chrisml

That infamous storyline. UGH.

Many women were raped and murdered during her time on SB. Marcy Walker's Eden was brutally raped in one of the most vicious rapes I've ever seen on a daytime soap. It was graphic and disturbing, and to make it worse, they decided to make her rapist her gynaecologist. Just nasty stuff. Women stalked and murdered on GH (in between a lawsuit for firing a pregnant woman). And then it got so bad on YR where they were going to have Jessica Collins's character lie about being raped but the network stepped in and made them change that story.

But JFP would never have told that story. Look at the stories that were told after Maureen's death on GL and you know that kind of story would never have happened under her watch. Eve going psycho over worthless Nick is the kind of stuff she sees as dramatic and interesting. Even my favorite SB story before her firing (Robert/Eden/Cruz) was forced on her and then she did a one off Christmas episode told from Cruz's point of view of how miserable he was about the whole thing. That's her M.O. Even during that storyline, there was a scene where Cruz manhandles Eden so much during a "love" scene (the cave scene) that there was a lot of criticism because Eden had recently been raped. I've been going through old soap magazines/tv guides the last few weeks. There were letters to the editors complaining that Maureen was not getting enough screen time (I posted one of them a couple weeks ago). The viewers wanted more of Maureen in 1992. Michael Logan even wrote about her being underappreciated (as he did about Susan Seaforth Hayes who was also fired that yr). The people who watched GL wanted to see more of Maureen. IT was the EP who didn't and used the focus group as an excuse to fire her because she certainly didn't have a long-term story in place--contrary to Nancy Curlee's sales technique interview with Logan.

JFP was good with the Emmy system and she got people Emmys or nominations. Talented actresses can do great work in sexist storylines or storylines that are primarily focused on the men. Likewise, talented actresses can do phenomenal work in non-sexist storylines and never get noticed because they do not do bloc voting or play the system. To be clear, just because a story is focused on a man does not make it sexist. When a show's stories are almost always focused on the men's point of view, then it becomes a problem. I've watched enough of her shows to know that when she comes on, the female characters will lose IQ points and become desperate for a man. The level of violence aimed at women will also increase and the the stories will be told almost always from the viewpoint of the men.

I know it gets thrown around, but I never had the idea that JFP likes women very much. Her creative decisions and her backstage behavior speaks for itself on that matter. I don't always want to be criticising her because I did like a lot of her work on SB. I thought SB had some phenomenal moments with the acting, directing, and musical choices. However, short-term or long-term plotting was never JFP's biggest asset on that show and it just got worse as she went to other shows. Her "drama brain" (as she calls it) confused shock value for real emotional drama. I think GL suffered because you had producers post-Calhoun who simply did not like women. Liz Keifer talks about this a little in her interview with Locher, but that's always the vibe I had post-Calhoun. There was a mean-spiritedness sexist attitude towards a lot of the show that was not always there when I was watching consistently. Every storyline seemed to revolve around the male characters and how the story would benefit them. Maybe others who watched regularly will disagree but that's always the vibe I got.

And in her interview with Alan Locher, Nancy Curlee makes it clear it was not her idea to kill off Maureen and she did not like the idea. She also says she wishes she had found a way to keep Maureen alive while everyone thought she was alive. I guess she was being a team player by making excuses. This is JFP's M.O. She comes up with a shocking dramatic moment but then never thinks about the fallout or longterm story. As DRW50 pointed out, she told this exact storyline on AW. Twice actually. The Lillian/Ed/Maureen affair story with Sharlene/John/Felicia that viewers hated (including the car motif) although Anna Holbrook did win an Emmy so there's that. And then she killed off Alice Barrett to supposedly give Stephen Schnetzer more to do and he promptly had nothing to do. Ed/Eve was not worth killing off Maureen for. Now, I'm wondering if Sam and Nora on OLTL had their affair in a car. Probably not, but it would be hilarious if they did. I still would love to know what happened with Robin Strasser and GL. It was the right move as she would have been a disastrous Alexandra.

I have a few Michael Logan columns lated to GL. One is Nancy Curlee talking about Maureen's death. The other is where he gives the best of 1992. I was surprised to see he chose AW as the best soap of 1992.

