lilyredd

Your point is well-taken. I have a blind spot when it comes to characters or people I do not like. I tend to concentrate on every piece of negative I find about that character so I apologize for harping too often on Lily. It does not help that every episode that pops up on YouTube is one where she is just ridiculous. Also, I think there was a point where Marland was going to try to claim Lucinda was abusive because there were episodes where they had Lily acting afraid of her mother which I thought was nonsense. I found Lucinda fabulous so there is another blind spot. That rape story with John sounds awful and demonstrates the constant erasing of women’s experience with sexual assault and aggression on daytime tv. How do you not know who you are having sex with- was she drunk or drugged, blind or blindfolded? Wtf?

ABBA always brings a smile to my face. Such amazing and fun music. I came across another music collaboration with the creators- Benny Andersson’s Orkester. Anyone know anything about this?

Years ago, the Toledo Museum of Art showed an exhibition of impressionist paintings. One of the national media nightly programs covered the exhibition. They decided to find the most stereotypical looking people to interview who knew little nor cared about art. This exhibition was attended by thousands in this city. What this shows is people want to believe that if you live in X you have this and you live in y you have this. The truth is you will find people in the Midwest with lots money and they spend it. It totally made sense for these wealthy characters to wear their wealth. I don’t take it as a diss to the Midwest because there is much to not like about it here, but one can find someone just as fashionable in Akron as in New York.

I think there is an interesting contrast of Lily v Andy. Now Andy had a very involved mother who was nothing like Lucinda or Iva for that matter- but his family had crap loads of drama (it’s a soap) and his father was really a bad guy- John raped his mother among many other crimes. His parents worked and with a father and stepfather who were doctors they were busy - the show would have John and/or Bob at the hospital at all hours. One could argue too busy to be constantly with Andy - something Lily and the writers constantly drag Lucinda. As to Lily, they established Lucinda was always busy and she was devious. The problem is trying to sell Lily not having warmth and love growing up- or she was lonely (go make some friends at school or the country club- your mama ain’t your confidant or playmate she is your mother)-I never bought it - that is not what I saw on my screen- I saw a character constantly adored. I remember a scene where Lily whines to Holden she grew up without love- now kids can truly believe they are not loved but it was clear onscreen that Lucinda loved Lily. A simple fix for me would have been someone calling her out on her nonsense - they did it with Andy and his drinking, with John and his crap, etc. I think that was the crux - letting her crap go unchallenged- while the writer may have wanted her to have unattractive qualities - in the totality of the circumstances, it came off as everyone was suppose to agree with her and like those qualities. About John, what happened with him and Dee. How was what he did not rape?

Stuart Damon was a wonderful actor. I loved Alan and Monica.

This is true for me. I have a hard seeing a strong, devious woman taking crap from a husband or any man. Lucinda wanting to get back with John even though he very publicly was sleeping with Susan made no sense to me. From the above perspective, it makes sense and sometimes we put our own sensibilities on characters.

Absolutely. I don’t think exploring the past has to be a set up for sympathy. It can be used to introduce new characters, new experiences etc. Too often writers, especially Marland, had everyone abused by one of their parents and your parents are not always the source of a persons problems.

Lucinda and Martin adopted Lily because Martin was infertile. I do agree with the concept that Lucinda did not need to adopt that ingrate or at least should have dumped her at the farm the moment Iva started stalking her about Lily. Lol. I think the story was that Lucinda who went by her given name Mary Ellen married Jacobo and gave birth to Sierra. Jacobo was a politician who sort of ran the country. At some point she met and fell in love with Martin. When Jacobo found out he exiled her and threatened to kill Martin. I think Jacobo was powerful and it was his dying that allowed her to see her child again. The show was never clear when she changed her name to Lucinda or how her husbands treated her. While on the one hand I have a hard time seeing a character with such a strong personality being meek and mild at a any point, I always thought Lucinda had bad taste in men and her need to control her relationships stemmed from abuse from those men. Too much changeover in writers and producers that the timelines of all characters get muddied. Exploring her wide open past would have provided much story for her and her relationships for years. Water under the bridge.

Thanks.

Who did Guest kill, I cannot remember. I remember her saying to Connor and Sam she was married to a famous Hollywood star- they should have cast him or explore some of these issues when they had her in therapy. There was so much to unpack with her character - marrying a man and living in a foreign country, forced to leave your child, and the man who was a big reason for her exile commits crimes and kills himself.. I would love to have seen more of the relationship between Lisa and Lucinda - it could have developed like Dorian and Vicki at OLTL.

You’re welcome. My mom used to watch The Doctors and raved about Nick and Althea and we thought it would have been cool for Gerald Gordon to play Martin Guest in flashbacks.

James Walsh was a rich old man Lucinda married after Lily’s adoptive father and Lucinda’s husband Martin Guest killed himself. James Walsh had a son who was the father of Connor and Evan with Edwina the mother. Walsh enterprises was founded by James Walsh senior and Lucinda built the company to a power pushing the son out. Connor and Evan came to town to take Lucinda’s company. She never knew the grandkids because they probably were babies and she had no relationship with Connor and Evans father. Connor and Evan blamed Lucinda for their father’s suicide- a copy of why Lucinda came to town and hated Whit McCall.

