JarrodMFiresofLove

Speaking of Lucinda and her family tree. Did we ever see Martin Guest on screen in a flashback? And what about Mr. Walsh?

Thanks. I guess I need a copy of Lucinda's family tree! Susan Brown is the one I remember in the role of Adelaide Fitzgibbons. Beverly Penberthy is the one who didn't make much of an impression on me.

Someone else mentioned James Stenbeck. What about Dusty Donovan? He was introduced in February 1983 near the end of their run. Plus they created Margo, introduced back in July 1980. Me neither. He's been married twice. His first marriage occurred while he was on the show. I think a lot of these guys were hired and given important roles because Marland had a fondness for certain types. And I wouldn't be surprised if Marland dated and lavished money on several of them who used him to get their careers going. But that doesn't mean they were actually gay. Marland also went out with female actresses on ATWT, for example he was very close to Lisa Brown. So who knows what really went on. But Greg Watkins was also appearing in Miller beer commercials in the 90s and in my opinon came across more masculine than some of the other pretty boys on the show. Incidentally Watkins has only three acting credits on the IMDb after 1995 when his role ended on ATWT. One credit is a voice over, another one is a short film, and other one is a minor role on some series I never heard of before. He did stunt work on a few episodes of Heroes in the mid-2000s.

Yeah Taylor did not exactly set the screen on fire. I'd forgotten all about her until I watched an old episode on YouTube. Then I remembered how she tried to snatch Tom during one of the times he was separated from Margo. I think the problem with Taylor, and this also related to her as a third wheel in Casey & Lyla's relationship, is that she was nothing but a plot device. Marland didn't really explain her past or give us anything to make her seem like a real person. And since the actress was so bland, she quickly fizzled and was written out.

Great comments. When I asked about Seli Groves' column, what I meant is-- do you have other synopses for more weeks of The Caitlins? Or just this period of time?

Not sure what you are asking. Stuart Blackburn is a writer producer who has worked on several top rated British soaps, mostly recently he's been working on Emmerdale. He has a great way of writing melodrama but adding humorous touches. The comic relief he does is never forced or over the top, and it always gives us insights into the characters. He never neglects any of his characters. When he was executive producer on Coronation Street for three years he used the entire cast and none of them languished in the background. I think he believes each character has a significant life and each life needs to be seen and known by the viewers. Kim Revill is a feminist writer producer who writes strong women's stories on Irish and British soaps. She specializes in crime stories built around female cops. Her work on the Irish soap Red Rock is unsurpassed. She always surprises me with the way she takes the stories into new unexpected areas. I can never predict the outcomes of her plots which is a rarity since as you know we have a lot of writers in the soap world who rely on old tropes and cliches. I also like following Kim's Twitter page which I don't do for other writers. But I think she lives a very interesting life. Camille Marchetta wrote Dynasty during the Who Shot J.R. arc, and she was the head writer on Dynasty during its fifth year which was the highest rated. She led Dynasty up to the Moldavian massacre and it's not surprising that when she left, the show had all kinds of problems the following year and started to take a dive in the ratings.

Thanks dc11786. I like how you compared the Catlins & Quinns to the Ewings & Barnes. Makes sense. Though in the case of Dallas, they kept the title more general by relating it to the setting. In the case of The Catlins, they were more specific and gave one family prominence. It's almost like if Romeo & Juliet had been retitled as The Montagues (leaving the Capulets out because Juliet becomes a Montague by marriage). Do you have all the recaps from Seli Groves' column? It's fun to read these.

Thanks for the info about Woody. It's funny how this comes flooding back. I hadn't thought about the storyline with Mary-Woody-Hutch-Linc in a long time. If not for Lisby Larson and the impression she made in the role, it would have been mostly forgettable. ***** Random survey-- so I am curious...which of Marland's characters do people feel did not make much of an impression? A few of his flop characters, at least in my opinion, include: ADELAIDE FITZGIBBONS -- some businesswoman that Lucinda and Kirk interacted with in the late 80s...the first actress was not very memorable, the recast was slightly more adequate. The only reason I remember this character is because I love the name Adelaide. I think if they had brought someone dynamic and charming in like Patricia Barry or Constance Towers, the character would have worked. CAROLYN CRAWFORD -- Leslie Denniston was largely wasted in this role. She'd been used so well on Guiding Light in the mid to late 80s. But on this show, she kind of fizzled. I think it's because Marland didn't really flesh the character out. She was mostly just an obstacle for Frannie. EVAN WALSH -- incredibly dull given he was Lucinda's half-brother, but played by such an attractive actor. During Marland's reign this show hired a lot of hunks that fit the working class mold (like Holden, Caleb, Linc and Hutch). But Evan was a sexy upper class type. However, I don't think Marland knew how to write the upper class as well as he could write the lower class or middle class. So Evan was very one-dimensional. Probably the only reason he lasted as long as he did was because actor Greg Watkins looked like something out of the pages of GQ. Here's a photo of Watkins in his prime:

