will81

3 hours ago, fivethej said:

Paul & Andy dig her out and save her. Paul picked Lauren up carrying her but nothing more was shown on-screen. Next time Lauren appears on-screen she is fine as nothing ever happened.

Lauren was in a coma for several days and pretty pale that whole time. She did recover fairly quickly though

7 hours ago, YRfan23 said:

I Uploaded a couple of the new 1988 episodes from archive on YT and the Vault!   
 

 

 

Thank you so much. I am loving 1988

9 hours ago, kalbir said:

Victor was a blank canvas of a character. All we knew about Victor was that he was a wealthy businessman that lived on a horse ranch and was married to the long suffering much younger Julia. He had no family ties or other connection to anyone in Genoa City. I believe it was rewritten years later that Katherine brought Victor to Genoa City to run Chancellor Industries but I don't think Victor and Katherine met onscreen until sometime in 1981.

They were in each others orbits by the summer of 1980. When Douglas and Victor were suddenly old friends and Douglas and Derek were fighting over Katherine. Douglas challenged Derek to a duel and Victor was his second. Later, when Derek got Kay hooked on booze again and planned to take her on a cruise, Kay had a sense of forboding and asked Victor to step in to run Chancellor in her absence which was around September 1980. I think this scene often gets mistaken for his introduction

39 minutes ago, Broderick said:

Found this, from August 1980:

Beau Kayzer is ready to move on.  He says he is leaving Restless this week to look for greener acting pastures -- mainly in films.  

"It ceased to become a challenge here," he said in a telephone interview from his dressing room in CBS's Television City in Hollywood.  "There is so little latitude in daytime television."  

Kayzer says soap operas are a "good training ground" but editing procedures give an actor greater flexibility on film than on tape.  He wants to do films on location and has already completed a pilot for NBC in which he plays an undercover detective.

[It goes on and talks about the spiritual and celibate nature of his character, his character's drunken mother, and so forth.  But it doesn't really answer the question about his contract.  I still believe he agreed to stay on -- recurring -- after his contract expired in February 1980, and after six months of it, he'd just had enough.]  

This definitely makes it sound more like he re-signed but a much shorter contract and Bell and Co went with it. I mean David Hasselhoff was basically a guest star through 1980, he was not on a normal contract. So makes sense they might have done this for Beau too. Possibly Brock and Julia were to be a couple after Victor was killed off and go on to other stories. Then when Bell decided to keep Eric he kept it going as a triangle, maybe hoping the front burner story would entice Beau to stay. Sounds like he didn't like the story much at all and left.

24 minutes ago, Broderick said:

Here's another one that indicates they really just didn't know what they were doing. 

• Nick Benedict has been signed to appear on Y&R in an as-yet-undecided role, although the studio informs us two new core families will be added to the show, one of which will include Nick Benedict.  [That obviously didn't happen as the "studio" indicated.]
• Come February, Meg Bennett will portray a potential romantic interest for Brock Reynolds, when she debuts as "Julie".  [lol]
• Other newcomers to Y&R include Janet Wood as unwed mother "April", David Wynn as "Steve Williams", and Michael Evans as the safecracker "Douglas".  
• Still not cast is a replacement for the exiting Brenda Dickson in the role of Jill Brooks.
• John McCook will be taking a short leave of absence to film a starring role in a TV miniseries.  

And I believe this is just January 1980. It was a bit of a mess that year.  

52 minutes ago, Paul Raven said:

This always puzzled me as all the actors contracts had to be renegotiated when the show went to an hour (thus allowing Brenda and John to exit) So Beau presumably signed a new contract. But he was gone by mid year.

If he only agreed to sign for 6 months then why would Bill Bell give him his first real frontburner romance with Julia, knowing it would have to be cut short?

If he signed a standard 3 yr deal, why did Bill choose to dump Brock at the end of a cycle?

We know that originally Victor was going to die (I'm sure they were planning a Paul/Cassandra/George type story) so obviously story plans changed, but why did Brock lose out?

It makes sense for 1980 where it seems everyone was throwing things at the wall to see what would stick.

My assumption is Beau wanted to leave and Bell needed an anchor for the Newman's, thus he asked Beau to stay and help launch that couple and hoped that would work and he could put them into a new storyline by the time Beau left. It sort of worked, just some of it fell flat

1 hour ago, Paul Raven said:

That does sound a bit clunky.

Maybe the family should have been brought in more slowly. 

