BetterForgotten

Too bad, as I’ve never cared for JE in any soap role after Beth. Though, I did like Beth Chamberlin and thought she did her best with some pretty terrible and offensive material.

Beverlee herself said Rauch tried to bring her back (she was obviously one of his faves at AW/Texas), but she was over the gruel of doing daytime by then and had settled on the west coast enjoying retirement (she did that dayplayer part on GH in ‘94 to keep her health insurance).

Bev was no-nonsense, yet she seemed very nurturing of her scene partners, particularly those young and starting out.

Zimmer and Watros definitely had some type of love/hate relationship going on. Zimmer did admit she was a bit jealous at one point, and she wasn't happy that Reva sometimes came off as an idiot in the story with Annie. Not sure about LW, but LW should be grateful she got to play Zimmer's sister for so long. Her work has definitely been very inspired by Ms. Zimmer.

Lemay was fond of JFP and she even hired him to consult at OLTL when she had become de facto head writer there before Megan McTavish was hired... Not sure she listened to any of his ideas though, but he did like her...

Add Rachel Miner into that group too.

I'm kinda surprised some loser fan didn't ask Maeve what's it like to be Meryl Streep's sister-in-law. 😄

Oh, make no mistake, Linda Dano by all accounts brought a lot of morale to that set and was very much doing her best to keep spirits up there during some crazy times.

BJL would be nice to hear from, but can't say I care about the others or that era of the show...

Aw, they talked briefly about Robert Calhoun and imitations about it. I didn't know Kathleen Widdoes played Maeve's mother on AW.

Bev always said she didn't want to play Iris again or commute to Brooklyn where AW was taped, but I wonder if there were other issues she didn't speak to as to why she wouldn't return to AW (granted she was still in the P&G family at the time at GL). I've always wondered how she and VW got on in real life.

Really weird, contrast that to Douglas Watson and Beverlee McKinsey - everyone always talked about how nurturing and polite they were. In McKinsey's case, she also had that reputation on GL with the younger cast. But whatever, not everyone is going to be a nice person to work with in any environment. It's just that in the entertainment business, that reputation will follow you and haunt you forever.

VW has openly said that she had kids to send to college and it was steady work, so that's why she stayed so long.

Of the NYC-produced soaps, it was said ANOTHER WORLD had the biggest soundstage (and actually second biggest soundstage in daytime after DAYS). I guess that makes sense, AW’s sets and directing (in the 70’s at least) has always stood out from the other P&G soaps or other soaps shot in NYC. Of course ATWT later moved to that studio when AW was cancelled, but by that point the soaps no longer had the same kind of budget they used to have.

But you know what, it was always going to be struggle for any show/soap to continue to center a show around an aging woman. It was bizarre to write out so much of Jo's family, but Jo as the continual centerpiece always seemed very non-sustainable to me.

I’d so love to see more of Jennifer’s descent into madness. There is a real authentic quality to Morgan’s performances in the SFT clips available, and it’s not overly consumed by camp or glamor like her other roles.

Nothing B&E ever wrote had much depth. Sydney was essentially just a string of catty/cheap one-liners. A few years ago, some of Morgan's work on SFT was up - she was really amazing on that soap.

Well, it's been rumored for years that the cast treated poor Morgan Fairchild horribly and were terribly jealous of the special amenities allotted to her in her contract. They would have never gotten away with that sh!t with an ABC Daytime superstar like Lucci.

And Jane Elliott herself was a producer on Loving during its last years! I would have sent Debi and Darnell back to AMC the first chance I got, but then again, maybe it's a good thing they weren't there for McTavish's second stint...

Labine had also created a version without a GH connection called Union Place, which was pitched to NBC, but they opted for Sunset Beach instead.

Or just give Claire Labine that NYC-centered soap she tried so hard to get of the ground after her GH stint came to an end. It would've been canceled anyway, but I would think it would have at least been more compelling than what we got with THE CITY (or during Labine's OLTL stint).

I personally thought Peluso's best work was on Loving, though, I know a lot of people seemed to think that's AW.

Agnes also started focusing on projects outside of daytime by the mid-80’s and returned in some capacity to AMC in the late 80’s when it was in a bit of a creative turmoil. When she left OLTL, she has mentored Gordon Russel and fully supported him to step in and creatively guide the show, the same with Wiser Washam at AMC. At Loving, there didn’t seem to be that foresight or much of a plan after Marland left. True, it was a much newer show, but it certainly coasted for such a long time. Perhaps her heart wasn’t fully in it, despite her business interests in it?

One has to wonder why this show was managed so poorly behind the scenes. Unlike her other soaps, Agnes Nixon maintained ownership of Loving, it was never owned by ABC outright. Either she didn’t have the business acumen to manage a business operation on her own, or she wasn’t equipped to manage against network interference. Even for daytime, the BTS turnover on a soap that lasted just 12 years was excessive. I wonder if we’ll ever know the full story. I remember when Laura Wright first went over to GL in 1997. She said she was shocked at how much better the morale and working conditions were on GL vs. Loving/The City (even though it was more work to do a hour long soap than a half-hour one).