Urabamba

Yeah, they really did screw it up. I don't watch soaps much anymore, but from what I do catch, it makes me realize how good Todd McKee and Stacy Edwards (and Susan Marie Snyder too) were as young actors in their first acting jobs. I sound like an old fart, but that talent level seems to be missing these days in soaps. I think they kept Todd around since Ted was a Capwell, but more than that it was evident that he had talent, and he apparently was well-liked by the cast and producers.

There was a scene before Hayley's rape where Ted gave her a horse, and she got upset. Do you know what that was about? Did she have bad memories or horses? IIRC, Jake wanted to but a horse but couldn't afford it. Hayley was planning on loaning him the money but realized she couldn't when she learned how much a horse cost. In typical soap fashion, Ted thought that Hayley wanted to buy a horse, so he bought one for her. Hayley ended up embarrassed, which she really shouldn't have, and Jake wound up pissed off, which, tough crap. Kelly was on the run for a while, and then she was arrested in February 1987. Only a few weeks later, she was apparently cleared of everything and able to attend her parents' wedding. What made the charges drop so fast? I wonder why they didn't drag the trial portion out longer. Gina had the tape that showed that Kelly didn't murder Dylan (ugh, one of the worst characters in SB history). She was using it as a bargaining chip. She ended up in jail for something at the same time that Kelly was there. While she was jailed Hayley was raped. So, Gina agreed to hand over the tape in exchange for somehow getting out of jail so she could be with Hayley. Watching some of this I just wonder why they split Hayley/Ted up so abruptly. It's almost as if they had hired a new hunk, Rick Edwards, hoping to make viewers love him, and when it didn't work, they punished Stacy Edwards by firing her. It never made sense to me how they handled Laken's return, Ted and Hayley's breakup, then Ted and Laken's breakup, then Hayley's death. Ted and Hayley were still dealing with the aftermath of her rape and it seemed like they were going to keep them together, although they definitely had her growing closer to Jake. Then Laken blew back into town (in full bitch mode) and kept trying to win back Ted. Both Hayley and Ted strayed a bit (Hayley made out with Jake, Ted made out with Laken), but neither cheated in the traditional sense. But they made Hayley come down hard on Ted (maybe because she was feeling guilty herself?), and she broke up with him. They tried presenting Hayley and Jake as each other's "true love" but the chemistry wasn't there. The Laken & Ted pairing didn't really work because they were so all over the place with Laken's character at that point. Then they had Laken break up with Ted because she had re-fallen for TJ (gawd, the more I type this the more I realize how ridiculous it all was), which ewwww. So, Ted was left alone, they eventually killed off Hayley, and then Laken was written off again.

Didn't they also write Augusta out because Louise Sorel refused to do the storyline they concocted that had her entering into a relationship with Dash post-rape?

Definitely. Laken #1, Julie Ronnie, was basically Ted's girlfriend; she didn't have much more development than that. That said, I thought they were a good couple - they had nice chemistry and were believable together. But it made sense to write her out - the only way Ted was going to develop as a character was to break them up, and she wasn't a strong enough character on her own to keep her around. (Although they got rid of her before coming up with a clear plan for Ted, which pissed me off because they basically had him doing nothing for 6 or 7 months). Laken #2, Susan Marie Snyder, was the strongest actress of the 3, but they brought her back in a completely wrong way -- they turned her into a bitch, which was just 180 degrees different from how Laken was. If they had done a better job of making her a more well-rounded character she probably would have stuck around. I had basically stopped watching by the time Laken #3 rolled around, but she seemed okay enough, but there was nothing that really stood out.

I loved Mason, Julia, Gina and Keith. I also really liked Lionel and Augusta, but their storyline lost some steam, and then Louise Sorel left. Kelly I mostly liked. I was hit or miss with CC and Sophia. CC was a nasty a--hole, and Sophia wasn't the most sympathetic character, but they did well together. My biggest problem was that I wasn't a Cruz & Eden fan, which became especially problematic around '87 or so - they were written into every storyline so you couldn't escape them. I wish the show had played up (and not killed off so many) and given more depth to secondary characters like Brick, Amy, Ted, Laken, Warren, Hayley, Jane, Pearl, and even Christy. It would have balanced things out some and added some heft to the show. Maybe I'm remembering incorrectly, but I just don't recall a show relying so much on so few characters. Even though it was critically slammed in the early years, I'm most fond of SB from'84 to '87 or so. I kept watching through '89, until Robin Wright, Lane Davies, and Todd McKee had all left, and the Lockridges were pretty much decimated. I know they reintroduced the Lockridges, so to speak, later on, but by then I just couldn't get back into it.

