DRW50

Thanks for sharing these links as even after all these years I had never read any of those interviews. I'm very glad that site was able to get in touch with so many people and that the site is still up. Seeing Les Brandt talk about Nancy Frangione and Charles Keating as if they were still alive reminds me of how many we've lost over the last 15 years. Les' idea of what Maggie and Rafael would be doing now is not one I would agree with, but he's putting more thought into them than AW ever did. Clayton seems like a nice guy, and I appreciated all his backstage stories of the support he got while also sharing his frustration at how little was done with the character. Then as now, black characters seemed to just be kept in tiny boxes. He mentions the nasty letters the studio received, which likely ended any plans they may have had. Not surprised...and they'd probably get the same reaction (or worse) now. Josie's friendship with Reuben was maybe the only time I found her character interesting.

I can't remember either - maybe William Daniels? Thanks for the extra info, and also to @kalbir @Paul Raven

This isn't directly GH related, but I was looking around Youtube and see that last year someone put up a 1949 episode of the Herb Shriner Show they'd managed to piece together from a rough tape. This was Herb's first TV show. Herb was the father to three kids, one of them being Kin. I wonder if he knows about this video.

Day in and day out he retweets Nazi accounts. We are at a place now where no one cares, at least no one in power - the media, the Republicans. The judges who do care are probably going to be ignored as the new GOP line is that judges don't matter. The rich are thriving and the rest of us are left in the sewers. But at least John Oliver and Jon Stewart can have a big dopey grin yuk yuk about how America is now a monarchy.

Sadly, in some ways, they were "right" in that Audrey and Steve never had major story again after they married, although part of that is probably down to aging out of a central narrative. At least efforts were made to keep them with more of a focus than Lee or Jessie got. This is still a common view now, to the point where one soap I watch (Home & Away) only has characters have children if they are about to leave the show. It's amazing that Lesley did manage to connect with viewers, unlike many high-priced poachings from other networks (one of them being Gerald Gordon a few years later). They seemed very close to bungling the whole thing. I know the main reason given is the Laura story. I wonder how much is also down to Michael Gregory. They have such a natural connection which I don't think she has with Chris Robinson. Watching the individual episodes is worthwhile, but I'm not sure how I would have felt watching GH in the '60s or early '70s knowing the characters could never progress and would just have to relive the same traumas again and again, only stopping along the way for another dead baby. Maybe that's where the patient stories served as a palate cleanser for viewers.

That's very funny. I wonder how quickly they decided to kill her off. Teri never really got a break in soaps post-EON.

Turns out it wasn't a 1988 episode and they misdated it.

I remember in that "catching up with our first cover cast" SOD article from the mid '90s, Ron mentioned doing a lot of theater, so you are probably right. This was where he told the funny story about Yvonne de Carlo asking him to go to bed with her.

That's one I put up a month ago, although it's an episode from a long-gone channel I can't remember and I just reuploaded it, so they probably did the same.

Never mind - those Chip Albers clips are already in the 1988 stuff available on Archive.

I know she has some fans (including several here), it's just never around when I look at Twitter or Bluesky, which have a more divided opinion on many characters. I think the blame on Mansi in some cases is unfair, but when I watch Kristina scenes I do feel like Mansi can't really get a hold on whatever Kristina is meant to be.

I think it was more than just Luke/Noah. This was a whole period of time, which still goes on today to a degree (the British soaps keep trying to force straight women into lesbian relationships over and over) where the soaps were trying to tap into an lgbt audience. I think it may have been less about offending anyone and more about censors. I don't have a problem believing censors would object more to a lesbian relationship than straight cousin incest. The oddest part for me was when they had a big chunk of an episode revolving around the women going vibrator shopping...all while making sure to never say vibrator. That character was so slimy to begin with, so to me the issue was more the story seemed to go into "cry rape" territory until someone at the network got squeamish and he was killed off.

Given how massively unpopular the Kristina recast seems to be this might be one of the rare times GH fans would side with a black man...

Thanks. It has but it's been a while.

I never saw Olivia as man crazy as much as desperately needy and prone to melodramatic romances. For that reason, her being involved with Natalia didn't really bother me. If GL had lasted the relationship never would have stuck anyway, because Olivia just never was going to be happy. I was more surprised when I learned that she had been involved with Frank and Buzz. Thank you. I never saw the comments. I didn't watch her GL run very closely but I'm not sure she had anything as repulsive in terms of assault and consent. I might say "Jammy" due to the origins, but I know many loved that story. Matt sleeping with Dinah when she had brain damage might be another, although maybe she was meant to be A-OK by then.

They still have a few they could get rid of, several I'd place before Dev. He hasn't been that bad over the last decade. He was much worse in the late '00s and early '10s.

I don't know but I've always assumed this was a strike story...maybe they did plan to write Silver out but the way they did it doesn't feel typical of what you'd expect from this era of AMC, not to mention this was Erica Kane's sister. That's the part that I think made the whole thing a mistake, especially in later years when Erica had clearly run out of storyline.

@jam6242 Thanks. I remember that movie but never knew the book it was based on. Emmylou Harris also had a song with that title - probably not tied to the book.

Don't know if I saw this promo before.

Wasn't Wheeler just a director at ATWT?

That's well put. Early LA Law was very good at having serious material and then some splashes of crazy comedy. HSB and St. E had also been on for a number of years and had seen their best days. The first half of St. Elsewhere's 85-86 was a huge slog (I am not talking about ratings, I don't know what those were, just quality) until they miraculously turned things around in the back half. Season 5 is also a huge mess and often moves too far into needlessly mean and "quirky" humor (which would also happen to LA Law later on). The show against all odds managed a renewal after season 5 - what were the ratings at that point and in the last season? Was NBC running low on shows? I'm grateful they got one last season, as the season 5 finale is one of the worst of all time for any show, but I'm still surprised they did. As for Dynasty, I think beyond just being tired of pretty people and silly problems, the show was just hollow by that time. There used to be a long comment on a TV website about why the show began to fail and how as the years passed, the Pollocks didn't even want the cast to move during scenes. And it truly does feel like studied lifelessness with each passing year.

Thanks for finding this. A fun interview with Eileen. I posted an earlier video (although maybe they didn't get it from there - that channel never says where they get stuff from so it could be all theirs) some weeks back, so I am going to post that link just in case it is the same as I want to give them some credit.

GL was lucky to last as long as it did. By all rights, after the disastrous runs of JFP and Laibson, it should have ended in 1995 or 1996. I think Ellen Wheeler made a lot of mistakes, but I don't blame her for the show's death - some might even say it would have gone off around 2004 or 2005 without her.

This is also the first unflattering photo I've seen of Balvinder Sopal.