I don't remember Mary Kay Adams on this show. Did she have a major storyline on this show. I am probably blanking out on her storyline. Is this around the time that Glynnis O'Connor was nuMargo? I have a vague memory of something to do with an architect. Anyway, I posted this in another thread, but Michael Logan rated soap hoppers at the time and Mary Kay Adams was a hit for her role as Neal on the show: There's also an interview with Douglas Marland about Margo's HIV status after the rape:

A couple of Michael Logan articles about Loving. One is when Downtown Julie Brown did a brief role on the show and the other is where Logan praises Dennis Parlato work as the permanent replacement for Larkin Malloy's Clay.

I wonder if this is why the Derek/Stacey pairing never seemed to take off. I was always confused why it didn't seem to go anywhere and his character lasted such a short time. For that matter, they never made much of Stacey either. She could have gone in so many directions, but the writers didn't have much interest in her.

I posted this in the GL thread as well, this is Michael Logan writing about Elaine Princi being fired:

I had no idea that Robin Stasser had wanted to play Alexandra after McKinsey left the role. I wonder if that played into the animosity that Strasser had for JFP when JFP went to OLTL. Michael Logan reporter this bit of info in his column. There's also information about the shooting at the Vietnam Veterans memorial.

Kim Zimmer wrote this about Ellen Wheeler: "She wanted to be the white knight who saved Guiding Light, but why reinvent the wheel, trying to turn the show into something it was never meant to be? In my opinion, it was a losing proposition to buck the formula that had been successful." I did not. I just wanted to point this out in case people get confused.

I watched an hour's worth of scenes with Lisby Larsen and Beverlee McKinsey fighting and it was riveting. I wanted more. They were excellent sparring partners. I don't know if Larsen was on AW before Texas or what happened after MCKinsey left, but I would have tuned in every day just to see these two.

Did JFP, Rauch or Conboy really understand most of the shows they produced? Conboy has the look of SB down, but the characters lost IQ points. Rauch took away everything that made SB and GL special and unique. I remember Liz Keifer saying something in a Locher interview about Rauch always wanting to see the underbelly of everything. He never wanted to see the good of anything. JFP wasted so much money to turn AW into a copy of ER. That awful opening that copied ER's. Not an original thought just copy copy copy. She then redid the Maureen/Ed/Lillian story with Sharlene/John/Felicia. While I think Conboy has more talent than Wheeler (and I think he could put together a decent GL episode), he didn't get GL either and he did damage to the cast. It's funny how even Locher calls Conboy out for being terrible for GL and Locher is usually on the fence for most things.

I jest but I can see why. She was an awful EP. If anyone feels like a hatchet woman hired by P&G or NBC, it's Savitz. My word. She was awful.

The Beverlee McKinsey interview that was posted a couple pages back was wonderful. Makes me appreciate her even more, but I was cracking up at her outrage over Ruth Warrick. Who knew she had such a dislike for Warrick because of Warrick's nonsense? Speaking of interviews, did any of the GL producers, ever give in-depth interviews about their time on the show?

I'm the soap viewer who holds a grudge so refusing to watch Justin Deas for 32 years is par for the course for me. It also doesn't hurt that from what little I saw he was terrible and I think the destruction he caused was not balanced by what he brought to the show. As I've said before, I wish him all the luck with his health, but as an actor, he has never done anything for me. I really like Beth Chamberlain. I think she should have won the Emmy the year she was nominated, but she had no support in the industry and that's usually how the people win. I judged her category for goldderby (back when you got mailed discs) and placed her number one. However, it was someone I thought was terrible and ranked fifth who won. Julie Pinson maybe? [I cheated and looked. It was Pinson. Ugh]. I think it's fine to have the supercouples, but the problem is that soaps spend way too much time on the obstacles, and have no plans for when they get the couples together. It's not always about triangles, affairs, past loves that have never been mentioned before, etc. I think getting rid of Paul Anthony Stewart was idiotic just to worship at the altar of Tom Pelphrey. I know there are people like Dave Kreizman who think he was the superstar, but he repelled me. Still does. One actor whose appeal I do not get. I also enjoyed Nancy St. Alban and thought she could have been given more to do as a more grown up Michelle. Instead, she got saddled with some weird storylines. Admittedly, I did like her amnesiac Michelle flirting with Tony mainly as I had a crush on the actor. Since the actor turned out to be a scuzzbucket, I'll pretend I didn't write that. From my limited viewing perspective, I think Millee Taggart was the only headwriter who could have saved the show if she had been given the opportunity to stay long term. I liked Conboy's visual style so maybe a Taggart/Conboy combo?

