Vee

If that is Keemo's kid it's a step in the right direction. If it isn't it's still a good step, since I was just waxing on about how soaps have fallen down on representation since the halcyon days of poor Mia Korf! They do still need to bring an eligible male though, and Keemo himself IMO.

I think a story about some dark secret in suburbia at the Webber house was a good idea - Laura, Lesley and Rick's life together was not a bed of roses, as the plethora of '70s episodes now blessedly available to us on YT from '77 through '80-on makes abundantly clear. I also loved, loved, loved that there was still so much location history on the show in 2002 that the Jones girls were living in Laura's old house and she could still visit it and talk to them about it. That's the kind of thing soaps can do generationally that other shows just can't. I don't think that secret had to involve molestation or Laura killing Rick's mistress. Nor do I think Rick was a saint, but he wasn't jumping into bed with every woman - mostly just Monica. (There was also the beat of Monica telling Lesley she was too maternal and frumpy and/or barren to satisfy Rick, a fear Lesley held onto for a long time before Monica said it to her face in those famous scenes, so it's possible he could stray.)

I assume Genie and then maybe the network vetoed it. That's just shameful.

I know there were a lot of rumors about how the Rick return story was originally supposed to go differently in '02*, something about that consortium he was involved with buying the hospital as well, and maybe they had intended to actually do a beat with Monica and restarting their affair, who knows. But it never happened onscreen. I just found it unspeakably lazy to do that with such central characters and such an iconic past story. And they started doing that kind of offhand backstory stuff more and more in that period, and it got worse over time. (* - The attic story itself was a pretty blatant ripoff of Charles Pratt and co.'s own story on Melrose Place, where Alison rediscovers her own childhood trauma in the family home and I think the attic, where she was molested by her father. I don't know if they ever originally intended to suggest Rick had molested Laura, but it was def my fear at the time because I knew Melrose Place well and knew Pratt was from MP. I believe there was also a rumor that originally the woman in the attic in Laura's visions, Rick's mistress, was supposed to be the young Bobbie Spencer but that got vetoed and it somehow became the murdered Theresa Carter. I have no idea what's true or not, I'd love for someone to tell us someday. Any or all of that is a pretty huge reach IMO, but Rick's sexual obsession with Monica did last years so it's not like he's incapable of infidelity.)

When either of you read the complaint, then we can discuss it.

This is a bad look, kid.

Nope. I did a double-take about this in this thread or another a few months back.

I think North has spoken fairly negatively of his soap days, though I may be overstating it as I can't find too much on that now and I don't want to dig back to stuff that is over a decade old; Chris was famously underused on PC, and he did audition for the first Stephen Lars recast on GH in the mid-2000s. I think it'd be a great get for him to cameo someday as scheming Chris, but I doubt he'd do it. From an interview in the 2010s, somewhat less negatively:

That's almost what they've been doing. Shades of how Roseanne handled the Beckys in its penultimate season, which was unnecessary.

What I don't understand is why there seems to be some mystery about the Ice Princess on the show today of some sort. For years in the 90s and 2000s we were told Luke kept himself very wealthy by chipping off pieces of the thing and selling it on the black market.

I only made it about halfway through that. That was rough.

Re: Genie Francis and sometimes beyond her wheelhouse performances in other roles, discussed in the recast thread, I wanted to comment on this a bit: I'm pretty sure I've always been a party of one on liking some of Genie's wilder or more off-brand performances. I thought she should've gotten an Emmy for her performance at the end of the reviled Rick Webber attic storyline, where Laura had had a complete psychotic break and was shambling around in the attic in her old wedding dress hallucinating and out of her mind - the storyline was so dark and such a rotten end for the character, but she was mesmerizing to me. I also loved her the day she re-froze RKK's Stavros in his cryochamber in 2013 and just howled incoherently at the screen through the glass window., shaking as it cut to black, thinking he had murdered her daughter. (Another great bit was whoever in the room had her defy Luke, who did the usual paternalistic 'my daughter' thing he'd been doing with Lulu for years, and had Laura push him off and say 'our daughter!') But most people roasted that sequence at the time, or the scene shortly before it where Stavros pounded the dining table during his captive banquet for her and Luke, and Laura just started screaming in terror right then and there. A lot of people thought it was OTT but to me it was a very real approximation of how she'd react to the return of her undead rapist husband who had abused and terrorized her for several years on that island. (These are both timestamped) Anyway: I liked the idea of Genie playing a vixen or schemer like on AMC or Y&R, but I don't think anyone can say that her performance as, say, Genevieve on Y&R worked at all. I think she could do darker or more spiky stuff at times, but when I've seen her try it often doesn't turn out like the moments above that I like (and no one else does!) - she often goes to cartoon. I love her but she's not the first talent on soaps whose scope sometime exceeds their grasp.

I'll take my Genie comments to the GH past thread or whatever it is, as it's pretty OT.

Wasn't Abby supposed to 'die?' What happened to that? Completely unrelated: If DAYS won't commit to either Marci Miller or Linsey Godfrey long-term (although it seems in this case Miller won't commit), I would 100% steal both to play sisters Serena Baldwin and Christina Collins, respectively, on GH.

