applcin

Saw Ronn Moss (B&B) on an Italian talk show "Verissimo" today (taped 10/30, I believe). I've never watched that soap but he said that he left a decade ago partly because he'd been in a car accident with his wife and the head injury left him having a problem memorizing his lines. He also wanted to concentrate on music. He misses the people from the show but not the grind but, overall, said it was a happy time and he's proud of it.

 

https://popculture.com/celebrity/news/richard-dick-evans-prolific-tv-actor-dead-at-86/

R.I.P. Richard Evans. Coincidentally, he starred in the same Star Trek episode as Patrick Horgan, who we lost this month as well.

Killing off little BJ Jones on GH and giving her heart to Maxie. She'd been played by Brighton Hertford since she was a baby to about age 7. It was heart-wrenching all around...Tony losing his (and late wife Tania's) only child and making the decision to give her heart to his niece. The effect it had on the Jones clan. I thought that was Brad Maule's finest work.

When she married her OLTL costar, Melissa Gallo changed to Melissa Fumero.

 

1 hour ago, Nicholas Blair said:

Some of you probably recall that Nana Visitor got her last name by playing a character called Georgina Visitor on OLTL. Wiki says her name was originally Nana Tucker, but I had the vague impression that she had used Nancy as her first name. I also have a vague recollection that she and Steve Fletcher were a couple around that time, and that he briefly changed his credit to--was it Steve Blizzard or something like that?--before changing it back to Fletcher.

Nana went by Nana Tucker, her given name, while she was on Ryan's Hope. There she played Nancy Feldman, which may be why you're thinking of the name Nancy. Her OLTL character was Georgina Whitman. The name Visitor came from somewhere in her mother's family. I don't know about a relationship with SF, but while on RH, she was living with co-star Richard Muenz (Joe Novak).

Tyler Christopher (GH) started out as Tyler Baker.
 

Aw, I saw him in concert some 20-25 years ago. He brought out his son Beau, who was a little boy then. Jay even cracked a joke about having an "effing stroke" on stage (because he was overweight). But he could still belt it out, especially "Cara Mia."

https://www.npr.org/2021/10/24/1048839862/jay-black-lead-singer-of-pop-group-the-americans-dies-at-82
 

R.I.P. Joanna Cameron, best remembered as the heroine, Isis, on Saturday morning tv in the 1970s.

https://comicbook.com/dc/news/joanna-camerona-secrets-isis-dead-at-70/

I mentioned this in "The Doctors" topic but I think it deserves a mention here, too, with the longevity of his career.
 

As the blind Lou Grant

35 minutes ago, amybrickwallace said:

Well...that was also before the internet and these misinformation wars. Still...you'd think people on the whole would be smarter than this. 

Also before the deep-seated mistrust of government...not that it hasn't to some degree been earned during these decades but I truly don't think, despite people like Mitch McConnell, that's there's some government plot to commit American genocide (even among political divides) or that Andrew Cuomo put restrictions in place because he was trying to be Il Duce of NYS.

Honestly, I don't think I've ever believed that people were smarter than this...or smarter now than in the past, at least not in basic nature. I've been of the opinion that, yes, we've made amazing technological and medical advances but basic human wants and fears that ultimately drive people....nah, that hasn't changed. (And certain people throughout history, both distant and recent, not only recognize but exploit this.) The costumes, props and sets have changed over the centuries but greed, fear of differences, self above others...always there. As nice as Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek vision was and how hopeful it painted things in terms of mankind overcoming its baser instincts, I fear human nature will turn things more dystopian.

 

1 hour ago, Ponds said:

I have to agree about social media, in fact, that's the reason I don't have a Facebook, Twitter or any of the other accounts out there.  I'm actually amazed that I post here...LOL!

