DramatistDreamer

Newsmakers from a few years ago, I remember them. Also, I prefer this greeting much more than a handshake.

Personally, I agree. I do think that they all probably believe that they are protecting the bottom line (although most are unlikely to admit this). Of course, protecting the bottom line is arguably what led to daytime soaps falling into the dire state that they're currently in.

That's a possibility but it's very likely that they never intended to keep the story up, knowing how dependent they are on Sony's and CBS talent and insiders for their blog's content. THR, Variety and Deadline, otoh, are not reliant on that whole soapdom for their existence and reportage. CBS, and Sony/Y&R, in fact are much more dependent on those major media outlets to help them maintain some kind of relevance. This is why, if this story is to have any type of continuity in the follow-up, it will be up to those major entertainment media outlets to follow up on the story, not the soapcentric media.

Not especially surprised that the soap media has mostly remained mum about this. CBS looks to be hoping that the story will just fade. Morons is not Moonves, after all. It's really up to the mainstream media to keep agitating and pursue the story since the Fairmans are much too intertwined with the CBS/Sony/soapdom brass to be critical. EDT-Oops, I meant Morina, but I am not mad at auto-correct, for once.

Has anyone read the Demi Moore memoir Inside Out? I've been listening to the audiobook and am currently on the section where she talks about her time auditioning and acting on General Hospital. Distinctive ways of speech, like hers, were meant for audiobooks.

There is a surprising amount of politics at play in the arts and entertainment field, tbh. And television seems to inspire the worst use of this impulse, judging from my brief time freelancing in television.

Thanks for this video @slick jones, this was very enlightening. You know, I have heard of "Your Arms Are Too Short To Box With God" yet I have never seen it. Unfortunately, I am not familiar with her soap work either. Are there any videos of her work on YouTube? (Okay, reading about the show history, it ran until 1982, that's why I have never seen it.) It sounds like she built up quite a legacy.

One thing that I have learned from having to critique people's work, in the past, even in person, face to face, during writing workshops, is that you should lead with a positive comment first. I would say "I appreciate the fact that you started these virtual reunions during a time when there is so much anxiety and people are looking for comfort". Then I would say "I like that you're using clips of scenes from these soaps that the guests can comment on", then I would suggest that he'd probably be great at focusing on producing the show and working with a host, he could likely do even more.

When SoapClassics released their P&G soaps boxes sets, I always wished they'd had kept going on the hope that someday they could've included bonus material like commentary from writers, directors and some long-time actors on certain scenes. In my experience, execs are usually not going to explain any choices they make, particularly the ones that go awry. Some may see it as an admission of some type of personal character failing, others simply lack any type of self-awareness. Others will just lie.

I don't watch CNN or any cable news (every now and then I will see something that piques my interest on their Twitter pages, but I generally avoid "talking heads") and what I will watch is mostly PBS. Cable news is a wasteland. Some major newspapers are nearly as bad, except for sections where you can still find decent quality reporting (e.g. NYT Metro).

This is one of the many reasons why I will never stop believing that these daytime soaps need a change in structure if they are ever going to slow the deterioration of their serials. They have proven in so many ways that they are no longer capable of sustaining a show that is well produced, well written or well performed at this pace, at their current budget. It's open for debate which model would be optimal, whether the running times ought to be reduced from sixty minutes to thirty minutes, whether the number of days per week ought to be reduced, or have a episode load similar to telenovelas, with a hiatus. I don't know what is the best model, although I can speculate, like everyone else. It just seems as if the current model just doesn't seem to be working, to put it mildly. And oh, replacement for some of these key production and executive staff needs to be part of those changes. As a creative, I care less about threadbare sets, than the quality of writing and performance. If those aren't there consistently, neither will I be, as a viewer.

I was watching the reunion upload with Carolyn Ann Clark and Kristen Vigard and although I thought the two were entertaining, I burst out laughing and thought of this conversation when I heard him say this.

Andy makes several good points here. If you're going to grill players, do it across the board. Don't just pick certain players and leave others.

Has anyone seen the documentary that's airing/streaming on PBS called Broadway: Beyond The Golden Age? It's got a number of former soap stars and some actors who have appeared on soaps like Alec Baldwin, Kelly Bishop, Denise Pence and some others. It's a decent documentary, I liked seeing the archival footage but there were some aspects that were missing, imo. Perhaps those aspects are included in the other installments-- this was the second in a trilogy. I haven't seen the first and I am not sure when or if the final one will be released.

Unfortunately, it's not just Twitter. Many of the largest newspapers have been relentless in the "what if" style of reportage. Even glancing at the newspapers (I rarely watch television news that's not hyper local) the coverage of Afghanistan is breathless reportage of every single aspect, including minutiae). I mostly skip those headlines. Needless to say it takes a lot less time to read the newspapers these days. The media needs to be more diligent in trying to better inform people against misinformation, which is a 'battle' that is being lost in real time.

Have to admit that I was always skeptical of this group, due to its 'top-down' hierarchy. I know that a grassroots organization would be unlikely to get as much attention in the beginning, but it would have been more likely to get more credibility and just maybe have avoided these traps, at least in the beginning. A grassroots structure with perhaps some support from prominent women might have prevented this, because when you place the well-heeled and the well-connected in these positions of power, you are likely to have problems, especially when it comes to other well-connected and well-heeled people being the focus of investigations and scrutiny. Someone posted a link this article, in a nifty non-paywall format.

On 8/10/2021 at 7:31 AM, DramatistDreamer said: There was a reason why I soured on the "Times Up" group. Like many advocacy groups, most fall away from the essential mission, especially when they can align themselves with the nexus of power. The people who are in most in need of help, don't get the help.

When were things in Afghanistan ever going successfully? I have been asking for over a decade.

They've been saying this for the past few days. Apparently, Tsitsipas has been using his phone at certain times during matches? Don't know how he's getting away with this, if true. That's why I was making fun with the E.T./Tsitsi "phone home" GIF.

There never seemed to be anything negative between VR and SC. (MS and VR is an entirely different story). VR and SC have each tweeted very complementary things of each other in the past. Has there been a new development between them?

They're taking turns imploding in this match.

Zverev and his non-volleying a$s is still leading this match. Stef phone home.

JMO but Y&R being the #1 daytime drama for so many years hasn't really been a good thing.

I doubt we will ever truly know why Ji-Min was dumped as a character, especially seeing that Eric Steinberg had leading man potential written all over him. It makes me wonder whether it could have been racist viewers writing in to express their displeasure, but since I have never heard that being said, it makes me wonder whether some other cast member with more seniority might have felt threatened by the charisma and sex appeal that Steinberg exuded and perhaps that cast member feared he might be displaced. Even when Ji-Min was on the canvas, I had never had hopes that tptb would ever have built a family around him, he was presented as a pretty singular character. When Ravi was on the show, some people liked to suggest that he was boring, the way they usually do whenever any male character of color is on Y&R, without considering the fact that the character is almost always underwritten, with little to no actual story written for him. There was a South Asian family on OLTL (briefly) and I really enjoyed Shenaz Treasurywala, as well as her co-star, Nik Choksi (who I found to be adorable), and in my writer's brain, I imagined not only the scenes that Abhi and Shenaz could have at the time, but also the dynamic that could have been had the sister and Ashley locked horns, when Ashley was mixing business with pleasure with Ravi.