Mona Kane Croft

I don't recall Pat's earlier murder trial being referenced during the Bernice Robinson murder plot. Perhaps it was, but I just don't remember it. Obviously Lemay was interested in Pat's history, because he revisited her experiences with Tom Baxter two different times in the mid to late-1970s: first with Marianne's abortion storyline, which echoed Pat's earlier abortion. And second, when Pat killed Greg Barnard during a flash-back to her killing Tom.

I remember when Stephanie intentionally burned-off her fingerprints in a hot frying pan. Yuck! But at least the show was believable during this period. And it had not yet become the Hope and Marlena show.

Great memory -- I had forgotten about Dennis's heart condition. I loved the Sven storyline, mostly because after years of watching, there was finally an identifiable plot on Another World. LOL. That storyline was one of the most compelling plots I've ever seen on any soap opera. But I think Lemay felt he had sold-out by penning that saga -- that Sven was one of those "outside forces" he had tried so hard to avoid writing. Sven came into the Cory household and caused trouble, rather than the Corys causing trouble for themselves. Lemay was embarassed by it, even though the audience adored it. And Sven's exploits brought Another World to number one in the ratings for only the second time in the show's history.

As most people know, Harding Lemay's writing style on Another World was to avoid the impact of outside forces on the characters, and to base his drama on inner conflict and each character's personality flaws. I've been thinking about how well he lived-up to his claim, and thought about things like car crashes, the weather, medical issues, etc. I watched AW during Lemay's entire eight-years, and can remember only two auto crashes (only one on-camera): first Walter Curtain's death in an on-camera car crash; and second, the death of Sally (Spencer) Frame's biological parents in a bus accident (off-camera). Regarding weather, I cannot remember any time the weather affected any of the action on AW during Lemay's tenure. Not even once. No rain, no storms, tornados, blizzards -- nothing. The characters did occasionally mention snow around Christmas time, but it never had any effect on the action. Lemay also avoided medical storylines for the most part. He did use fatal diseases to kill-off two characters, Cindy Clark Matthews and Theresa Lamont. But those were less plots, and more simply quick devices to get rid of two departing characters. Alice Frame's miscarriage and later inability to carry a child was important to Alice's story arc, but that is really the only time I can remember Lemay using medical drama on the show. Mary Matthews died of a heart attack, but that was hardly a medical based plot, because Mary died suddenly without warning, and never entered the hospital or saw a doctor. Can anyone else recall Lemay using auto accidents, the weather, or other medical drama on Another World? Anyone remember him using other types of outside forces to drive the action?

Has anyone mentioned Mike Marshall on Another World? His suicide was by shooting himself deliberately after he'd been cheated out of his fortune. In the lead-up to AW's spin-off, Texas in 1980, Mike's suicide took place on an episode of Another World, but all the characters in his orbit lived in Houston and became characters on Texas. Mike was never in Bay City and none of the Bay City characters had ever met him. After Mike's death, the remaining Marshalls became one of the core families on Texas.

Completed suicides on soaps are very rare. But there have been a few cases. I have heard about some of them, but cannot remember -- mostly because I was not watching those characters at the time, so didn't see the scenes myself. One I recall: Naomi Collins killed herself on Dark Shadows by drinking poison. I'm sure others posters will have a better memory than I do, and will add to the list.

The characters are: Vic Hastings, Lenore Curtain, Jim and Mary Matthews, Steve and Alice Frame, Rachel Clark, and Ada McGowan. I was watching at the time, but I have no idea why Rachel is laying on the floor and Ada appears to be praying for her. I don't recall Rachel being ill or anything during this period. I also do not recognize what object Vic Hastings is holding. It appears to be a TV remote or maybe a camera. Vic was on AW for a couple of years. He worked for Steve at Frame Enterprises. And I believe he ran the company while Steve was in prison. If my memory is correct, he dated Janice Frame and Lenore Curtain, and I believe he had a severe crush on Alice Frame.

Wow, that's very sad. Joan will never get the acclaim she deserves -- especially for her work on soaps. She was amazing as Andrea. Caused so much trouble for Jo.

When Vivian returned almost a decade ago, and plotted to bury Maggie alive, she had a man-servant that she referred to using an unusual title. Does anyone remember what she called him? I'm not asking his name, but by what title did Vivian refer to him?? It was some sort of antiquated phrase.

Lemay was actually very good at writing things he didn't want to write, and didn't actually like himself. So he should have forced himself to write stronger plots more often. The Sven storyline (probably Lemay's strongest plot on AW) brought AW to number one in the ratings, and had the audience mesmerized. Yet, he disliked that storyline immensely and said he was embarrassed he had written it. There were also several characters he disliked, yet wrote wonderful situations and dialogue for them. I've always felt Lemay was stubborn and didn't want to write anything he "didn't want to write." LOL. But he should have had more self discipline and realized he had the talent to be a far more diversified writer.

Yes, I believe the closest thing to business stories Lemay wrote at AW were when Tim McGowan embezzled most of Steve's money from Frame Enterprises while Steve was in prison; and later when Ray Gordon insisted Alice make him president of Frame Enterprises and then promptly bankrupted the company. Those were believable plots, I suppose. But not really what I would call business intrigue stories.

Great scenes. But this is rather confusing. There are two different weddings in these segments. During the apartment scenes, they are discussing Bill and Missy's wedding. And the cut-in dancing segments take place in Jim and Mary Matthews' livingroom. The later wedding in the large church is that of Lenore and Walter. And the later dancing segments are from Walter and Lenore's wedding reception. All of this was likely written by Agnes Nixon who created Ada, Rachel, Sam, and Lahoma and added the show's first working-class family to AW around 1967.