Andrew had heat with a lot of forbidden women, which I think was part of the draw from the beginning, first with Megan then Marty and finally Téa. Bob Krimmer had soul - I think he was Malone's avatar onscreen - but also fire; he was playing an eccentric villain role on Babylon 5 at the same time as OLTL. So compared to that heat, the happy family with Cassie could never really measure up. Their dynamic was much more comfortable and mellow, which is likely why LB got bored and found heat of her own elsewhere. I don't blame them and I think they should've been experimenting with both characters more, but once Malone was gone investment in Andrew waned. I do wish they'd gone all the way with Andrew and one of those women, but I suppose it's a testament to his character they didn't. I think Téa slept with Andrew but I can't be certain, it's been so long. I remember almost wishing Andrew and Marty had gotten together as mature, weathered adults at the end of the run, because they still had serious chemistry in their brief scenes when she returned from the dead and had amnesia and was quizzing him about her life in late 2008. But I am happy with the idea that Andrew and Cassie reconciled, too. More and more early 90s Gottlieb/Malone, etc. material has been made available over the last few years, and more and more of it to me indicates how shitty a hand Mia Korf got dealt (even if, IIRC, it was her choice to leave for a David Henry Hwang play). It was incredibly forward thinking of OLTL to have an Asian-American lead female at that time, and sadly it's still incredibly forward thinking of soaps today - I can't think of one on any of them now. Korf also has barely aged a day since, judging by her appearance at the OLTL reunion with cast and crew a couple years ago. I love Kassie in the role and I'd never reverse it now, she's beloved and there's just no way, but looking at what they did BTS with the recast it was unbelievably tone-deaf by today's standards (let alone back then) even if a white woman doing a Scarlett O'Hara riff was "Malone's vision' for Blair. I do think there's a way you could have woven Korf into the show in later years or its hypothetical future that would've honored her place, nodded to the past and done something progressive with more Asian characters. It's just an idea I won't put out for public consumption because hey, you never know.

It may well have been Gottlieb, but I don't believe it was Malone. I remember some of us, me included, being surprised a couple years ago when eps from August turned up with Carlson's name, at the very least, being on the show around then I believe. I can't swear to it but I think Gottlieb came first then installed Malone a month or two later. I do know Cassie's first airdate, because I just watched the episode: Mid-April. Gottlieb took over sometime in July. I usually defer to the knowledge of people who were there, but this is different. YMMV.

Do you, but:

Malone was not writing for the show til late August or September. Gottlieb might've had something to do with Loon Lake but I really don't think so. And I believe Cain Rogan was created from Malone refashioning the Hudson King, Heinrich, etc. character into his own creation, inheriting it from either DePriest or Carlson. He came in midway through that storyline and changed it so that they turned the tables on him (I think) and created Cain. Laura is also on record as saying Rauch hired her.

JFP's priority was Tim Gibbs, who she'd recast as Kevin over fan protests. Kevin Stapleton was very well liked in the role, and the pairing with LB was pretty popular; Bonarrigo was also unhappy with the recast. But JFP wanted to put Gibbs over at any cost, and possibly Sonia Satra from GL (as Barbara Graham) as well. Somehow Cassie became the villain in a story in which Kevin had cheated on her with Barbara, then Barbara had become unstable, shot and killed Drew and paralyzed Cassie. I thought the twisted turnabout of it where Cassie became Barbara's tormentor was interesting on paper, but I had not anticipated Cassie being written out in the process. (They did at least get rid of Barbara, but I think JFP would've found a way to keep Satra if she could) LB was just the first. Tim Gibbs continued to be pushed on any available female, and they were all sacrificed for him, including the talented Susan Misner; an attempt to put him with Robin Christopher didn't go over. Ultimately Gina Tognoni left the show after their forced, cold fish pairing fizzled out, and he was so disliked that post-JFP he didn't even get an onscreen exit before Gina. (Ironically, Heather Tom and Dan Gauthier actually became popular as Kevin and Kelly in the 2000s later on due to the show embracing the Alan/Monica Quartermaine-esque dysfunction of their original coupling and its twisted roots under JFP.)

Michael Malone had nothing to do with pairing them, it was before he arrived. She was a Rauch hire and the pairing (and I believe, Loon Lake) was his people.

I'll have a look.

Me too. I don't know what book you mean, I'm afraid - there's been so many DS books I haven't gotten since the '90s, when I owned them all.

I think she got moved into a very straight-arrow, big sister role with Andrew which worked for the character, but which also ultimately bored the actress. And a lot of Andrew and Cassie's stories I find boring to watch! But I always liked Cassie, she was part of the firmament to me as a kid, same as Andrew. I think that's what the audience objected to most when she was fired, losing her calm, intelligent, graceful presence. (Allegedly they were somehow not actually the original plan for either character but were paired due to fan feedback on them together, while the initial plan for Andrew post-Megan - pairing him with loud, big-haired lady cop Maggie Vega - fell apart due to their inability to secure their casting choice, Saundra Santiago. There's an image.) I know there were rumors of friction with Laura and Bob Krimmer in later years and that she pushed heavily for the pairing with Kevin Stapleton, which did work for her. (She and Krimmer seem very friendly in recent years) I do think she had way too many saintly, agony aunt stories before then. And when they put her with KS they did a lot of photoshoots with her clearly trying to emphasize sex appeal for LB again, and she was stunning. But she wasn't a Friend of Jill, and Tim Gibbs was JFP's priority. The show tended to treat Andrew and Cassie as a pair any time they appeared near the end of the network run, including their final appearances. I like to think they just got back together.

Yes, when this came up a few weeks ago I noted that I do know some Ava Haddad diehards, which I attribute to the classic Mitch storyline from the '80s. But I've never heard anyone complain about Laura until now. Most people seemed to despise Gagnier. I've seen many of her episodes but I personally don't think she's that bad. I blame the story with Jon Russell.