Very true. I think this was actually my biggest problem with the show. Unlike other soaps I watched back in the day (ATWT and AMC come to mind - I guess I watched one from each network), SB was way too focused on too few primary characters and didn't do a great job with balancing storylines. If you weren't invested in a primary character (like Cruz and/or Eden), the show could be infuriating. Yet, it still was my favorite soap, because it was just so different in its sensibility.

I never understood why the show didn't give Todd McKee more to do. And the way he was marginalized made no sense, since he was a good actor and had chemistry with both Laken and Hayley. The show could have easily delved into the young adult relationships more, and gotten back into the Capwell/Lockridge dynamic by really getting Ted and Laken back together. Instead, they paired Hayley with Jake (I had no problem with them breaking Ted and Hayley up, she had gotten a little too high and mighty for my tastes by then), who had absolutely no chemistry; and they wasted the repairing of Ted and Laken by breaking them up again too soon. Then they killed off Hayley, Laken took off again, Jake left town, and Ted was left with nothing to do. It never made any sense.

Not from SB, but here's one from B&B: B&B Jake. Here's a recent article on him also that explains the B&B thing: http://santabarbara-online.com/index2.htm

Sorry, second post in a row, meant to address this in my last one. I think SB did a good job with developing a core cast of characters by early 1985 but for whatever reason didn't seem satisfied with that and ended up getting rid of good characters and introducing other ones that were annoying as hell. Granted, no soap can survive by being stagnant, but some of the character and storyline changes just seemed so arbitrary. As for strengths, SB was easily the funniest soap ever.

Re Hayley: I agree that Stacy Edwards was a great actress. Other than the fact that SB seemed to have almost every female character raped (seriously - Kelly, Mary, Hayley, Eden, Julia, etc.), I never understood why SB ever did the rape storyline with Eden. I thought that Stacy did a great job with showing the horrors of rape and that doing the same thing with Eden was more than unnecessary. That said, though I liked Hayley, she wasn't one of my favorites. I thought she ended up being a little righteous for someone who killed someone (even if inadvertently), and tried to play innocent even though she was also culpable in the ending of her marriage to Ted. Plus I never bought her with Jake, though that had more to do with the fact that Rick Edwards as Jake was pretty but not a great actor. She had much more chemistry with Ted. This. I loved the show, but it played revolving door with too many good characters. After some hits and misses to start, SB had a really good core of characters by early 1985, but it never seemed satisfied with them. The dumbest thing was when the original Lockridges were pretty much written out of the show (starting with Laken - she and Ted were good together, so I thought that was dumb - there could have been great awkward Capwell/Lockridge family scenes if they had kept them together; then Warren - never really got a good storyline, which was too bad b/c John Allen Nelson was a good actor; then Augusta - loved her and Lionel together, Louise Sorel was awesome - it was stupid to break them up). The show just wasn't the same without the Capwell/Lockridge feud. Instead they subjected us to too many random and annoying characters. Dylan Hartley comes to mind. And this is an unpopular opinion, but I wasn't the biggest Cruz/Eden fan. Eden started out a strong female character on a show that had too few of them and kind of turned into a whiny, sometimes helpless shrew. And Cruz was just too damn perfect (seriously, were there any other cops in that town who could solve crimes) and had way too much storyline. It was difficult to watch the show when Lane Davies took summers off to do theater and they filled his time by making it the Cruz and Eden show.

Not to be naive and believe everything I read, but I'm pretty sure both of them are straight.

Todd McKee was an excellent actor (as well as having a hot body). He had a lot of storyline with Laken and then Hayley in the first 2-3 years of the show, and then for whatever reason, he didn't have much to do his last 2 years. I thought SB did that a lot -- forgot about good actors and characters (Ted, Warren) and eventually wrote some of them off (Brick) in favor of characters that went nowhere. Todd and John Allen Nelson both left on their own accord, not sure about the actor who played Brick. Regardless, I thought Todd was great in the role of Ted - just wished they had used him more. He had good chemistry with Stacy Edwards (Hayley) and Julie Ronnie (1st Laken) and probably would have been good with the second Laken (Susan Marie Snyder), although they dropped her too right after they killed Hayley (maybe this was around the writers' strike? Seriously, what the heck were they thinking.). He also interacted really well with the Capwell siblings, especially Mason. I had stopped watching SB by the time they brought Ted #2 in. From what I've read, he was fine in the part, but McKee really defined the role.

She auditioned for the role of Hayley.