barely ever appeared on PC when the buildup pre-show suggested the opposite. I can't remember if she ever had any scenes on PC with Scott.

From the June 24 97 SOD. Primedia Inc

I'm glad you brought that up about Meg, as I thought she hadn't returned from 1958 to the early 70s. At first I thought that some of the soap histories just didn't remember one of her last appearances but I guess for some reason the idea was scrapped. I wonder about the beatnik thing too, especially when he mentions that Alan has sex. Would that be something they'd be able to get past the censors in 1962/3.

I was reading through the From Mary Noble to Mary Hartman book. Apparently the co-author, David Rounds, played Phillip Holden on LOL. The book has a photo of him as Phillip. I will try to scan later if I can get a good picture. He started on the show in 1963 and stayed for several years. He talks some about the rehearsal process and the taping and the sets. I was surprised to read that his character came to town with a past of being falsely accused of attacking women. I didn't think a soap would do that type of story back then. Paul Raven already mentioned some of this, but in case anyone's interested, the book has Roy Winsor's story projections for some of 1962 and 1963. At this time Roy Winsor was producer, Joseph Hardy associate producer and script editor, and Don Ettinger the head writer. The book then points out that "Aggie" was just a guidepost and that she went on to be named Kay, as Paul Raven has already mentioned. Apologies if any of this was already posted or known. I hadn't seen as much detail so I put all this. If it isn't already out there then later I will post a daily breakdown they put in the book, for Episode No. 2919, Thursday, November 29, 1962. Just let me know if you want to see it, as I know the posts that take up too much space are an eyesore.

Really? For some reason I remember some of those from episodes. Maybe I'm wrong though.

Joe

You're probably right, sadly. Some are speculating it's Jen Metcalfe. I notice that Glen Wallace has finally gone back to having grey in his hair now that he's done. I think he started dyeing it ever since his late 2007 appearances.

Thanks for posting those. The guy who plays Tamwar seemed kind of out of it. I love Nina Wadia. She's hilarious.

Thanks for posting those. I like what Clare said -- I'm happy to be working! Considering her last few years as Jacqui I can see what she means. I'm glad that Kieron didn't try to act like he had nothing going on until this story. There is a rumor that a big star is going to be leaving the show and it's going to be announced tonight. We'll see I guess.