Broderick

My biggest takeaway from 2025 on BTG is how well Karla Mosley & Daphnee Duplai have grown into leading ladies.

Probably what Ted should have said is, "Nicole, ole weird-ass Leslie is running around saying Vernon is having an affair with Sharon. Now, I believe she's wrong. But on the off-chance she's right, I wanted to let you know about it so you wouldn't think I'm keeping secrets from you. She's most likely wrong, though." How hard would that have been?

I really enjoyed the Christmas episode with Vernon singing "Joy to the World" and "Never Can Say Goodbye". (Hard to believe Dani & Beautiful even considered ruining Anita's Xmas with that silly third-hand account of Vernon's "affair" with Sharon. It's painful enough that LESLIE believed it, and even dumber that TED would believe Leslie's story, and downright RIDICULOUS that Nicole would believe Ted's testimony about it.) The payoff of Clifton Davis singing was probably worth the silliness of the circumstances though, I guess.

Ours always went up late, too -- because one of the kids (me 😆) insisted on keeping it up till January 6th for the wise men's arrival. Mama was afraid it would burn the house down if they decorated it in early December and left it up till Epiphany. Now that I'm an adult with my own place, we just wait and decorate it on Christmas Eve.

Meet your first! We brought our inside Sunday and plan to decorate it Wednesday afternoon. That'll give us our twelve days (plus one extra), which seems like more than enough to me. I'd be tired of it if it sat there from Thanksgiving till Epiphany.

They messed that up. Mrs. Bell isn't related to Irna. Bell often told the story about his introduction to Irna. He was working for a Chicago ad agency. He heard Irna might be looking for an assistant writer, as one of her writers was leaving. He called Irna's secretary and was advised to submit a sample script. He did. But the writer who was thinking of leaving decided to stay. Several months later (or years later), he crossed paths with a lady who said she was Irna Phillips's niece. He said, "I sent your aunt a script one time, but nothing came of it." The niece said, "I believe she's looking for someone right now." The niece mentioned her conversation with William Bell to Irna, and Irna said, "If you see him again, tell him I need an assistant. I believe he's the boy who's married to the talk show hostess, and he sent me a script once." That time they connected, and she hired him.

No pushback from me. When there are TOO many female writers, the Lifetime movie effect generally begins creeping in. Needs more male input. A balance is always good.

Miss Nicole is perfect ... You nailed it; she's distant and kinda cold, but she's so pretty and so engaging that you can't help being drawn in.

If I were getting something delivered from Dooky Chase, I'd get the pompano or the veal panne -- not that damn ole gumbo. Winterfest hit all the right marks for me -- it's like those countless parties we ALL attend in early December -- overhyped during the planning, and then it's just a basic party where somebody gets drunk off their ass [in this case, Vanessa]. From a dramatic standpoint, I thought it served its purpose -- it highlighted Kat's isolation from her childhood & from the people she's loved all her life; it gave Leslie another chance to torment Laura & Mona; it showcased Bill's nostalgia for Dani Dupree & her family; it struck a note of jealousy in Theodore when he saw Beautiful enter the club with her new beau; and it started Beautiful's "healing process" from all the hurt she's felt since learning of Ted's betrayal. And best of all, it caused Drab Ashley to leave in an even more MOROSE mood than usual. My only complaint is that the writers seem to think we're as DUMB as Leslie about Vernon's meetings with Sharon. I thought it was clever to create a situation where Leslie gets the wrong idea and can potentially make a fool of herself, but the writers seem to think we're all as stupid as Leslie about a series of voice lessons. Hopefully, we ain't. One thing the writers have done well is consistently show us the kind of person Senator Dupree is. No sense in trying to trick US into thinking he's suddenly changed.

Having adult kids is the most interesting thing I see about him. Maybe Kat can trade-in that dud she's stuck with for one of Dr. Rollins's kids, lol.

I imagine the writers considered dramatizing the scene involving Madison, Chelsea, and Willow but decided it could easily backfire from a medical perspective. Either Willow would've had to go WAY over the top with her observations, or else her commentary would've come across to many viewers as completely reasonable, especially with Chelsea sitting there smiling & encouraging her, while Madison frowned in frustration. The end result, unless Willow was presented as TOTALLY bizarre, would've appeared that Michele Val Jean supported the position that a "smile and a crystal" are more effective than an antibiotic in clearing up an infection, and I don't believe that's the impression BTG hoped to give. In this case, it was probably better for everyone to discuss it afterwards to highlight that Willow is down in an internet rabbit hole, and Chelsea was encouraging it. As Anita said today, "I thought Aunt Melba was completely normal and fine in the brief amount of time I spent with her, but I realized Vernon and his mother had FAR more experience with her than I did."