It was rumoured (rightly or wrongly) that Parker was fired to pay for Deas's salary. The same thing happened with Alice Barrett and Robert Kelker Kelly on AW. JFP denied the AW story but who knows?

The book was written right after the cancellation so I think her anger at Ellen Wheeler was extremely raw. She was extremely angry at Wheeler in the book. There's a funny bit (to me) where she's ranting about Ellen Wheeler and then interrupts the rant to tell readers how beautiful and talented Beth Chamberlain is and then she goes back to ranting about Ellen Wheeler (Zimmer is ranting about the GL cast doing hurricane relief which she felt broke the fourth wall but she eventually comes around to accepting it). She also cites Paul Rauch as her favorite of all of the producers. I think it could have been personality conflicts mixed in with some sexism. I think Slezak was put off by Gottlieb's claim she was going to revolutionise daytime. I think Slezak underrates Gottlieb's time on the show and overvalues Phelps's and Rauch's but that's for the OLTL board. You and I have somewhat similar viewing habits with GL. I stopped when Maureen walked out the cabin door and did not return for a long time as a regular viewer. In a way, I don't think I ever did come full time. I think I just watched certain stories because I have no memory of so much that is talked about on this thread. I refused to watch anything with Deas because I'm petty and I blame him rightly or wrongly for Parker's firing so I miss a lot with the Coopers. To this day, when he pops up in a scene, I fast forward. It's childish, but there it is. I would agree to a certain extent, but to be fair to Zimmer, she does say Wheeler brought about the end of GL (along with other reasons) by getting rid of Maureen Garrett, Marj Dusay and Jerry Ver Dorn. She was also extremely upset that Wheeler broke up Harley and Gus. Zimmer writes, "After Ellen took over the reins, several veteran actors were dropped from the show because of budget cuts. Without contracts, their salaries were no longer guaranteed. They became day players or heavy recurring characters. Still, without their contracts in place, several chose to leave the show to find steadier work. Maureen Garrett, who played Holly, Jerry verDorn, who played Ross Marler, and Marj Dusay, who played Alexandra Spaulding, were just a few of the actors who left the show after Ellen chose to take them off contract, meaning they were no longer guaranteed a weekly salary. With these actors gone, there was a lack of veteran influence, allowing Ellen to refocus the show on the youth of Springfield. She wanted to be the white knight who saved Guiding Light, but why reinvent the wheel, trying to turn the show into something it was never meant to be? In my opinion, it was a losing proposition to buck the formula that had been successful for, at that point, sixty-eight very solid years.”

After watching the Locher interview with the GL writers, I reread parts of Kim Zimmer's memoir and I paid specific attention to the parts pertaining to Ellen Wheeler. I don't think Zimmer is wrong in her assessment of Wheeler's tenure on the show (someone hired to basically kill off the show). Zimmer feels Wheeler gutted the show of its heart and alienated its longtime viewers. I was amused by her repeated mentions of Wheeler's incessant crying. Zimmer however is quite sexist and makes remarks like "a male producer would have kept me in line." What I'm most curious about is what Zimmer had to leave out of the book since she said the Wheeler parts had to be edited before publication. She also claims in the book that Ellen Wheeler wrote the show during a writer's strike.

I never thought someone would confuse Michael O'Leary with Grant Aleksander, but apparently the writer did. The writer also misspelled Judi Evans's name wrong. From what I remember of the SB ending, people hated it. Krista Tesreau's Andie was trying to kill someone and then Paul Rauch was smoking a cigar.

I was researching another topic but I looked for some Guiding Light things and came across these articles. One is a minor article from 1983 about a cast baseball trip. The other is a 2002 article from Television Quarterly article celebrating the 50th anniversary of the show.