Perhaps some scenes with Paul and Mary, with mentions of the others, then Carl joins the group followed by Steve and Patty.

Carl could have already been seen in police scenes, Mary and Paul could talk about him and viewers could connect him to them before they are actually seen together.

It really was an interesting time for the show that I could examine endlessly.

It did kinda happen that way from what I can tell, only in a condensed period of time.

Carl was first seen in Jan 1980, investigating the Walter Addison death. Then Steve Wiliams was hired as a reporter by Stuart Brooks two weeks later and he was on the case too and mentions his detective father. Ironically Paul was not seen during this time. I believe Doug Davidson was finally getting a contract and was in negotiations. Suddenly he reappears and has beef with Steve, feeling he was the favoured son. Before we know it in March Mary has her menopausal pregnancy and out of nowhere Patty shows up isn't happy about her old mum being pregnant. 

Within a few months Mary loses the baby, April reveals she has a baby with one of the Williams boys (her parents assume Steve), Paul joins a cult, Steve and Peggy investigate the cult and Patty goes upstairs one day and comes back down six months later as blond Lilibet Stern. 

I think the issue is the family was kinda just there and already in the middle of drama without the audience being given the chance to get to know them, I am pretty sure Doug Davidson had been on recurring and was not a major character before the Williams were built around him, which started without him being onscreen. Bell usually took six months to introduce new characters before giving them lead story. Not so with the Williams.

7 hours ago, allmc2008 said:

She was always asked by industry people "how have you been able to tolerate such a monster for such long!"

She'd then say "what monster?"

Lots who worked for him did spread lies or exaggerate certain incidents. She was with them when they worked for him and she'd tell these people it wasn't true. He loved Sally Sussman and Elizabeth Horraway though.

 

He did have an ego and could be temperamental when others in the room criticised him. Remember, he worked with Irna. The last thing she said to him was "you will never be a success in this industry bc your life is too normal."

Kay said Lee said during the period he worked for her she'd keep him from early in the morning to late at night. He'd come home around dinner and Irna would call as they started to eat. He'd tell her but she wouldn't care. For HOURS Irna would berate him on how terrible he was and degrade and undermine his ability.

Yet, he always spoke nice about her.

 

On a side note she doesnt remember how Jim Riley got on the show or any contributions he made. But, she and him were great friends and he was fun to have around. She said Riley was a real raconteur who could tell you stories, and keep you engaged, at a bar for HOURS. She misses that.

Orson Bean who was Alley Mills' late husband was like that too, she said.

Interesting that anyone tried to make Bell out to be a monster. I could see him being shown as a little cold, as he did seem to have a reserve about him. 

I can imagine all the digging from Irna probably left him with a bit of a complex that created the temprement. It must be hard to take criticism from anyone when someone you admired basically told you that you're a loser. 

It is funny, I went through all the end credits of the episodes we have. James Riley just pops up as a Story Consultant out of nowhere and disappears almost as quick. Nice to know Kay and James got along. I really love the era Sally Sussman was with the show. I know Terry Lester loved her too and when he left claimed she was the sole reason the Abbotts were successful and got story. I think Bell must have been pretty annoyed by that. I wish Terry hadn't burned his bridges and had come back. 

8 hours ago, blueberrywaffle said:

Please, will March - December 1988 ever be posted in german ?

Not sure anyone here has them. I know they broadcast to 1989 (I think) in Germany and France but not sure the angel that uploaded all the others has those. 

On 7/10/2022 at 5:35 PM, allmc2008 said:

It was a quick rise to that position.

At some point in the 70s Bill went on vacay and on vacay his dad died. Between the start of the vacay and the end of the aftermath of his dad's death she was flying the solo. It was like 3 months or so. I think that was 1976.

She did work with Bill on certain things like researching the breast cancer story

Elizabeth Hollower was also more of an active writer. Bill and Kay loved her eccentricity and basically had her write the Kay/Jill scenes back in the 80s. I THINK she wrote the dream sequences (don't quote me on that).

 

But the hour expansion really did a number on all of them. It was so much work but it was just them two plus Jack Smith. Bill never got over loosening the original characters though.

 

Thank you for the response. I had a feeling those two were like two peas in a pod and both loved the show and took care of it. I would be fascinated to see the period in 1976. Maybe I wouldn't notice much difference. On the Y&R FB group Julianna McCarthy praised Kay and how she wrote for her character, as she felt the dialogue felt genuine and real.

