BetterForgotten

Honestly, other than moving a few pieces around and a change in the day to day writing, I do wonder how much control PM/EK really have in the writing. 

I know PM didn’t put up with interference/mandates from past jobs. But I also need to consider he’s older now, and may need health insurance or something, lol. The show feels like, for the most part, that everyone is happy with the status quo and whatever changes are being made feels more like window dressing rather than trying to correct systemic issues that have plagued the show for a long  time. I am desperately waiting for a big burst of new energy that still has yet to come 2 months into this regime. It almost feels like TPTB decided PM/EK would just provide more gloss over the typical material they continue to dish out, and expected just that. 

I know that old adage of giving things more time, but 2 months in, and I still feel something about this show is as half baked as ever with this regime. I am struggling to find what the true vision is here - and to @Khan’s point, part of that definitely lies with FV as the EP. 

34 minutes ago, John said:

Could Roy DeLuca be Blaze's Dad????

And Melissa Bedford is her real mother, Natalia is overprotective because she stole Blaze at birth and doesn’t want to get caught….

It definitely started in the late 90’s when Maurice returned after his first stint. 

As bad as it was, JFP’s first year did start to explore other parts of the canvas again. It was all just terrible and used to push her FOJ’s, per usual. 

12 minutes ago, Contessa Donatella said:

I'm pretty sure Kraze is here to stay, so, wishing & hoping for Blaze to be gone is likely a waste. 

Nothing is set in stone for a recurring player like Blaze just because you have a fan bias for it, Donna. 

I keep forgetting Luke is related to Bill Eckert and wasn’t just a random lookalike, lol

If Ava murders Natalia and Blaze, I would be happy. 

I’m not sure why they’re chem testing Sonny and Natalia and giving them all these intimate scenes talking about their families. Would only work if Natalia is secretly a mob Queen and secretly pulling the strings behind Pikeman. But I seriously doubt that’s the plan. 

Natalia’s one-note, controlling ass, is such a drag to watch. Please write this character out now. 

So Natalia also has a son? 

Please do not build up more of this family, PM/EK! 

10 minutes ago, carolineg said:

He's teaching Aiden more baking skills obviously

And he’s bisexual, caught in a triangle with mother (Liz) and son (recently aged up and legal Aiden, lol). 

6 minutes ago, Khan said:

Oh, he's in town alright!  He's working for Pikeman.   

I heard he’s going to be Sasha’s sous chef at the Quartermaine mansion. 

Is Dante the next one to randomly change jobs now? 

These surveys went out before Latham, MAB, and I think Mal all got fired in the past. Let’s hope history repeats itself and it’s a sign! 

5 minutes ago, Faulkner said:

I just saw on Reddit that people are receiving Y&R surveys again. Usually a sign of something:

https://www.reddit.com/r/youngandtherestless/s/fOUzFjmhL8

Every time one has gone out previously, the EP/HW was fired shortly after. Let's hope history repeats itself again, lol. 

1 hour ago, titan1978 said:

Shelly Curtis learned the right lessons from her showrunners. I would welcome her back in any capacity to GH.

Wendy Riche herself has said Shelley was her right hand, as she had no previous experience producing soaps, and having Shelley’s support and expertise meant the world.

Shelley credits Gloria Monty for teaching her how to produce love scenes with passion and how to edit them successfully. For those that haven’t seen, it begins like 13:37 in:

6 hours ago, Vee said:

What is she doing these days? I am reminded of when Ginger Smith and Jennifer Pepperman were speedily promoted from within to run the PP soaps. I have no idea what Smith is up to now (she did a very good job with AMC 2.0) but Pepperman is now riding high producing for pro wrestling, which isn't far from soaps. Curtis is of course leagues above both.

She was directing at B&B before the pandemic hit, but stopped after they came back.

She’s still very close to her GH folks. Both Vanessa and Maurice hung out with her and Wendy Richie last year at Maurice’s birthday party and posted about it. This is from Vanessa’s Instagram post last year.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CpS9VeSvimE/?igsh=NjJ4ZGgzMHU4cm9s

3 hours ago, Khan said:

And I, for one, would like to know why.  Why does he always keep so many actors on the payroll, when there's only so much airtime and budget to play with?  Even his longtime mentor, Paul Rauch, wouldn't have thought twice before jettisoning large groups of characters, so why is FV different?  Does he hate to see anyone out of a job?

I'm hesitant these days to criticize any soap, for a number of reasons, but when it comes to this show and to this producer...?  I'm sorry, I think it's great that FV is, by all accounts, a terrific guy to work for/with - not to mention, he IS rather easy on the eyes, lol - but I just don't understand him as a producer.  More specifically, I don't understand his vision, or know if he even HAS a vision (beyond sluggish storylines and bloated casts with bland leads and overly precocious child actors). 

Like another poster said, he keeps the trains moving on schedule, but isn't there more to producing a daily, one-hour drama than that?  (If that's all it takes, then I nominate Mr. Conductor from "Shining Time Station"). I feel like there also needs to be some creative sense or verve on display and it just...isn't there. 

Even when Elizabeth Korte and Patrick Mulcahey write otherwise great scenes, they still lay like limp dicks on the screen, because FV has added nothing to the scenes besides turning the cameras on and off.  Yeah, it's true that "if it ain't on the page, it ain't on the stage," but you also need an Al Rabin or Robert Calhoun who can turn up the emotions in that scene to eleven.  A great or even good soap opera scene should kick down the [!@#$%^&*] doors like a rock star; but at best, a great or good scene on GH merely nudges you awake with its' elbow.

