Vee

Troy and Lindsay happened for real after OLTL finally seemed to realize everyone hated Troy/Nora. GT rehired Ty Treadway after the Colin murder mystery because he was sure everyone wanted to "finally" see HBS and TT paired for real, but the truth is they didn't have enough chemistry and Ty, while a wonderful guy, was simply not a very good actor. The subsequent romance was awful and embarrassing, and it was compounded by the plotline of Troy [!@#$%^&*] Lindsay and stringing her along to put her behind bars, which highlighted their scorching chemistry and put viewers on Lindsay's side, even though I was happy to see her finally pay for her crimes against Nora.

When they went back to Troy and Lindsay having a hot affair behind Nora's back in late 2002/early '03, the S&M-esque scenes began. Their most memorable, of course, being on Griffith and Malone's first full day back in February '03 - when she screams at Troy to "take what you came for!" and shortly thereafter, Nora walks in on them together in a very explicit-seeming series of jump cuts with Troy's pants around his ankles, where it looks for all the world like he is [!@#$%^&*] Lindsay either from behind or in hindquarters heretofore unknown. I'm still surprised that made it on the air.

She never married Max - Rae married Asa, in a storyline that was pointless, barely featured, and went nowhere.

That terrible storyline did offer up some classic lines, though, when Renee tried to convince Rae to divorce Asa by conning her into believing she had gone off her rocker wanting him back - "I met Asa when I was a madam in Las Vegas. He was looking for uranium and he found me. When I'm finished with the shock treatments I'm going back into the life!"

I loved Max/Roxy, yes. And Cris and Natalie, back then.

Sylvia Miles was absolutely terrifying as Stella. I swear to God she looked like some sort of leviathan, risen from the briny deep of the ocean to wreak armageddon. It was as though you practically saw rancid seawater and the sands of time dripping from her wrinkled pores. She did not appear human.

I did love Allison's return but even that went on too long.

Yes, it was Whitesell/Broderick, and they were mostly terrible with the exception of Bo/Gabrielle and the baby switch story with Natalie and Jessica, which was not exactly thrillingly broken down or dialogued.

Look at Eddie Alderson nonchalantly perched on Mark Derwin's head.

I was so, so happy for the show when it won because I felt it truly deserved it, even when frankly Gary's stories were not very good. During his tenure as EP the show had a sense of lightness and fun and boundless optimism even when it was serving up some really goofy [!@#$%^&*]. It had come out of the hole of the JFP era and started putting itself back together again. Even when some of the stories were terrible, I couldn't begrudge it much. They all worked so hard and cared so much, and I think they still do today. I also think it was a mistake not to do Live Week every year since.

I was crushed when Luna was killed, but I also really liked Max and Maggie. I hated when she was thrown off the show in such a silly way.

I'd still bring Gabby back with Max, Tina and Cord before the end. Why not?

I have heard Michael Malone say - and it may have been hyperbole - that he had been interested in having Gabrielle on the show opposite Max in the '90s, but Paul Rauch had already driven her off. I know he had planned a Max/Gabrielle/Bo/Nora quadrangle in 2003, and that would have driven the show as a frontburner story like gangbusters if it had been allowed. But it wasn't.

I remember that story. Leah Brahms from Star Trek: The Next Generation nearly got Viki killed.

Hank did not have an onscreen exit. He last appeared convincing Rae to divorce Asa - in order to be with him (cue vomiting). He was last seen luring her into a delightful game of touch football in Angel Square that spring, as I struggled to contain my lunch at the thought of Hank being pawed by Linda Dano. A few weeks later, Daniel Colson strode into the LPD and informed Nora and Bo that due to the Mitch Laurence mess, the state had dismissed Hank and appointed him as acting DA - Hank was said to have gone over to Llanview U to teach law and coach football, so he was still in town, unseen. I think they said more recently that he, Rachel and RJ had all moved to Chicago.

What I never understood is how Peter Parros ended up playing virtually the exact same role - Dr. Ben - on two shows only a few years apart. When he turned up on ATWT in the same boring role I literally thought the character had crossed over.

I think if the rumors are true that they're bringing Rachel onto the new show - and I would love to believe they are - than they might as well go for new tentpole couples and pair her up with Kevin once again. That would be a new, interracial generation for the Buchanan family to cement things while you'd also have Natalie, Jessica, Joey etc. in play. That also gives a base for other Gannons to be brought back in from.