I do have Facebook but, unlike many, I started it to play some games and find pages of entertainment interest, not to engage with anybody I know IRL. I limit my interaction to sites of personal interest where the administrators usually keep things friendly, on topic, and they ban trolls or people who get rude. I don't normally post in the "heavier" topics on this board but I felt like I needed a place to share what I saw and heard today. I mean, that was one person's reaction but it was among one of the more extreme ones I've seen in someone I know personally.

Today I was witness to an exchange between my 65ish neighbor, who recently returned from her annual 4-month visit to her hometown in Croatia, and her married daughter. The daughter is a teacher here in NYC who is currently in the early part of a year-long maternity leave. There's a mandate here that public school staff must get vaccinated. So the mother began yelling that the vaccine is dangerous, she doesn't want her daughter to get it, etc. Lots of yelling. The daughter's husband left, saying something like "go ahead and be a liberal wussy (substitute a p) and bend over."

Shortly after, the neighbor on the other side of me (who is a different brand of crazy but that's a whole other litany of stories), yells a greeting across my yard to them and the mother mentions that they were yelling about the vaccine. Well, he's in the funeral business and he got his vaccine back in December. So she tells him that she believes it's all bs, that "they're trying to kill us all by giving us COVID in the vaccine." She went on to say that her sister and cousin got the vaccine and both got COVID whereas she got neither. He mentioned that his vaccinated mother (who's in her 70s) got COVID (upon which the neighbor thought she had made a point to him) but he said he believed his mother would be dead now without it. They debated a bit more about it, he made a comment to her to then at least build up her immune system and always wear a mask (not exactly advice he totally follows himself but hey, in this case, he tried). Later on, I heard her say that people are so stupid. Meanwhile, yesterday I streamed my mother's church mass for her and there's the neighbor, maskless amid a sea of masked people.

As it happened, when I got my first dose back in March, she and her husband saw me at the place. A day or two afterwards, she started a conversation with me about it, where she told me she didn't believe in it but to each his own and her husband was possibly looking into getting the J & J one. Her husband jokingly asked me if I felt like Rambo, to which I replied, "No, but I might turn into a Borg."

Meanwhile, the neighbor next to her, who is also in her 60s, talks about having had COVID over a year ago because her doctor found antibodies and he then apparently told her she doesn't need a shot. As it happened, about a week ago she, too, had a conversation with the funeral dude, who told her she should get the shot but she adamantly refuses. She also seems to have some cultural or political bias about it because she comes from Poland, and she has said that she knows what it's like to come from Communist rule and that's what these politicians are trying to do, etc. and that it's all bs. Apparently, her lawyer-daughter and son-in-law told her early on about doctors inflating the numbers.

Let's just say I usually try to avoid or cut short these kinds of conversations. Don't want to give it the energy.

 

I just mentioned this in another topic but I think the 1991 Dark Shadows reboot got doomed by coverage of the Gulf War. As someone who hadn't seen the original show and could only experience this series on its own with no frame of reference, I really enjoyed it. I like the genre anyway. Plus they had a decent cast, with veterans like Roy Thinnes and Jean Simmons and they were using some familiar NBC soap actors of that era, like Michael T. Weiss and Joanna Going. I enjoyed Ben Cross' portrayal as well.

I wish, at the very least, that it could have ended with some resolution instead of a cliffhanger. I would've liked to see what transpired between Vicky and Barnabas once she knew what he was and he knew that she knew.

I think there are so many variables and questions, some of which others here (esp. DD) have mentioned, when it comes to the idea of reboots that it's hard for me to blanketly say yay or nay. It would depend largely on which soap, who's the target audience, how/where/when would they be shown, are they trying to replicate the original, continue with the "next generation" or telling new stories with new actors in old roles?