That's really what GH needs, I think: a leader - be it a HW, be it an EP, be it both - with an Elton John or Mick Jagger-like attitude to the work.  Someone who's gonna push and kick and bite off and tear down and give us balls-to-the-wall soap opera - even with no budget! - because they know that all the network can do to them is fire them.

Exactly, @Khan! That’s been the problem with this show (and all soaps tbh) for a long time. Shelley Curtis touched on this in her State of Mind interview with Maurice. Maurice tried to make an excuse about budgeting for soaps today, but Shelley wasn’t having it. She was clear that the people producing soaps today don’t know how to produce them with emotion and skill, and that shouldn’t take an extreme budget to do. What should be core scenes end up feeling like a deflated ballon. Soap producers today lack the basic understanding of how to milk the emotion and deep meaning out of scenes that need it when they’re tasked with translating them to the screen.

In an ideal world, Shelley would still be producing this show. She said everything in a few seconds that I had been thinking for years. She also really seems to love GH in particular. 

But, alas, we seem stuck with Frank “budget extraordinaire” Valentini…

This tour ended up being a big triumph for her - not just commercially, because her legacy and back catalogue alone ensures she can still draw crowds - but after her near death experience last year, she surprisingly has looked more healthier (even with a grueling worldwide touring schedule at the age of 65), and seems more appreciative of both her legacy (which she often ignored in the past) and of her fan support than ever. I’m glad I got to see her in NYC back in January. 

Many may have come before and after her, but she is the Queen of Pop, and I’m grateful she’s still around when so many of her Pop peers are not or are totally irrelevant at this point.

I can’t imagine my life had I not grown up with her or followed her for so many years. I don’t say that about many celebrities, but I often feel like I experienced so much of life and the world through following her for so long, as weird as that sounds. When so many pop stars were trying to sell a highly manufactured image that was foisted upon them by the industry that they couldn’t live up to, Madonna told us it was OK to be who you really are and that, “Everybody is a star. Everyone is special in their own way” as the lyrics to ‘Spotlight’ say.

Anyway, this Rio show was such a massive undertaking. I’m happy it was a success and she’s ending this tour, which is supposed to celebrate her 40 years in the industry, on a very high note.

And she made history, too!

Several regimes have neglected Liz or demoted her presence on the show. She’s essentially the new Amy Vining now, lol, only Liz has kids. 
 

I just want to see black folks represented for the complex and multifaceted people they are as much as any other race. Not the default best friend, thug, and steeped in condescension “goody” and sanitized town doctor or cop. 

26 minutes ago, Khan said:

Not necessarily!  After all, friends have been known to fall out.   

It will be interesting with Kent now having more direct oversight on Y&R and being Sony’s plant on the production team. Will this lead to a power struggle between him and his old friend Griffith? 
 

2 hours ago, titan1978 said:

I have no doubt he is a good boss to work for. I just think he’s a better manager that keeps the trains running than a creative EP. All the cast comments about him make me wonder what the hell JFP did all day. Because they all talk about how hands on he is on the floor and how it wasn’t that way before (the 80’s vets compare it to Monty’s eyes on everything).

Which is interesting, a lot of those people were Tweeting about how they’d miss Jill when she was fired, too. JFP is the type of producer that stuck her hands in everything, for better or worse. Or at least that was how she was before Frons came to ABC. 

Wendy Riche wasn’t “on the floor” a lot either. Technically, the EP is supposed to manage the entire production and deal with executive level matters, and subordinate producers are supposed to oversee the day to day “on the floor.” Riche had Shelley Curtis (who Riche called her “right hand”), and later Francesca James, Julie Hanan Carruthers, and Carol Scott largely doing that type of work.

Makes me wonder what the other producers on staff are doing if Frank is micromanaging the day to day on the floor. Frank also worked his way up in every production role at OLTL, so this may be part of his “style.”

4 minutes ago, TEdgeofNight said:

Mulcahey is NOT meant to be a headwriter! Dialogue writer, yes. Headwriter, NO!! The ratings are at all time lows with Mulcahey & Korte. Dull, boring May sweeps. 

Honestly, there were other problems at play, JFP’s ego was at an all time high, and he wasn’t to blame for everything that went wrong. But, GH right now is sort of reminiscent of Mulcahey’s brief HW-ing stint at GL in 1994. 

Much of the day to day writing can be thoughtful, but it’s low energy and the stories don’t really have much stakes to them.  It was more noticeable at GL because they had just come off some really great years, and Justin Deas was eating the show alive in a very aggressive way.  GH is different in that regard at least. 

I’m not sure we needed a whole sequence of Dex in his underwear trying on his cop uniform for the first time, other than Valentini wanting to her this actor in black boxer-briefs. 

Maurice’s acting and line recitation is especially bad today. 

2 minutes ago, dragonflies said:

So is he in charge of DAYS too since it's a SONY production, ?

I don't think so - Sony distributes and owns the distribution rights for DAYS, but Corday Productions is the owner and the official production company.

Y&R is considered a "co-production" between Sony and the Bell Dramatic Serial Company, with Sony owning the majority share. Sony also controls the distribution rights for Y&R.