My only quibble here is that Lucinda gave Worldwide to Lily. Lucinda is like Miranda Priestly- she ain’t going anywhere! Worldwide could have been a great source of stories that last decade like Succession and Billions. Walsh and any other companies fell so they could have established that company as a monolith like Amazon. Have all the grandkids vying for power with Lucinda as puppet master.

I actually do not disagree with you. I watched most consistently from 86-93 so that is my main point of reference with story and writers. I only watched intermittently after that time with college and career etc. I don’t think Lisa, Bob, Kim, Susan had much at a certain point either beyond health issues or their kids. Strangely, when I watched in later years the dynamic with Lily and Lucinda no longer irritated me.

That same lack of imagination? Lol, I don’t know. Writing for such a large cast with all the intendant requirements and demands is immensely difficult. I just did not enjoy the tone or the direction of the Lily/Lucinda dynamic.

Thanks for the episode. This will be unpopular, but this episode epitomizes why I often disliked Marland’s writing and why I disliked Lily so much. The Walsh takeover had only been a few months prior to this wedding. Someone who takes over my mom’s company will not be at my wedding, my hubby is not working for them nor will I dance with one of the people and beg them to work together. Lily is awful. That little scene with Lucinda at the beginning where she says she would concentrate on her own life should have come to fruition. It showed a lack of imagination to just write her as interfering with Iva’s daughter. Lucinda is a joyous character- let her have fun. It was a missed opportunity. A Lucinda untethered from Lily would have had fun. Frankly, a Holden free from Lily would have had fun. The couples here lack heat or joy or fun. I can see why Zenk enjoyed the writing for her character in later years. Here and so often with some of her pairings she looks so earnest instead of joyful. It must have been freeing to just play.

I was so young but my recollection was there was no scene of their wedding and this might have been on an anniversary.

Never noticed her dental work. I always thought young Lisa Brown looked a bit like young Judy Garland. I remember they had Iva win some contest and get a makeover and a cruise and I always thought it was funny because that lady had every hair color under the sun and had different looks through the years but in reality needed a personality transplant.

Best part of this episode was Mary Kay Adams. Just a wonderful actor. She even made Royce and Scott tolerable. Great chemistry with everyone and I loved her interaction with Lucinda. John and Iva? Were they popular? I tended fast forward through them and the Snyder family in general.

I loved characters like Lucinda -rich, complicated, weird, over the top, intense and bad. Like Dorian and Alexandra and Iris and Alexis. Just delicious and fun. Too often their stories, however, were just Lady Capulet retreads when stories involved their bland children. There are enumerable examples of Lily being awful in a quiet manner. The one that stands out is her telling Lucinda she wished she had grown up poor. The audacity of such ignorance with no blow back and the unwillingness of the show to call her out on that crap! My dad lost his hearing as a kid because he couldn’t get proper medical care and cannot afford new hearing aids right now because my mom needed dental surgery. It was such a gross statement. Strangely, the show could have granted her that wish later. She dumped all the stock Lucinda gave her and got rid of her trust fund during the disaffirming her illegal adoption (another nonsense move- it was illegal nothing to disaffirm.) While she would never truly know poverty, I would have enjoyed seeing her not be secure in her finances and for her mother to stop gifting stock to someone who did not appreciate it.

Lily Snyder is a character I had the same thought from the first scene I saw her as I did her last scene: she is awful. I know writers can have preferred characters or favorites but they fall into a trap thinking that every character worshiping at the alter of their favorite will make that character shine brighter. Marland really overplayed it with Lily. Every woman of a certain age wanted to be her mother, all the guys wanted to date her (especially if their last name was Snyder when they should have recognized you don’t sleep with your niece- adopted or not), everyone liked her. Too many far more interesting characters were mired in the muck supporting her stories. The show would have been served with her exit for longer than a few months at the change of actresses. When she married Holden the first time, I wanted the show to ship them to Kansas to run that other Snyder farm. Frankly, even knowing how toxic Lucinda was with her kids, Lily was a crap daughter. Passive-aggressive and constantly whining about every little thing her mother did or did not do at every turn. It was not entertaining. Every time Lily disowned her, I wanted Lucinda to celebrate.

Cal and Lyla just never worked for me. Actually, Cal was a character that never worked for me. I do not know what is was about him as the actor was fine (I mainly remember him playing a sexist pastor on Designing Women). Lily calling him “grandpa” always seemed weird to me. It is too bad the show didn’t keep a Bianca around for Lucinda - she was the only daughter never fazed by her shenanigans.

So I went back to watch the episode, what memories. I was in grade school when this aired. Marland was quite good at details from year to year. I think this was his best era with ATWT (85-90). I know Lucinda and John were popular, but I liked it better when Lucinda did not like him. Finn Carter was really a natural.

OLTL- I cannot imagine Elaine Princi as Dorian during the Death row/secret room story nor could I see her in any of the David Vickers stories.

Thanks! I just watched the ATWT 50th anniversary special episode from Soapnet via YouTube (sorry I do not know how to post it here) and Hubbard mentioned how Marland liked to write for young love but when she said it on the show she was very complimentary of him and didn’t sound negative at all. Perhaps, it is overblown as to her feelings on her character and Marland’s writing for her? I do, however, think Hubbard disliked how the John/Lucinda marriage ended and maybe that and the writers having Lucinda throw herself at John or Gavin Kruger or Craig only to be rejected may have informed her opinions on any love stories. And it is of note she always seemed to remember that pairing and John after he left the show.