chrisml

In "Cesar Romero: The Joker Is Wild," Samuel Garza Bernstein says Cesar Romero's health was the main factor on his job not lasting longer (although he does indicate most of the guest stars didn't last long either).

Linda Dano and Kale Brown play Super Password against Peggy McCay and John Aniston:

It wouldn't surprise me to find out if AW producers had vendettas against characters especially after the way Rauch and Lemay acted against Jacqueline Courtney until she died. However, I think Taylor Miller just was not well received and the execs panicked and killed her off. They had the brilliant Sharon Gabet, and look what they did with her. It's insanity that they wasted her. Of all the shows, AW is the one show I wish I could go back and talk some sense into the execs and make them redo some of their idiotic decisions.

I remember thinking Malone's OLTL was quite witty and sophisticated, but I also haven't rewatched the show as a whole in a while. The parts of OLTL I've rewatched were not comedic so I don't know if I'm just romanticising a time of OLTL that I mostly adored. I always thought Gottlieb could have been an excellent team at SB. From what I saw, I don't remember him being particularly amusing at AW.

Robert Tyler/Bary Kaufman was such a beautiful man. One of the most beautiful men (for me) in daytime.

I'm not sure Pamela K. Long would have been a great fit for the show. Until JFP, the show usually had a lightness and a sense of humor that I don't think Long would have been capable of achieving that lightness/humor under JFP or on her own. In terms of family dynamics, she would have been quite good but she had JFP as a barrier. Clint Richie was complimentary of Pamela Long and her take on the show. As for Kale Browne, I like him as an actor and a personality. I don't blame him for what happened on OLTL. I blame JFP. He could have made it work. Catharine Hickland was fantastic under somewhat similar material, but the writers did Browne and Sam no favors. It also didn't help that they had to lobotomize Nora to prop up Sam and the damage was long lasting as happened with most of JFP's decisions.

There's also another poster who did not know what was coming up and this person was actively trying to avoid information. The poster is doing extensive reviews and I thought it was only considerate not to spoil it considering how much the poster brings to the thread. However, I don't want to get into a debate about spoilers, so if there are no rules against it it's all good.

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Iris's departure story was VERY unpopular. I had the letters to the editor and the reactions at some point. If I can find them this week, I'll upload them. I was going to post them, but the discussion had switched to a different topic at that time months ago. People were not happy with what they saw as lack of story and character assassination for Iris/Carmen Duncan. The way Iris was written off insulted viewers who adored Duncan and the character of Iris. I think that's what they wanted. The last years of AW they seemed to make decisions with the sole purpose of driving away viewers. As a viewer, firing Duncan really severed my ties with the show. I was always hopeful I could return to AW as a viewer (I gave up on AW in 91), but that decision just seemed too idiotic that I knew I could never trust the show and I was right. Alice Barrett's firing only cemented that in the cruelest of ways.

Found this about the creation of the Billy Douglas/Andrew Carpenter story as I was looking for something else. It highlights the subversive nature of the storyline and why I think it was so special. It's from "To be Continued...Soap Operas Around the World" by Robert C. Allen.

Catching up: @DRW50I think too often producers/writers see gay men in terms of certain stories: coming out, gay bashing/homophobia, refusing to accept their sexuality and having sex with a woman and this coupling results in a baby. They are rarely if ever allowed to get outside this box. I think AMC was more palatable because it was not as confrontational as OLTL's storyline. I don't want to put down AMC--more the different reactions. OLTL was directly calling out bigotry and that's not something a lot of people want to see. I can't see that storyline even being played out today. @Maximthanks for the article. I can see why the AIDS project would be skeptical, but I'm glad they did it because it meant so much to so many people. It's so odd to me that ABC and the rest of daytime never saw OLTL worth much. IT was always AMC and GH. Even when they won best series, they only won best series and nothing else that night. I don't even think they were nominated for any acting awards that night. Crystal Chappell showed more enthusiasm for their win than the network heads in charge of the show.

I might have to watch clips of the show now. I'm so glad Slezak is getting to work she's too talented to be retired.

It probably was Gottlieb. And even when Haskell, Howarth, Smith, and the writers won, the show was not nominated. AMC's "gay" storyline was a bit more palatable for viewers and voters though so the show won for that.

I gave up on soap watching and the Emmys a while ago, but yeah, the list is long of overlooked shows/performers and undeserving nominees/winners. It just felt at the time that there was a real anger towards OLTL about this storyline and I never understood why. I would hope it's not homophobia, but I also wouldn't be surprised. So-called allies are often shown to be the furthest thing from an "ally." Also, there just always seems to be a major resistance to someone doing something different in the soap world. Hence, why they just rotate the same producers and writers. AMC won for the gay story with Ben which I thought was fine, but I think OLTL was bolder in the storytelling. AMC was the the voters' darling. I think voters don't always watch the shows and just nominate the same shows and people. If a storyline gets a lot of attention, they might nominate the performers, but the daytime emmys tended to just stick with the same people and shows even when the shows or performers didn't have the material. It appears to be worse now at the primetime Emmys where two or three shows will dominate all the categories.