I have always loved the way Kay spoke about Bill Bell, she obviously had such respect and admiration and I feel the same was true for him about her too. 

Yes the hour long expansion - I have always been slightly obsessed with the 80 - 82 period, it is obvious the show was struggling. Not down right awful but not at its usual strength either. I am fascinated to know more. I think one could write a whole book about that period. Would Kay ever write a book about her time at Y&R? I would love for her to get a behind the scenes history together, no need for anything to scandalous, even just the general stuff would be so amazing to know. 

19 hours ago, allmc2008 said:

Kay did tell me that, yes, it was the Midwestern audience that reacted strongly. She gave me a lot of little fun stories about the earlier years that I should share. But, some of it is supposed to be hidden.

 

One thing she did say is that, early on, she was assigned to log fan mail. She confirmed that the people who thought the show was real weren't putting on an act. Something about the writing of the mail pieces showed clear mental illness.

 

She and Bell would, when she first started, spend half an hour or so outlining a script by having a piece of legal pad that was divided in 5 rows and 5 columns. They would fill in a row, after brainstorming for that half hour or so, and then she'd write a few acts and he'd write a few acts.

When Jack Smith came in 1979 they divided it in 3 ways.

When they knew there was going to be multiple episodes in a row that featured a hot climax one of them would dedicate to those scenes for all those episodes all at once as to know loose the flow of suspense/intrigue.

One thing I'd really like to know - was Kay basically a co-headwriter starting in the 70's? I found an interview with her from around 1979 which calls her a HW of the show. I know we or I use Associate HW but was she functioning as a co-HW?

I know Bell said there was a point in time where he couldn't tell the difference between one of his scripts and one of Kay's

57 minutes ago, allmc2008 said:

Regarding the Katherine/Joann story.

Kay Alden told me that she had a friend who worked for the show that functioned as a creative consultant of sorts. They used her to read current publications to keep a 'pulse' on the current times. She read a story in Cosmo regarding lesbianism and that is what led to Kay/Joann.

Alden told me that the studio called them as a specific scene happened. Basically, there was a 'meaningful glance' between the two and one of them touched the other on the shoulder. The studio said that they could see the ratings crash and burn on some device. In fact, they lost a great deal of viewers and they didn't return for several months. But after that call, they had to end it. They both agreed to never try to do that again -- largely due to the the chunks of horrible letters they got from the fans.

That's fascinating. I read an interview with Bill Bell which he did prior to the Joann/Kay story. When asked about gay characters he said he wouldn't do a male couple because he didn't think his audience would respond well but he thought the audience would be more accepting of two women. This along with the cosmo story must have given him some confidence and it must have hit hard when the ratings crashed and the unkind fan letters poured in. 

Pretty sure this is the only time this side was shown. Maybe to the left of Jill are the doors?

Jill on the chaise lounge, behind the fireplace. I assume the terrace doors are directly in front of her and there is a nook or something. 

Also it seems Lauralee Bell was on contract in these episodes, which surprises me as she wasn't on contract during her shorter 1986 stint but went on contract around May/Jun 1986. I always assumed she was recurring in 83, 84, 85. 

2 hours ago, Paul Raven said:

So glad that Cricket aka pizza face was able to offer Traci some words of wisdom that changed her whole outlook on life.

At 48 min in we have a seen of Jill standing on a terrace with the Abbott living room in the background. She then enters from an area next to the fireplace. Once in the living room we see glimpses of a chaise longue next to the fireplace. The editing doesn't make it clear how that all fits.

I don't recall that area ever being shown or used again.

Does anyone else recall seeing it? Why use it that one time?

The chaise lounge was always there. We see it briefly when Jack comes home one night in a 1984 ep and Jill is sitting on it waiting for him. Around the time he was going after Ms Wells. Maybe Sep 84???

I assume the terrace is the fourth wall we have only seen maybe once and you go past the fireplace to the wall which is actually a door/window???? But this has to have been built later than 1983 when we get a good view from the staircase (Patty's view) when Jill and Jack are doing the re-enactment. In that shot it just looks like windows with blinds and very basic. Lol, maybe Jill got some redecorating in after all.

40 minutes ago, YRfan23 said:

I haven’t watched yet but I’ll have to keep my eyes open for any confirmation! Maybe the commercials on that episode will help better then the 6/21 or 7/2 episode did.