The 1991 Dark Shadows reboot was actually my first experience ever with DS, and, I suspect, of quite a few younger people like myself back then who hadn't had access to the original. Here was a reboot of a daily daytime soap turned into a weekly nighttime one. The characters and storylines were recreated, although the stories were vastly streamlined to fit the weekly model. Plus, there was also the need to adapt certain elements from the 60s to the 90s, or ditch them altogether. It had a successful start and I think of the show as a "what might have been" situation as it seemed more that outside circumstances (the Gulf War, preemptions, etc.) killed it rather than lack of interest. I believe it could have been a really good series with multiple seasons. I think another reboot could also work again today if the right elements are there to make it appealing to enough people.

I think another "niche" type soap like The Edge of Night could have a chance as well and could be written as a weekly, particularly if they maintain the theme of mystery and film-noir type storylines. At this point, it's been out of sight (save for any interested people who might want to look for it online) for so long that it could be reimagined. With the majority of the mainstream daytime soaps, though, I think they'd have to be so changed, adapted, refocused, etc., that they might only have the show name or some character names in common and not much else...which then begs questions like who are they doing it for and why not just create a new product? The PP reboots of AMC and OLTL failed so miserably, I believe, because a) they desired a demo that wasn't interested in "Grandma's story"; b) they were essentially cut off from that Grandma audience that didn't follow them online or didn't have the tech savvy to do so; and c) whether by actor/character glaring absences, storylines, less censorship and so on, these were not the same shows people had loved. The daytime soaps that are still on, and those that went before them, have that loyal audience that sees them every day, knows when to watch, record, stream, etc. But if one attempts to adapt them to a more modern schedule, put them on cable, show them with far less frequency and maybe even a year or more between seasons, they would die quick deaths, I think.

Given how long tv and film have been around, it's pretty hard nowadays to find something that isn't either a remake or a derivative of something else. There's a lot of re-purposing the old things to make them appealing to younger generations. Understandable in one way and kind of sad in another. Something that I appreciated about growing up in the 70s was that, while there were a lot less tv stations, those stations were broader in their content. On one channel you could see modern shows, classic shows (and films), documentaries, music videos (old and new)...we were exposed to a wider variety of content and history because it was there in front of us and there weren't as many options. Nowadays, you have to search harder for a particular type of show or genre amidst the morass, meaning you have to already have either some awareness of it or interest in the genre. Reboots may or may not stand alone on their merits--with people either remaining unaware or unexposed to the original-- or they may spark an interest in what came before. I think most reboots now would fall into the former situation--created mainly for a new audience who would see it as a brand new "world"--and not really for the classic viewer who wants to revisit something familiar.

R.I.P. Eddie Paskey, one of the most familiar faces/supporting players in the original Star Trek as Lt. Leslie.
 

I was today years old when I found out that this character from ST:TNG's "Who Watches The Watchers" is KLS.  I wasn't (and am not) really familiar with her career so, before watching DS, her name wouldn't have rung any bells with me. Rewatching the episode tonight, I decided to check on the actress' name and now I'm like, whoa, that's Maggie Evans, lol.

I'm at the point now where Nicholas has caused Angelique to become human and die. I'm glad for the end of that story, even if not permanent. I needed a break. Then again, now there's mustache-twirling Nicholas running amok. It's amazing how many characters end up back-burnered or on the periphery as they focus on the story of the moment. Elizabeth, David, Roger, Maggie, Joe, Vicky, JeffPeter. I guess Joan Bennett must have had time off at this point since Liz is institutionalized.

I wasn't surprised by Sam Evans' death since I was a little bit spoiler-ed with that one. Talk about peripheral. He had barely anything to do since the initial story of Burke coming to town for revenge. 

So Nicholas encourages Adam to be a brute, knowing it will alienate Carolyn. Sure, it was a good idea to hide him in a house full of nosey people, lol. I have to kind of chuckle when Adam laments about being ugly...at this point in time, I think Robert Rodan is the handsomest actor on the show...actually, probably the best-looking one I've seen so far, lol.  And I find him somewhat similar to Joel Crothers; in fact, I was having some trouble telling them apart while Adam was skulking around the woods. Stokes has just told Adam he was created.(Funny how many people knew where Adam was except the two responsible for his existence.) And now, Adam wants Barnabas to create him a woman. Cue The Bride of Frankenstein. 