I do think there's an edge and fire to Nathan Purdee as an actor and artist that they did not properly utilize in many of his later years on the show. And they could do that if, after being sacked for a serial killer (that was Hank's exit - the city dumped him offscreen for Daniel Colson in the wake of the Mitch Laurence debacle, and he went to teach law at Llanview U), Hank had grown fairly cynical and turned towards a lucrative career as a defense attorney while also struggling with his honor and moral fiber. Or perhaps, yes, as a hard-driving federal prosecutor, maybe that's more apropos. I think you could do a lot with both brothers. RJ could have been running this show years ago if daytime knew how to deal with leading men of color.

Sheila was an utterly different character as played by Valarie Pettiford versus Stephanie Williams, who took over the part and was an utter non-entity as Hank and Sheila became Bo and Nora's token black talk-tos. It was sad yet totally uninteresting and unsurprising to me as a kid when I tuned in one day and suddenly Sheila was leaving Hank for vague reasons, out of the blue. But Pettiford's Sheila had grace, strength and intelligence.

I have only seen a bit of the days when Hank, Sheila and Troy Nichols occupied the canvas together. Troy always seemed like a bit of a goofy stick in the mud to me with an odd voice, a holdover from Paul Rauch's very late attempt to re-inject black characters he didn't care about into the canvas. I recall reading one of the articles here where Gottlieb talks about hiring a black writer to handle that triangle - saying she had Sheila between a "new kind of black man" and an "institutionalized one" (Troy), or something. I'd like to see more of that story, however dated the language is now. I always wanted Hank to come back to the show as a suave, "grayer" defense attorney. I figured Nathan Purdee would come back to the role if you pitched him his opening scene as being woken up in the middle of the night by one of his old friends or family - the camera pans past a beautiful young woman in bed to Hank, who picks up the phone. It would be more action than he'd gotten in his last five or six years on the show. I also had liked the idea of pairing him with Tina, just because I thought it would be two hilariously different types.

Who the Christ was Jimmy Whitman?

I remember seeing a lot of early episodes with Kathleen Cullen's Amanda before she was unmasked as a Spaulding, when she was just the sheltered, virginal pianist locked away in that house, pining away for some architect. The neurotic edge to the character was fascinating, and it turned really spiky when she became a Spaulding. I always thought it was a shame she was never brought back.

Nice to see Sonni/Solita/whoever. Years ago, I dreamed up a very bizarre twin mystery storyline involving Blake and Ross's sons, kind of Vertigo-esque, and at that time Marcia Cross could not get arrested in show business post-Melrose Place and pre-Desperate Housewives. I had wanted her to come in and do a bit as Carrie Todd, who would be kind of a side schemer in the storyline due to her own prior bifurcated personality issues, which would give her a unique perspective on what becomes of Blake and Ross's kids. That's off the table now, of course - I wouldn't have minded seeing it with Michelle Forbes as Sonni instead. She'll do anything these days. GL has such a rich, crazy, sometimes austere, sometimes madcap history, and I think it would do well as a 13-week seasonal show on cable with a select cast.

When Wheeler was hired, I, like Zimmer, thought she was a good choice, and Zimmer outlines all those reasons in the book - former actress, made her bones as director and line producer, etc. But she turned out to be a disaster. Zimmer is actually much kinder and more diplomatic about Wheeler and the show overall than I would have been; she acknowledges that Wheeler had an impossible task and she was a demanding lead actress, but the bottom line I think is that Ellen Wheeler was incompetent, out of touch and perhaps unstable. She says that any time Wheeler was challenged, the woman would burst into tears.

I think she pulled a number of punches in the book, it's a little disappointing for me but pretty classy for her. There's no discussion of any issues with Cynthia Watros (Watros is only mentioned to compliment her performance), JFP, etc. Nothing in-depth on Peter Simon and Ellen Parker or some stuff like that. She deals in her character's stuff and praises Tom Pelphrey to the high heavens, and the diatribe about the episode of Jeffrey declaring his love to Reva as the Peapack cameras focus on an American flag over his dialogue is pretty funny - they had that in there because they had (as they often did) unusable footage of the actors and so they intercut the poor audio with footage of something else entirely. She says it was bottom of the barrel in Peapack and that she wished the show had ended two years earlier. I cannot disagree.

As per BE, she also says that "the actress" was a dark, miserable energy on the set from the time her lead (Bogue) turned her down to the end of her tenure. Despite that, Zimmer was sad to see her go.

I'm not sure where else to put this, and I apologize if I'm repeating something - I downloaded Kim Zimmer's book for my Android, and she has a great number of GL anecdotes in there. The most notable was a barely-veiled blind item that I think confirms some of the Beth Ehlers rumors that have been going around for years.