Interesting, because most people forget Marland had script writers who penned the dialogue for him on ATWT. Lemay at AW in the 1970s had a much smaller staff, and usually rewrote the dialogue his script writers had written. I did love Marland for his wonderful plots. They always had a beginning, middle, and end. And they seemed organic to the characters, even though they were often extremely strong and traditional soap opera plots. Marland obviously loved and embraced the soap opera genre. Conversely, Lemay rejected and disliked the genre he was writing for. I believe Lemay said he didn't like writing murder trials and medical stories. He did write a few murders on AW, but none of them were traditional murder mysteries. And only two had trials -- John Randolph (for killing Even Webster) and Pat Randolph (for killing Greg Barnard). Bernice Robinson and Rocky Olsen were also murdered, and there may have been a couple of other murders I have forgotten. But only two trials.

I agree. But I believe he has said that nearly anytime he wrote a strong plot on the show, it was because he was forced to by the network and P&G.

Most of the time, Lemay didn't even try to write plots. He wrote wonderful characters and put them in conflicts and situations, but seldom were there really identifiable plots/storylines -- at least not in the typical soap opera fashion. I remember being completely hooked on AW for all of Lemay's run as head-writer. But I often complained, "Nothing ever happens on this show!" What I didn't realize at the time was, I had fallen in love with the characters. They were almost like real people, experiencing believable problems. Lemay's Another World was so plotless, it could almost be considered an experimental soap opera. The show during that era is hard for me to describe in a way someone who hasn't seen it would understand. But seriously, characters just ran into one another and talked. Worked together and talked. Visited one another's homes and talked. Scene after scene after scene. The plots were nearly all extremely weak and at times almost non-existant.

I don't consider either of those romantic arcs (or Steve and Alice's) to have ended or begun with the first marriage. They began typically at the time each couple met, and continued in all cases until at least one of the actors in the couple left the show.

I respectfully disagree. I've always believed the long tortured romance was one of the things Lemay did better than almost anybody. He wrote arguably the best years of the Steve and Alice love story, created the Mac and Rachel romance which continued until Doug Watson's death, and don't forget about Robert and Lenore, who were nearly as popular as Steve/Alice until Susan Sullivan left the show. I do agree Lemay tried a lot of love stories, and gave up on them -- Willis/Angie, Russ/Gwen, Russ/Elena, Alice's romances after Steve, etc. But much of that tendency came from Lemay's over dependance upon "chemistry" between actors. He'd watch a couple of episodes featuring a new couple, and if he didn't sense chemistry, he would immediately break-up the couple and move on. But when he did see chemistry, he definitely knew how to write long romances that practically defined AW during his time at the show. Just my opinion.

Well, Lemay also said he thought Harney was a far superior actress to Courtney (give me a break!! LOL), so there's that. Plus, I think he did try romances with Harney -- three of them. But he just kept putting her with dull men. Lemay simply failed in that regard.

Rachel Davis was probably the best villainess ever on any soap opera, and of course she is not included in the list. This is really just a list of moustache-twirling super-villains (with a few exceptions). The youthful editors at SOD likely don't even remember old fashioned soap opera archetypal villains like Rachel, Liz Matthews, Lisa Hughes, John Dixon, Phil Brewer, etc.

Yes, I thought the Sally adoption storyline was quite good, and kept Rachel in Alice's orbit for another year or so after Steve's death. Lemay's writing was never heavy on storylines (plots) for anyone. But he did a very good job of giving Alice lots of airtime during Harney's time at AW. After Courtney left, Vicki Wyndham clearly became the young romantic lead (which had been Courtney for 7 or 8 years), but Lemay kept Alice extremely important to the show. And in my opinion, Harney's Alice was simply moved to number two, when Wyndham moved up to number one. One thing Lemay failed miserably at was giving Alice a new romance. Her first love interest after Steve's death was the boring loser, Ray Gordon. Next was another loser (if not boring), Willis Frame. And finally, Dan Shearer, who was not a loser, but certainly a boring love interest for the late-1970s. Lemay should have created a dynamic charismatic new character as Alice's new permanent love interest. But NOT another millionaire businessman like Steve and Mac. Perhaps a very successful doctor or lawyer, and perhaps played by a well known soap opera leading man stolen from another show. The lack of a dynamic post-Steve romance for Alice was Lemay's huge failing for the characters, and probably led to her leaving the show after Harney's first replacement was unsuccessful.

You are absolutely correct about this. It was the Alice/Willis romance plot that Courtney didn't like (and supposedly the final reason she was fired), but Courtney did not refuse the play the storyline, she just complained about it. Oddly -- despite that plot supposedly being the reason she was fired, Lemay delayed the romance and it did not play out until nearly 3-years after Courtney left the show. And guess what -- Courtney was right! The Alice/Willis romance (played by Harney and Russom) was awful and ended nearly as quickly as it began.

Anyone on this forum old enough to remember AW pre-Lemay Christmas day episodes? If so, please tell us what you remember . . .

Doug Marland planned to give Ellen more interesting things to do, after David died. Unfortunately Marland passed away before he got around to it. There was a budding romance with Ralph Mitchell (who had returned), just at the end of Marland's run, but the next set of writers dropped it.

For a variety of reasons, including the look on Rachel's face, I'd be this is Liz Matthews' house.

Does anyone recognize the set in this photo? I started watching AW in 1971, and I'm fairly certain this set was not used during the time I watched the show. So it must have been used prior to 1971. This is not Jim and Mary Matthews' house, but it might have been Liz Matthews' original house. That set was never used again after Liz left the show in early 1971. Anyone remember this set on Another World?