 

Just to clarify, for anyone who may consider getting it, TD is the only premium/paying content on that channel. Everything else is free. So if you pay, you're paying to watch only TD.

18 minutes ago, Liberty City said:

Is it available to watch online from the very beginning, or has that passed already?

It's available through itsrealgoodtv.com. It's part of their premium content and a subscription costs about $30 annually. Everything they've digitized so far is on there. They also have an app on several streaming devices. I watch TD through the app on my Roku. I'm up to mid-1972 at the moment.

I'm up to June 1968 now. Professor Stokes has just interfered in the dream curse by controlling his dream. It's funny, I was kind of glad to see the end of Matthew Morgan and only started to appreciate Thayer David when he played Ben Stokes. Now that I'm seeing him as the professor, I'm finding him one of the more interesting actors in the cast to watch. I've come to appreciate his range.

This is also the Adam period. I have to say that, and I may be in the minority, even though I find it cringey at many times, and such a blatant Frankenstein ripoff (right down to Adam interacting with both a child and a blind man), I don't completely hate it, esp. since Lang is out of the picture.

Again, I may be in the minority, but I'm not into the ongoing Angelique/Cassandra story involving constant one-upmanship back and forth. I was really hoping she'd die when her portrait was aged. I'm pretty tired of her. And the dream thing? At the time after Stokes' dream, Joe said it was about a week since Maggie had hers. All those weeks of story, with one dreamer after another blathering on and on about it and it all happened in a week their time? So that means Adam escaped 3-4 times in a few days? Maggie must exist in a time warp, just like when she was presumed dead for "two weeks."

Episode 510: LOL at Thayer David coming into the shot during the end credits where it seemed like the cameraman alerted him and he beat a hasty retreat.

Not crazy about the Dr. Frankenstein/Lang story and I find the actor, Addison Powell, a bit of a chore to watch. He's so over the top (which says something with this cast, lol) he puts Colin Clive to shame, plus his reading of the cue cards is so obvious. It's funny, watching DS and The Doctors simultaneously, to see how more obvious the DS actors are with the cue cards and how David Henesy seems to act circles around some of the adults.

Now that we have Dracula and Frankenstein and a witch, is the Wolf Man not too far behind?

Between Barnabas, Angelique and Julia, pretty soon all of the characters will have been under some form of mind control at some point. Not to mention they all seem to "fall under" within seconds.

Wow, in the span of a day, Julia and Barnabas visit Willie, she "evaluates" him, gets him discharged and they bring him home.  Now that Barnabas' "influence" due to his semi-transformation has lifted, it's a bit bizarre how nobody questions their own actions. Like Vicky doesn't think "what the heck was I doing eloping with Barnabas?"  Or Carolyn not going "why did I spend so much time focusing on Barnabas?" Apparently, they are somewhat aware of what they did but don't question it, particularly Carolyn, who got to see Barnabas in action so much. Then again, Vicky, who refused to accept Burke's death, immediately fell in love with her warden. The pacing of this show is so weird. Certain things get played out a long time and others get rushed ridiculously fast.

So...at this point, it seems we are to think that Jeff is Peter in some form, either brought to the present, reincarnated, whatever, to explain the resemblance. But then, no explanation is given for Maggie/Josette, Joe/Nathan, etc. When you're backburnered, I guess it doesn't matter much!

 

I made it to the end of the 1795 story. Admittedly, I did ff at times...once I got the gist of certain scenes, a lot of Trask, Abigail, Millicent, Nathan stuff seemed redundant to me. As mentioned, I did particularly enjoy Thayer David during this story. Joel Crothers made me get Miles Cavanaugh off my brain. And I really liked the work Louis Edmonds did from the point Joshua discovered Barnabas in the coffin. After experiencing frontburner Roger, backburner Roger and Roger on steroids (aka Joshua), seeing him play a tortured father agonizing over what he knew and what he would do about it...experiencing so much tragedy and horror, I really enjoyed watching Joshua in the last weeks of the storyline. LE was great in those scenes, even if I couldn't entirely buy actors nearly the same age as father and son.