It's so infuriating to think about just how much excellent work Gottlieb put out and the show was never nominated while others consistently got nominated for subpar material. I remember the show got criticism for the AIDS quilt storyline. Marlena de LaCroix (of the current BTG debacle) was particularly harsh. They always found something to attack the show with. You would have thought Gottlieb had borrowed money from these writers and not paid them back. The attacks got so personal at times.

I went back to Clint Ritchie's website and he had a lot of media on there. There are some interviews and it's obvious he still had a lot of anger about Clint being portrayed as homophobic. Even when he left the show, he kept bringing up 1992 in the interviews. I can't imagine how Roy Thinnes and Slezak felt about the whole thing if Ritchie were this upset. The interviewer taunts him at one point by asking him what he thinks of Slezak not wanting Viki and Clint to ever reunite (think this was just before he left the show). He's gracious about it but he does not act surprised.

Thanks @Vee for the explanation. I wondered about Clint's role in the Billy/homophobia storyline because Slezak did not usually badmouth her costars (save for Marcia Cross). She called out Ritchie's behaviour around this time (think it was him throwing a chair as I don't have the oral history book with me) and that's why I thought maybe they were going too far (as you point out) as a way to give audiences a reason to dislike him if they had to write him off. He certainly thought so but I think some of that was Gottlieb making him stop drinking. It's really s shame because he's so talented,, but I can imagine he'd be hell to work with based on the bts reports.

Wasn't Clint's part in the homophobia/gay storyline a bit influenced by the fact that Gottleb was tired of his alcoholism and his on-set behaviour? I know in the oral history book that one of the conditions for his employment was his sobriety. I wonder if this storyline was being used as an escape hatch so to speak if he didn't succeed.

I haven't watched soaps in a while so I can't comment. The last time I remember a casting problem on GH (minus the Kelly Monaco scandal) was everyone wanting Wes Ramsay gone and Valentini refusing to fire him for the longest time. I guess it would depend on the circumstances and how it was handled (re: worthless characters). I would need to trust the EP and I never did. As a viewer, I just grew tired of so many regime changes and firings that I'm resistant to quick firings, but I can see where they would be useful for characters who just aren't working. Crystal Hunt would be someone I would have fired immediately. I try to give actors and characters a chance, but sometimes I've just had enough. I even felt bad for the character of Emily during the Sloan harassment storyline. I would have found a way to redeem her. Mauceri is such a sad case because she was so good as Carlotta. I also don't shed a tear. I have no sympathy for that sort of person. Not one drop.

Mauceri was nothing but a hypocrite but then I've never encountered a homophone who isn't one. She can act in a gay love story (I think I do) and has no problem with that, but then must have had some conversion in between that and the Kyle/Fish storyline. I noticed she NEVER talked about that movie when she was whining about being fired. It didn't fit into her martyr role she wanted to cultivate. I'm afraid to know what Tonja Walker may have said about the situation as I don't want to think any less of her than I do already. I'm not sure what I think about quick exits for characters who aren't working. When new regimes come in and there's a quick turnover, it does alienate me. I think execs should look at a show and try to make existing pieces work. I prefer when characters who never interacted with each other are suddenly thrown together in exciting ways. Obviously, there are performers who are not working, but if I used that as a measuring stick, I would have fired Strasser for a while after her return (not to be a broken record, but egads I can't take her screeching and I've stopped watching OLTL clips for the moment because of her).

Patricia Mauceri also conveniently forgot that she was in a gay film, I think I Do when she was going on her "I can't do a gay storyline" tour. Tuc Watkins was in the same film so I wonder what he thought of her behaviour.

Thank you @DRW50for that Carmen Duncan interview. Such a fantastic and underrated actress. She was my Iris as I never saw McKinsey in the role. Duncan deserved an Emmy for her work. A shame she was never given the acclaim she deserved. I also don't understand how they just wrote off the character of Larry. He just faded away as if he didn't even matter. So odd to me that shows do that as if viewers won't notice. We notice things like that. I was not watching then, but when I went back this summer and watched some the last months of his tenure, I missed Larry. I can't imagine what longterm viewers thought at the time.

Thank you Vee for the explanation. I must have really blocked her out. This is my fave period of OLTL and yet I remember nothing. And Thanks @Maximfor the extra information. I think I also confused her with Crystal Chappell's character at first--another character that didn't work.

I have no memory of this Maggie character, even though I watched during this time. I do remember liking Cain and Tina, and I especially liked the Angela storyline. I also think they didn't know what to do with Alex once they decided to keep her so she went from vicious to comic to threatening to comic, etc. I don't know if I would have the same reaction now that I did then. I recently rewatched 1990's AW and I pretty much had the same reaction I did back in 1990 so who knows? Humour on soaps tends not to age well so I'm worried about reliving some of this. I know Gottlieb's more dramatic stuff has aged very well except for some parts of Cassie's miscarriage storyline (mainly Strasser's terrible performance).