Vee

It was a Michael Fairman interview (naturally). IIRC Gottlieb did mastermind the DID arc but left in '94. I thought Horgan and co. did a fairly good job of maintaining the existing style and tone until '96, though others disagree. She's not Linda Gottlieb but she's never gotten enough credit for her work, which is part of the reason I was happy to have her back at OLTL 2.0 - instantly the show was, tonally, serious and adult again.

Doubtful, since she just showran Sharp Objects for HBO, which was a hit.

I think there was a certain swooning literary romantic angle with Viki and Sloan, but you're right that it was not quite so visceral. I thought Derwin and Erika had real chemistry and thought the younger man thing was a good idea, but couldn't stand the story. He wasn't a great actor, though a very sweet and funny guy offscreen. Around 2001-2003 my brilliant fanfic idea was to have Tina return, fall for comatose Ben, and when he awoke a changed man he'd have an affair with her and promptly exit the show solo. I remember this too:

This is an interesting tidbit from a Jeff Giles interview about OLTL oral history Llanview in the Afternoon, but I don't remember this anecdote from the book. It also gives a different angle on the Clint/Viki/Sloan triangle which suggests Sloan was always fated to be removed from the story somehow - which I figured, but I didn't know it was supposed to originally end with Clint the victor earlier on. Linda Gottlieb's public comments about the early story seemed fairly down on Clint at the time and IIRC she famously said she was going to give Viki the one thing she'd never had: "An orgasm." Which is a great quote tbh.

Does anyone remember when the Victor/Sloan psychological mirroring stuff aired? When in 1995? I seem to recall a dream Viki had of Sloan or Victor's face being superimposed on each other, but I don't remember when or many details of the plot point. If they're on YT, great. Ah - found some of it, from late '94 I think - Viki equates Sloan breaking up with her (secretly due to his illness) with Victor and Eugenia on the stairs. But I could swear there was more after the DID reveal. The end of the second sequence may be what I remembered; Victor and Viki kissing after she kisses Sloan. Shades of Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me. I am a little surprised they let that air. The bit with Victor and Dorian is great. All as disturbing as when I was a little kid. I started watching in the spring-summer of '93 and from the start I could tell something was very off with the legend of Victor Lord as they retold the past story in bits and pieces for a new viewer. I don't know when I consciously realized I thought he had molested her, but by this time (this was fall '94, I think?) I knew something very, very bad was coming. And I've told my story about the big reveal in 1995 many times - I didn't really know Viki had had multiple personalities before she threw Dorian down the stairs. Terrifying.

Jarrod has departed because we were all too critical of bad soaps.

Billy Magnussen (Casey, ATWT) continues to conquer Hollywood - he is in Cary Fukunaga's new Netflix miniseries Maniac with Emma Stone, Jonah Hill, Justin Theroux and Sally Field, and will be in Guy Ritchie's live-action Aladdin.

That's bizarre. Could Eli have been Pam Long? I doubt it.

I'll never believe Dave Weigel is into Trump. I think some of that stuff is unnecessary doomsaying from decent people. Others definitely view it as a game - or lean conservative.

I actually don't think most of the media want that. I do think it would work for people like Haberman who still seem to only view a lot of this as an access game. It's cognitive dissonance: A lot of folks at the Times know and feel Trump is bad, but they also have intense ego issues over their reporting as the paper of record, and feel anyone who questions their closeness to their sources (including the Trump family and circle) is hysterical, too liberal and doesn't understand the game they need to play. It's also why none of the NYT folks ever admitted fault on Clinton - she had it coming and it was the game.

NYT printed this Rosenstein story, which is clearly dropped by Bill Shine and Trump to try to push a narrative to fire Rosenstein. Other outlets (including the Post, I believe) have since claimed Rosenstein's remarks were sarcasm.

It is so good to see you back as opposed to finding ghosts of your posts at the old A.V. Club.

Why was it the right move?

Yes, I remember that.

Good. I read this old fúck's interview about the Jian Ghomeshi essay and it was beyond tone-deaf and vile:

I thought Kelly was doing better these days, but I haven't paid much attn since the early Clive Davis conflict over her second(?) album which I really liked. What's happened since?

Stumbled across a April 2000 episode of OLTL and woo, Herve Clermont is as bad as I remember as ADA Jared Hall, Ed and Carla's alleged full-grown grandson. He had a pointless plotline about some sort of college drug scandal and failing his bar exam - something Téa knew about, and I believe was originally supposed to lead to her being killed off, since JFP blamed Florencia Lozano for the failure of the pairing with John Bolger's Sykes. When Roger Howarth agreed to return to usher FL out as part of a trial run for his later return Téa was spared, but Jared remained and he was awful. They tested him with Ellen Bethea's Rachel, who returned and recurred in Llanview in the spring/summer months while Nora was "dead", but he disappeared because the actor sucked and sadly Rachel vanished not long after. Unfortunately, the April episode in which Al Freeman returns as Ed to testify on his too-old grandson's behalf doesn't appear to be on YT. I vaguely remember it.

He did!

I remember seeing a bit of Kathleen Cullen as vindictive tycoon Amanda and being surprised she sold it well after the earlier dreamy ingenue story I'd mostly viewed before. It's been a long time so maybe I was wrong, though.

The full clip with reactions from the panel at the end: Why is Carrie Ann Inaba upset? Does she even know Chen?

She saved them for the end and I felt she gushed over them a lot as the originals with her. Her relationship with Sharon is allegedly not so rosy BTS, but who knows.