Going back to the credits at the end of the August 1984 episode, it's easy to get a sense of cast overhauls. Namely because the actors are listed in order of seniority, not alphabetically. So at the top of the list we have long-time people like Don Hastings, Henderson Forsythe, Patricia Bruder, Larry Bryggman and Kathryn Hays (Eileen Fulton is temporarily off screen but of course would have had special billing at the end.) These are the ones originally hired in the 60s and 70s. Then after Hays we have Frank Runyeon (Steve) who had only first appeared in 1980. After Runyeon the next person in terms of seniority is Jacques Perreault (Frank Andropoulos) who hasn't been on the show more than a few years. He's followed by Linsday Frost who had only started a year earlier as a recast Betsy in 1983. So a person with only one year on the show is 8th out of 35 cast members. This indicates there must have been a huge cast purge in 83 (probably to make room for the McColls). Interestingly we have Colleen Zenk listed after Lindsay Frost. I think this is because Zenk took some time off in 82-83 to make the movie "Annie" for John Huston. So she probably lost some of her seniority-- she first appeared in '78 and should really be listed after Kathryn Hays before Frank Runyeon. Following her is Hugo Napier who is soon to depart as Gunnar, then Brian Bloom who also hasn't been on the show very long. After him is Kate McNeil (billed as Kathy McNeil who plays John's current wife Karen) then we have Robert Lipton (Jeff Ward). Lipton started in 1978 so he should also be billed above Runyeon but maybe he took some time off like Zenk. He will soon go on recurring and make sporadic appearances in 1985 and 1986. After Lipton it's all people who have been hired by Mary-Ellis Bunim in 83 and 84.

Thanks. I was thinking there was something called Aunt Mary's apple pies...maybe that's what she was known for selling in her coffee shops and bakeries.

That's right...I remember Hutch turning out to be Linc's half-brother. The actors did resemble each other. I think there may have been someone named Woody...possibly he was the father of both boys, never seen, just mentioned when Mary was revealed as Hutch's mother. It's all a bit vague in my memory. I think these were characters Backus struggled to continue writing for after Marland's death. They most certainly would have lasted longer if Marland hadn't died, since I'm sure he introduced them with long-range plans in mind. What was Mary's business? Why did Lucinda "want" her?

Random question -- I remember Lisby Larson playing a character named Aunt Mary in the early 90s, near the end of Marland's era. What was her storyline about and what happened to her? I am thinking she was recurring, not a major long-term character. Larson was/is a fantastic actress and always made a memorable impression in all her soap roles.

Speaking of Ellen, after mentioning Patricia Bruder recently I looked her up online. I was surprised to learn she was born in 1936. Meaning she was 47 when Dani Andropolous was born and Ellen became a great-grandmother. Perhaps Bruder was not playing her real age, and Ellen was meant to be older than Bruder actually was? Equally surprising was the fact that Henderson Forsythe (David Stewart) was born in 1917. So he was 19 years older than Bruder. Does that mean David was supposed to be about 20 years older than Ellen? Were their ages ever addressed on camera? Was the David & Ellen relationship supposed to be a May-December romance? Obviously I didn't watch the show in the 60s and only started watching as a kid in the early 80s. I just never realized the apparent age difference between David and Ellen Stewart. It's kind of fascinating. I am assuming all Ellen's kids and most of her grandkids and great grandkids were born on camera. Is there a family tree of the Stewarts with the years the characters were born?

Yeah, I think that explains why Lisa was supposed to be in the dark and believe she was having a baby, to make the pseudo-abortion more realistic. This story was operating on several levels. Plus it was kind of a spoof that of all people Lisa would be pregnant like the Virgin Mary. So it was classic Irna. Eileen probably didn't understand the goals of the story and was trying to play it "straight" which you can't really do with this kind of material.