We also have the partial July 04 ep. Synopsis suggests these eps were from Jul 1 - 5 so my guess would be Jul 01 and 02. The ep listed as Jul 08 preceeds the Jun 21 ep as at the end of the Jul 08 ep Ashley gives Jill the good news about John and the Jun 21 ep picks up right from the same spot. Jack also finds out from Dina that his face is no longer in the pictures in the Jul 08 ep which he tells Jill in the "June 21" episode

I am loving all these 80's eps. Thanks everyone for posting. I do think the June 21 ep is Jul 2 and the Jul 8 ep is Jul 1. Kay told Jill she showed John the photos in the Jun 27 ep and these seem to be from the following week.

9 hours ago, ChickenNuggetz92 said:

Official CBS rip of the special is now in the Vault!

Amazing, thank you

I'd say with Y&R there is more to the story. In 80-81 most or all the core characters were onscreen, definitely by 1981 all the Brooks sisters, Stu, Liz and the Foster kids were on canvas and had story.

In late 81 both Pamela Solow (Peggy) and Wings Hauser (Greg#3) left the show and Greg was recast and Peggy was supposed to be recast but wasn't. Howard McGillan (Greg #4) just didn't work, I'd say in large part because Howard seemed slightly more like Jim Houghton's Greg and Wings had a method actor vibe to him, though he mostly seemed a little over wrought all the time. You can't turn back the clock and it seems Howard barely appeared except as a supporting character to Jill and sometimes Chris. He probably stopped appearing by July 1982.

In spring 1982, David Hasselhoff (Snapper#2) left for good and recasting Snapper wasn't going to be easy and I don't blame the show for not trying. Next Jaime-Lyn Bauer (Lorie) left, another one who couldn't really be replaced. Next Lynn Topping (Chris#2) was let go, it made little sense for Chris to stick around when Snapper was gone, though Bell tried. Although considering they let Lynn go in 1980 without a recast, I don't think he tried too hard. I liked Lynn, not sure Bell was as invested.

That left Deborah Adair (Jill#3) and Victoria Mallory (Leslie#2). Bell tried to link them to new families, for Jill this was dynamite as she worked in the newly formed and already popular Abbott family. The Laurence family didn't gel and he let them loose and then dropped the axe on Leslie. I honestly don't think Bell was as inspired by Victoria Mallory as he had been Janice Lynde and I think it was harder to make Leslie work without Lorie with Victoria in the role. He tied the two together too much. I found Lynde seemed to hold as much onscreen power as Jaime-Lyn and I think Bell would have had her and Lorie sharing the spotlight more. I feel under Victoria, Leslie was a supporting player to Lorie. 

Stu would go six months later and Liz a few years later. 

I think Bell would have kept his core families, but it was getting harder and harder for him to maintain interest as original actors left and recasts left or didn't work out. I also think he created the Abbotts because JLB was going and he had a very fractured set of original core characters and needed a stronger foundation. Bell always said the show was more important than anything else, no actor, character or writer was above it. I think he did what he had to do to help the show survive. 

I guess Cricket from Y&R would fit the bill. I never had issue with Lauralee Bell, but Cricket was suddenly the in demand model, teen advocate, teen slueth and desire of every young man in town. Then her mother turned up and married into the main family on the show, though oddly she had little to do with them during that period. 

7 hours ago, BoldRestless said:

Ugh! That is so not realistic. I was dealing with one of them once. They eventually negotiated to sell me a huge lot for like $2/tape which was reasonable (all unlabeled and ended up not much Y&R on it anyway). 

 

If this guy's mom was taping them without commercials that means she may have fit a lot of episodes on those tapes, God bless her. I'm definitely interested in donating towards this. I could also digitize the tapes if this guy doesn't want to do that. I'm going to have some free time this summer hopefully.

Agree - I am trying to get through to him that $20 a tape might work for a few tapes, but you aren't going to sell 200+ tapes for that much. 

18 minutes ago, ltm1997 said:

 

 

Good Lord!!!!! I think on behalf of all of us, if this goes well, I can say one word to collectively sum this up…”JACKPOT”!!!

If there’s even ONE tape from 1983 or 1984, I’m gonna faint!!!!

Yeah I was hoping for that period too. I will keep in contact with him. Hopefully we can swing something. I told him I want those episodes, haha. 

Update - I talked to the guy. He's holding on to them for now. Apparently other people also talked to him and he seems to know now how valuable they might be.

