Vee

Well, that's cryptic.

I have often never understood why Diane looks down on anyone when she's spent decades eagerly defending the mob and luxuriating in her own brilliance. I think she used to do this even in the Guza era; fluff herself for how brilliant she was at getting Sonny and Jason off and then turn around and castigate them for their life choices. I could swear there was a point early on where she simply was who she was and did not care, but then came the speeches.

I don't. BW didn't name him and I assume he never aired.

I didn't listen as closely to the earlier portion so I don't know how much he discussed MW. He was very candid about having many ups and downs with Julie Pinson before they got married.

Before he began filming it, yes. He'd heard from an inside source he was to be killed off and tried to back out but was threatened with litigation. He claims he arrived on-set furious, but JFP took him aside and said it was going to be a fakeout and that they wanted him back on contract full time. BW says he ended up loving his material in '05 but still took the DAYS offer because of the money involved. I have my doubts any of the big promises they made him about A.J. would ever have materialized, but I am glad he enjoyed his final stint.

VP and Susan Howard had to be huge losses in and of themselves. They're two of the key things that keep me watching in various segments on FreeVee, not that I think Pam has ever measured up onscreen the same after the first season/miniseries. I've said it before and I think @DRW50 theorized it was because of the star salaries on Dallas, but I've always felt KL and its various sets and location shoots looked so much more beautiful and sweeping than the chintzy patio set and so on at the mothership. You put that pool and patio next to the Westfork ranch or Lotus Point on KL and it's no comparison.

As I think someone else mentioned, Barbara Bloom mandated they take him after the initial recast post-SK filmed for a week and didn't work out - she knew from DAYS and Baywatch that he could deliver. Riche and Guza took him because they were told to. It was good money and while he never liked the story he loved all the people he worked with, including Mo and Steve who he was close to and who he said hated beating up on him everyday lol. He was also very, very close with JI and Stuart Damon.

How many more years did they get with Bobby back? 3-5? That's not nothing for a cast and crew especially in those days, but the show suffered big losses with the women.

He said he got on there because he was a friend of the EP (LML, I presume).

I do think Sean Kanan's A.J. was sympathetic, especially in his initial return in 2012-13. Early on, at least, there was a clear investment in playing him with Michael, with Monica, with Elizabeth, with beloved characters like Brenda to rebuild the character in a positive way. They made a big deal of him racing to see Edward before he died and being heartbroken, racing up the stairs only to miss the moment. They turned on him later but A.J. remained (for me, anyway) rootable. But I'm biased in general towards A.J., because I also think Billy's A.J. did have real chemistry with the family unit and a lot of people. (It's touching to hear him talk about how close he was to John Ingle and Stuart Damon.) They just had no investment in him for him, in part because as Billy says in that very dishy podcast interview, GH never wanted him and neither did Riche. I was surprised to discover JFP and co. apparently wanted him back full time in 2005, promising him the moon story-wise, and that he was apparently very happy with his material for the first time during that short stint - but DAYS offered him 'an ungodly amount of money' and he went there (despite BW's having spent the past year performing The Normal Heart in NYC and preferring theater), only to not work for his first two months and discover they had no story for him, they just wanted to take him off GH. Classic Ken Corday! His OLTL story was amusing - he got called by Michael Bruno to talk to FV and then was hired and working the same day on 45 pages of material, only to discover he was a recast of Michael Lowry. "Michael Lowry is six foot two!" Interesting too to hear that Guza approached him to apologize for never writing for him and 'underestimating him.' Better late than never, I suppose. I have no idea what role Billy played on Y&R.

Yeah, Hal Ashby is held in fairly high esteem for auteurs of that era but The Landlord is definitely one of his films that regularly goes overlooked. The fact that it's a film that deals directly in issues of race vs. some of his more prominent and famous works like Harold or Maude or Being There doesn't seem like coincidence. (And Bill Gunn is an even more niche name - until recently, a lot of people I think assumed Ganja & Hess was just another sort of blaxploitation Dracula riff.) I do wonder if Criterion will eventually pick up The Landlord. I've had the Warner Archive disc for years.

God, Christopher Gerse. I still can't get over last seeing him as the pervy scientist on Westworld beating his meat to sexbot Rodrigo Santoro who promptly kills him. But hey, he's still working!

Yeah, that's why I said it feels very conveniently self-serving. I loved Lynne Moody on GH and I've heard good things about the characters, so I can't wait to see them.

Yep. And it still hasn't been fixed. They're blaming logistics and claiming it will take time, which I don't buy.

Jacobs' take on it sounds a bit self-serving and convenient to me - he claimed he always tried to cast as many Black guest actors as possible and had to fight for years to get the Williamses onscreen. I do think Bill Duke's episodes in particular have more actors of color, but I'm not seeing nearly as many as Jacobs claims overall. Such were the times.

My idea some years back always was to have Dan Wolek (maybe going by Daniel) return as a new love interest for Blair. He would have long since left medicine, would have spent years away in dark places. He would be a troubled, gray character with ties to higher levels of the international criminal element, but he would be a good man beneath. The idea was casting someone like Grant Aleksander, Michael Park or Brian Bloom, and to craft someone with enough gravitas and stature to compete in the audience's mind with the spectre of the Todds who would no longer be a going concern post-Me Too era. Further, bringing back Daniel would bring back the Woleks - you could have Michael Storm appear with father and son estranged for years, and Daniel would also have a runaway young adult son or perhaps multiple children who could shore up a youth scene. (A roughneck young cousin could romance Kevin and Kelly's kid Zane.) Speaking of Katrina Karr: By the same token, I'd wanted to do a story where Bo, on the cusp of mandatory retirement, reopens an ancient LPD serial killer cold case a la Zodiac - something dating back to Ed Hall's time that was never solved. Fearing the culprit has returned and trying to beat the clock on his exit date Bo would pore through Ed's records, and this could lead to a guest appearance from the great Nancy Snyder as Katrina, who knew Ed well and knew the streets of the city in those years, and maybe some of the victims. It could also be a nice flashback to that era of the late '70s/early '80s, where I agree the vibes were immaculate.

It really is like the show gets off on making everyone genuflect to Carly at this point. It didn't used to be this bad. They must think the FB audience needs Carly to always be the heroine.

As I mentioned, I was at one of 'em! I never thought it'd turn up again. And yes, @DramatistDreamer The Landlord is excellent. For those who don't know, Bill Gunn wrote and/or directed all of these. While Marlene Clark isn't in it, Gunn's public television soap opera, Personal Problems - shot on old-time video - was also restored and released not long ago and is now free to watch on Kanopy. I have talked about it here in the past, back when I first saw it during the Bill Gunn retro in which Stop was screened over a decade ago in NYC, but I highly recommend all of the above. I remember Stop being pretty good.

A legend for Ganja & Hess alone, but great in many things.

I was under the impression they knew Devane and Nicollette Sheridan were unlikely to be back if they went another year.

Something I'm still not over. I found their friendship baffling because of Nina's decades-long obsession with Ava stealing her husband all those years ago, but they surprisingly addressed it onscreen not long ago by having Carly call Ava on that history, on what Nina did to her and I can sort of buy into their strange bond now, with Silas dead and both these weird-ass women with very dark histories left behind.

Diana was unbearable by the end. Well before, tbh.

I didn't see this posted with Shaffer, Springsteen, Stevie Wonder, etc. Apologies if it has been. A real full circle moment. Little Richard behind her visibly delighted is great. For the ER fans, if you want to cry:

Two unbelievable covers.

I think Michael used to call her Krissy going back to their teen years.