Here's the interview Eileen Fulton did in 2005: https://interviews.televisionacademy.com/interviews/eileen-fulton#interview-clips

So was it a story Irna wrote, or someone else? I think the idea is interesting, but I agree that after a point it gets silly. A woman who wasn't really pregnant might think she's pregnant in the beginning but technology would cause the doctor to verify rather quickly there was no baby. What they could get away with in the early 70s they could never get away with now. And it was probably a real stretch for viewers then to accept it. The only way the story might work is if the the woman was held hostage, in some sort of drugged state and led to believe she was pregnant and had given birth. But to play this as a "straight" medical drama is ludicrous.

What year did the phantom fetus storyline occur? Has such a storyline ever been done on any other soap?

Probably when Bryggman left it saved her neck. They no longer had to pay him and if they were not offering Eileen any substantial guarantees and she was willing to do what they asked her, then I guess she was safe, even though Goutman and the headwriters were no longer committed to telling stories for Lisa. Most of her later years had her as a sounding board for grandson Casey or for Barbara; she wasn't even interacting much with Tom, Margo, Bob and Kim at the end.

Thanks for such a detailed post and for providing more key information. I remember watching a few episodes in the 80s when I was a kid. But the show was on TBS which we seldom watched and it aired at such a strange time. It definitely is a show I'd like to see in its entirety. Like Capitol it is completely defined by the 80s and there aren't a huge number of episodes to go through. I do love Lisby Larson and the clips I've seen from her on this show look fabulous. Peter Boynton was wonderful as the oily Tonio on ATWT, so I am sure he's just as good on The Catlins, even if he's not playing the same type of character. One thing I am curious about is why the show's title only referenced one core family, when the original concept was focused on two rival families. Was the idea to eventually get rid of the second family or eventually marry them into the Catlins? I am sure there's a reason they picked one family over the other when titling the show. Maybe that's something Sam Smiley could explain for us. Hopefully he's been preserving the episodes he had on tape.

Fulton's full interview (it's over two hours long) is on the EmmyTVLegends website. I just watched it a few days ago and she's very lively, with some great anecdotes. She's extremely candid about several eras of ATWT. I believe the interview was done in 2005 when Sheffer was still in charge. Probably before his departure was announced or she wouldn't have been so careful what she said about him. In the interview she says her least favorite stories were the phantom fetus one, which she found to be totally preposterous and made Lisa seem stupid. And she did not enjoy the racism story where Lisa disapproved of Duncan and Jessica's marriage, which was done by Marland, wasn't it? She said she struggled with how to play it and how to justify Lisa's narrow-mindedness.

My theory is that Eileen Fulton remained on the show because she loved playing Lisa and hoped that the next headwriter/producer team would value her. She was hanging in there and not wanting to just give up and walk away. But by a certain point (probably 2008) it was clear she was never going to be a relevant part of ATWT anymore. I looked at the cast totals using the link someone provided earlier and there were quite a few months under Sheffer and Passanante where she had 0 appearances or just 1 appearance. There is one month during Passanante's reign that she has 6 appearances which I think is the most she ever had in the whole decade. Six appearances during one month is not even two days a week. My guess is she got to stay on contract, she was still given special billing and she probably was still paid her usual rate per episode but only when she worked (no guarantees and no salary increases). During 2010, the last eight and a half months of the show, she was only in 12 episodes. She only had one appearance in the show's last month. Lisa was definitely not relevant at the end; and this leads me to think that if the show had continued she would have been taken off contract at some point and been recurring. The only way she would ever have had substantial screen time again would have been if they killed Lisa off and she had a proper exit story.

Larry Bryggman had practically nothing to do under Hogan Sheffer. It didn't surprise me when he left in 2004.

Eileen Fulton definitely disliked Hogan Sheffer. She was very vocal about her lack of screen time during his tenure. I suppose he was unable to kill Lisa off or her send her out of town, so he just used her very sparingly. She took it personally. But since Passanante also didn't write much for her, I wonder if it was really Chris Goutman who was responsible for her lack of screen time.

Also a lot of the actors like Tunie were glad that Sheffer was building on things Marland had established. From Backus' exit in '94 to Sheffer's arrival in 2000, the show had gone off track again. They were glad to see Marland's work picked up again by this new guy.

Yes, it must have been Kim's husband in the 1984 photo. Or else it was someone who worked behind the scenes, since it was not an actor on the show at that time. I'm going with the "it's her husband" answer.