I do think the show will bother, and I'd like very much to see Judith Light and Michael Storm return. I think they need to be asked and the Woleks need to be represented. I'd also very, very much like to see the Gray/Hall clan represented, even if only by a new relative of Ed and Carla's. But honestly, I'd like to see Al Freeman and Ellen Holly totter in with Ed and Carla's grandkids at the end. It's the last possible moment to heal that spiritual wound at the show's core but it's the right thing to do. Just do it. Get 'em all, Andrea Evans (I would be stunned if she did not appear, in fact), John Loprieno, JDP, Fiona Hutchison, Judith Light, Michael Storm, Al Freeman Jr. and Ellen Holly. Drag Jessica Tuck back in to play Ghost Megan one more time. Ask Lynn Benesch to appear as Meredith's ghost! Make Susan Haskell make out with the back of the Thorsten Kaye stunt double's head if she has to in order to give Marty a happy ending. Do it all.

I'd also bring Dan Gauthier back immediately with a little Zane to reunite Kevin and Kelly, but I think the show will do the stupid thing in this case and go for Kelly and Joey. Dumb.

Donna Wandrey was awful as the original Roxanne Drew from "Parallel Time," but what could you do with the dialogue and plotting on DS around that time? It was meticulously-crafted camp, good camp but camp, and totally plot-driven.

OTOH I thought Wandrey was smashing as the "Real Time" Roxanne, an immortal vampiric bitch with an axe to grind who went sappho on Maggie Evans. Her attacks led to Maggie's fairly ignoble exit from the show. I think she could've done a bitch on AW, but not like Strasser or Wyndham did Rachel.

I've always been curious about this show. I assume the Labine/Mayer episode is no longer on YT; I can't find it, anyway.

I think Faith and Delia - as played by Faith Catlin and IK - are two of the most excruciatingly real portrayals of people that I've seen on soaps. It's just fascinating stuff and frankly I didn't know Ilene Kristen had this in her given the fact that Roxy on OLTL is often limited to broad comedy. Her work here is chilling and riveting, you can't take your eyes off her. I know people like this Delia. And Faith - well, the machinery is always working.

Damn.

This is old news, but: IIRC, Robin Strasser was repeatedly courted by Agnes Nixon in the '70s. At first, Agnes asked Robin to take over the role of OLTL's troubled young Cathy Craig, which I believe had previously been played by Dorrie Kavanaugh at that time. Robin didn't care for it, so Agnes created the role of Dr. Christina Karras for her on AMC. When that bombed, Agnes finally got her slotted in as Dorian on OLTL.

I believe Cali Timmins was also yet again seriously considered to play Tina in 2003, when Malone made plans to bring back her entire family. That entire storyline was scuttled.

Brandon Routh auditioned for Al Holden in 2001 but lost the part; Gary Tomlin saw "something special" in young Superman and created the role of Seth Anderson for him.

Sarah Brown came thisclose to being the Marty recast in 2006. For some reason it did not happen.

I always preferred Little Mo to Kat. Then again I missed the tail end of that.

I'll take opinions if anyone wants to give them - I am considering getting back into viewing the show full-time, which I did religiously during HS and college both online and on various cable stations. I've kept track of events and watched off and on and off again (poor Pauline!), but I am seriously considering picking it up again regularly.

I was last hooked on it around 2003 or so when they had Den and Lisa's return unseating Phil, and Dennis and Sharon and so on (ironically, this is roughly where NY public television's EE rotation is now, and I am sorely tempted to stick with that). That story petered out and I dropped out of regular viewing, but even in their worst times I tend to think the British soaps have it all over ours in a multitude of ways. I've been saying this for a decade about other Britsoap plotlines, but the very fact that UK soap viewers can look upon something like Syed/Christian/Amira - a bisexual Muslim love triangle - with cynicism and disinterest indicates just how far behind the American soaps have always been in many areas, even with shoddy stories. Then again, it's also a radically different approach - the writing has almost always been king on the British soaps, which means anyone can die roasting alive in the back of a car in broad daylight (handsome Steve) or alone and unloved in the snow (Pauline). We'd never stand for that here. It's both good and bad, I think.

Anyway, I understand the show is being overhauled (again) and I'd like to know - should I pick it back up for good?

Is she stable and able to be released on her own recognizance yet, or is that never going to happen? Will anyone ever sue that crazy twink webmaster?