I also enjoyed the way things were depicted in the past to explain the present: the altered parts of the Collins family history at Joshua's decision, how Barnabas ended up chained in his coffin, the significance of his ring and Josette's music box, the reason Josette killed herself. Although, in the present, Barnabas seemed to express hatred for Jeremiah but, in the past, he ended up more rueful than hateful over him once he knew why things happened the way they did.

Since I had seen the revival series, I expected the buildup to the resolution of 1795 would essentially play out the same, such as Victoria's relationship with Peter and her being transported at the moment of hanging. The big difference so far is that the 1991 series ended with Victoria having learned Barnabas' secret in the past and reacting to him with fear when she returned to the present, while in this series Vicky doesn't know his secret, at least not in a definitive way. 

So Julia got a haircut and, unlike Samson, seems to have gotten some fortitude back. 

Okay...Professor Stokes? LOL, love it. He "cleaned up." 
 

13 hours ago, jam6242 said:

When Robert Gerringer was replaced as Woodard, there was a strike going on against ABC by members of the union for the technical crew.  Gerringer refused to cross the picket line.

Yes, I knew about that. But I was under the impression that the 3rd actor to play him (Peter Turgeon?) alive didn't play him as a ghost but I think I'm mistaken in that. Still, with Jeremiah, it was a bit jarring. I figured, when they had him laid up with his face bandaged, that it was no longer AG and I was like, he got shot in the face???

Thanks for the responses everybody. I did a fair amount of DS binging this weekend and I think I'm nearing the finish line of the 1795 story...Trask has just shown Forbes the dead Maud in his room. I'm ready for this period to be over and to return to the present soon. It's been a little too drawn out, I think.

As for Thayer David, yes his re-appearance was a surprise to me but, I must say, I'm enjoying him more so this time around as Ben. I also never realized he was the fight promotor in Rocky but, then again, I didn't know who he was til I started watching DS. He looked different "cleaned up", lol. I looked him up on imdb and I think I've probably seen him in other primetime guest spots.

I do imagine, with this having been a NYC-based show, and so many of the actors disappearing for extended periods, that they were accommodated for other jobs, theater work, etc. Even the way the show is acted and produced is very theater-like and it's been interesting to notice which actors have done better than others with dialogue, less obvious reading of the cards, looking at the camera and so forth. 

I guess the present-day Collins' descendants came from Millicent and/or Daniel, since Naomi & Joshua's kids are both dead.

I did watch the 1991 tv revival, my first experience with DS, and I have some vague memories of it, particularly now associating the latter-day actors with their 1960s counterparts. I also remember that show's finale when Victoria returned from 1795 with certain knowledge and am kind of curious to see how it plays out with the original, particularly as it won't be a finale. Unfortunately, the revamp never got the chance to play out the ramifications of Vicky's "trip." I am kind of curious if there might be a dream element to it, mostly because I'm wondering if the "you look exactly like so and so" aspect with the entire family will come into play, or whether the viewers were basically just supposed to ignore it and take it as the show having a small cast and reusing actors...although they did the same thing in the 1991 version.

 

I'm watching the series for the first time and am currently up to the 1795 story, where Barnabas is set to marry Angelique and Naomi has just gifted them the old house. Something that's had me curious is why, when they kill off characters and then have them come back as ghosts, they use different actors to be the ghosts? I mean Dave Woodard and Jeremiah Collins; in the latter case, they actually used 2 actors, one to be the zombie and one to speak for him. Why didn't they just continue to use Anthony George? Did he become unavailable or was it cheaper the other way?