I had nothing against Maurice Johnson, but I'm crazy about Keith D. Robinson. I believe he came along at a difficult time -- "after the damage to Ted had already been done", so to speak --- but I can't imagine anyone else in the role now.

Not at all. The entire storyline with Victor & Nikki wouldn't have happened with Erica Hope, lol. There was an undeniable chemistry in Braeden's "Dracula" character playing opposite Melody's "I-just-need-to-be loved" dingbat stripper/cultist/lingerie model. It wouldn't have flown with Erica Hope's more conniving, manipulative version of Nikki. The Nikki character's motivations softened, and she became someone we were (usually) rooting for when Miss Thomas took over in 1979.

🤣🤣

Gosh, I had no idea those two "actresses" were actually "TV people" until I came to the board. I assumed they were a pair of ghouls who'd auditioned for the role of June last summer, got passed over, and someone pulled out their headshots from a file folder and said, "Get these two on the phone & ask them to play the country club hags on December 1st."

Melody Thomas as Nikki Reed on Y&R was completely different from Erica Hope. Erica Hope always seemed grouchy, angry, and casually whorish, while Melody Thomas debuted as more of a smiling, airheaded dingbat who could be easily convinced to do anything, no matter how lurid it was. I felt like the audience warmed up to her immediately. (Though I still think of her as the New Nikki, lol.)

Same here. I can tell the difference in the dialogue writers. I can also tell some difference in the directors. For me, what distinguishes a "good episode" from a "lousy episode" is (a) what material the headwriting team gave the breakdown writer to work with, (b) whether the dialogue is crisp and realistic, and (c ) what choices the director makes in presenting the scenes.

I can't tell one breakdown writer's work from another.

Because Kay Alden (a female writer living in Chicago who had a big crush on Eric Braeden) wanted to write some scenes for Lori Brooks (a female writer living in Chicago who had a big crush on Victor). The whole storyline was self-indulgent and foolish.

She told Vanessa to "DOUBLE her offer" on the Jarvis house. The Jarvis family accepted the doubled price. Assuming the house has an appraised value of $2,000,000, she's theoretically paid the Jarvis family $4,000,000 for the house. The bank would loan Leslie 80% of the appraised value ($1,600,000), and Leslie had to pay the balance with cash at closing --- $2,200,000. She only had ONE million. Where the hell did she get the rest?! And now she's got contractors working on the house all day & half the night. Who's paying THEM? I keep thinking all this will crash around her. Either that or the writers have absolutely no idea the limits of a million dollars. Sounds like a "lot of money", but it obviously ain't when we look at Leslie's spending since she got that million dollar check in August.

My (dim) recollection is Eileen Davidson met Brenda Epperson in a restaurant where Brenda was waiting tables. Brenda said, "Oh my God, you're Eileen Davidson. People are always saying I resemble you." Eileen told Brenda she was leaving Y&R, Brenda auditioned, and they hired her based on her physical resemblance to Miss Eileen.

Thanks, I never saw her on One Life to Live. My only exposure to her was on Capitol.

I never thought Catherine Hickland was anything special. Other people liked her, I guess.

From day one, I've never detected one iota of chemistry or passion between Ashley & Andre. I'll never buy the two of them as "star-crossed" lovers. He's got no reason in the world to give a rat's ass about her, and she's got no reason in the world to think he's anything spectacular. That's a thread that needs to be developed more carefully or else dropped entirely IMHO.

I dunno. I gave Capitol a half-hearted chance but just didn't care for the show at all. If I remember right, Julie & Jordy were the only two characters who appealed to me. Then Julie was recast with an actress I've never especially cared for. And the writing never seemed to gel on the show, so I abandoned it. I'm surprised it lasted 5 whole years. Y&R was a mess from the spring of 1980 till the spring of 1982, and any actor would've probably fared as well as another on the show. It lacked purpose and direction until about June of 1982, when it started another upswing.