He told me he has at least 200 tapes and looking at the picture they were 120min - though LP or EP mode could have been used. He felt it was mid to late 80's through to mid 90's. He seem to suggest the last tape had eps from 1994 on it. He doesn't know how many episodes per tape yet. There could be 400 eps or 1000+. Depends how many on a tape. My guess would be 88 - 94 in EP mode. Just a hunch based on what he has told me. 

I told him about the One Drive and said I would be happy to help pitch in money if he wanted to digitise them and upload them. He was open to that idea. He was also looking at ebay and some exhorbitant pricing like $20 a tape. I asked him to keep in touch. Hopefully we can get our hands on these. 

24 minutes ago, YRfan23 said:

Amazing!! That guy needs to find  a way to get that collection on here!! did he say what years they were?

He's on a VHS Resource FB Page. He collects VHS but I'm not sure he has any interest in soaps. It was just part of the collection. I messaged him, so hopefully we can find out what he plans to do with the tapes and if he isn't going to upload the eps, I might see who wants to pool some money and buy them off him if possible.

I can't tell if he has 200 tapes with Y&R eps on them or 200 Eps. Not sure what period but definitely 80's and possibly mid to late 1980 or he might have meant mid to late 1980's. Have to clarify. 

This was just posted on the Y&R FB page. Maybe we can ask him if he is willing to upload or sell them and we can pool some money together

58 minutes ago, Wendy said:

I think casting - as @carolineg points out - makes a difference for any role. Would Drake have worked as Edmund Grey? Maybe. He had the charisma and charm. But he may not have been a journalist had Drake played him.

To use an old prime time example, apparently, the character of Sam Malone on Cheers had apparently been envisioned not as an ex-baseball player, but an ex-football player! And one of the actors in contention for the role was real-life former L.A. Rams player turned actor Fred Dryer (who would recur as sportscaster Dave Richards on the show and also got his own big break with Hunter, obviously!) I think I even read that William Devane (ex-Greg Sumner, Knots Landing) had also read for Sam.

However, once Ted Danson got the role, it was changed so that Sam was a former member of the Boston Red Sox baseball team, and the rest is history.

(On a side note, another actress up for Diane Chambers was Julia Duffy. She, of course, landed on Newhart as Stephanie. I think she even appeared in a Cheers episode as a friend of Diane's, but I can't be sure.)

So I think any role can be played by almost any actor if the details are tweaked just so...

Julia Duffy did appear and I think she may have appeared in an episode with Fred Dryer. Maybe not, but I'm pretty sure she did. 

19 hours ago, blueberrywaffle said:

is the german episode february 19 1986 available ? I cannot find it any where. >.<

Have you visited the One Drive Vault? All the episodes and more are there. Feb 19, 1986 is there

https://bit.ly/3kMIjRN

Thanks for the tag @victoria foxton I am a bit behind

The Aug 4th ep 

What an odd opener - Did Donald Briscoe hurt himself or was it Tony? Laura makes no reference to it and even tells Tony he is the picture of health as he holds onto his foot in pain, and it didn't sound ironic to me. Once he has his shoe on he is fine or acting that way. I got so lost in thinking about Donald's foot and missed the scene entirely. 

I wonder how many scenes Susan Flannery's Laura had with Tony. From synopsis it doesn't seem like much. Laura was brought into the Mickey/Bill feud pretty quickly. I like Floy Dean but even without having seen more than a few short clips of Susan, I feel like Susan's grounded and thoughtful approach would always win me over. Days had some amazing actresses, in fact the more I get to see from all the shows back in the 60's and 70's they all had amazing performers. 

The scene between Alice and Marie is so beautifully acted. No shouting and histrionics, just two women talking about love and relationships. Alice can guide her daughter without seeming like a busy body and can be pretty blunt without seeming like a jerk. Bell allows Marie to need her mother in that moment. Dysfunction works well on soaps, but I miss this sort of thing. Two characters relating and talking and sharing a moment together without all the drama. Soaps did this well back in the day. 

I love this stuff @allmc2008 Thank you so much for sharing. 

I am surprised she loved working with Jack Smith. I still blame him for ruining the show (for me anyway)

Some things I would love to know

Has she ever talked about what happened with Brenda D?

Did Bill Bell consider her a co-HW as far back as the 70's or was that just what she was unofficially? Did they even have official titles for the writers in-house? 

Was Terry Lester right in saying Sally Sussman was largely responsible for the Abbott storyline push in the 80's?