Broderick

14 hours ago, Khan said:

The only season of DYNASTY that ever meant anything at all to me was the first season.  

The 1st season was my favorite by far.  (Yes, it was a little slow & sluggish, and the ratings were generally poor; if they hadn't made some drastic changes, there likely wouldn't have been a season 3.)  

That said, the first season had a thoughtfulness and honesty about it.  Who'd have thought in 1981 we'd be seeing a weekly show with a sad-eyed, gay son, and an aggressive daughter who acts out because Daddy won't treat her like a "real man"?  Those were fairly new concepts for TV, and the scenes for the most part were played with love and sensitivity.  

I could tolerate Season 2, which was more-or-less an extension of Season 1, although the focus began to shift from two characters I really enjoyed (Steven & Fallon) to a character that I considered fairly cartoonish and ill-conceived (Alexis). 

By about the 5th Season, the camp factor had become so great the show was practically a self-parody.  

1 hour ago, kalbir said:

@Broderick Come to think of it, Y&R's action/adventure storylines were quite tame in comparison to the more outlandish action/adventure storylines on General Hospital and Days in that same era. I still feel those storylines didn't really suit Y&R

I don't think many of us would look back and say, "Wow!  Those crime syndicate stories were great!!"  lol.  They tended to be pretty ludicrous.  But they did tend to spring organically from the characters; they were never isolated islands of stupidity.  

That first "mafia" storyline circa 1982 was built around the (alleged) "Hot Hips" tape of Nikki (which sprang directly from Nikki's determination to headline at the Bayou), and Paul's infiltration of Pete Walker & Tony DiSalvo's inner circle played on all the fears Mary & Carl had about their son going astray from their Catholic family values (which they were also dealing with, on a less dire level, with Patty's decision to move in with Jack Abbott).  No matter how stupid the story became -- or how convoluted the situation with Cindy Lake and Pam Warren got -- the storyline constantly rippled back to Victor Newman, Kevin Bancroft, and Allison Bancroft, to Mary and Carl, to Andy, to Patty, and to many other characters. 

That storyline also introduced us to Jazz Jackson.  And it was Jazz's involvement with Mr. Anthony that led to "Round 2", where we learned Jazz had been working for Mr. Anthony in order to pay Tyrone's college tuition, and Tyrone was coming to town to work for the prosecutor's office.  All of this led to the romance between Tyrone and Amy, and then to the "Leon Monroe" disguise, Amy's heartbreak over thinking Ty was dead, Tyrone as the Franciscan Friar on Xmas Eve kneeling beside Amy at church, Ty disguising himself as Caucasian so that he could move about Genoa City freely again, and then to Alana Anthony falling in love with Ty. 

Yes, it was all VERY stupid, but in each case, the emotional beats were always played, and when the stories were finally over, you could look back and say, "Well, that wasn't as TERRIBLE as I thought it would be."  lol.       

Not to beat a dead hoss, but back to Whitewashed Tyrone for a minute, and the historical context of the storyline.

Isn't this the first time CBS daytime had even toyed with the concept of an interracial relationship?   

ABC's One Life to Live had touched on the subject of racial identity back in the late 1960s or early 1970s with the character played by Ellen Holly, who for a short time "passed as white" although she was Sadie Gray's daughter.  She had a white boyfriend while she was "passing", and then she had a Black boyfriend after she was "outed" as being Black.  [Another storyline that no writer would likely TOUCH in today's environment.]

NBC had experimented with Valerie Grant and David Banning on Days of our Lives in the mid-1970s, but this was "safer" to the viewers because the male was white, and the female was Black.  (Same as the ABC scenario.)

I don't think CBS had even opened the Pandora's Box yet of attempting an interracial storyline, let alone a storyline involving a handsome Black male and a pretty blonde female.  

With Whiteface Tyrone, Bill Bell gave us such a storyline, with virtually no backlash at all from viewers.  We all knew Ty was Black, and there he was courting Alana Anthony, becoming engaged to her, marrying her, and having a scene in a honeymoon suite with her.  This just wasn't something that was done on CBS daytime in 1985, but Y&R did it.  Would viewers back then have tolerated it without the whiteface?  Probably not. 

I do remember this -- after Ty took off all that preposterous make-up and Alana came to grips with the fact she'd been deceived, she asked Tyrone, "Why did you have to lie to me?  I would've loved you anyway."  Ty then kissed her on the lips, without his whiteface on, and this was something you just didn't expect to see on TV in the 1980s. 

Nowadays, such a retro-situation seems quaint, outdated, peekaboo-ish, and AWFULLY stoopid, but when we criticize this storyline, let's remember that while ABC and NBC were doing "supercouples on the run" and "mad scientists freeze the world", Bill Bell was quietly giving us Y&R's very first interracial love story, in a context that was probably appropriate for the time and that viewers -- who were younger and more open-minded back then -- didn't immediately reject as being "too much" for their sensitivities. 

3 minutes ago, kalbir said:

So we could've gotten a Nathan/Amy/Dru triangle.

I think that was his original plan.  But he stupidly brought Stephanie back without a contract while he phased in the storyline, and then *poof* she got a job on GH, and it was back to just Nathan until Dru's arrival. 

9 minutes ago, kalbir said:

Katherine/Marge got JC her second Lead Actress Emmy nomination, but it was one of those second/third tier storylines that Bill Bell gave to the main females in 1989 that were not named Cricket or Cassandra.

The Jackson brothers were gone in that cast purge during the EP change from H. Wesley Kenney to Ed Scott. Do you think there was storyline potential with them in the years before the arrivals of the Barber sisters and Winters brothers? I think Jazz could have been a restaurant/bar/nightclub owner and Tyrone could have been another lawyer in town besides Mitchell Sherman and Michael Crawford.

Jazz was interesting, but honestly Jon St. Elwood was more of a "character actor" than a lead.  Phil Morris, though, was a leading man whose time on the show seemed short-circuited, due to the nature of his storyline (the crime syndicate).  And I've always believed dropping Stephanie E. Williams to recurring was one of the biggest mistakes Bill Bell ever made.  Obviously an attractive young lady with her smile and her talent was going to snapped-up by another show; she wasn't gonna wait around indefinitely.

I *suspect* Bill Bell's intention was to give Stephanie a little bit of a rest and then bring her back as the "offset" to Victoria Rowell's Drucilla character.  He CLEARLY intended to contrast Dru with an upper middle-class female rival, which ultimately turned out to be Olivia Winters.  But in his early planning, I'll bet you anything her rival was going to be Amy Lewis.  (You'll recall that Stephanie was brought back to the show following a few months off, then she was snapped-up as Simone on General Hospital, just before Victoria Rowell's debut.)        

3 hours ago, YRfan23 said:

What was your opinion or the audiences general opinion of Marge? Was everyone outraged that after all these years, they were getting a Kay doppelgänger tale? Those stories are typically far fetched even if I thought Kay/Marge was well done. 

I can't speak for everyone of course, but I was a big fan of Jeanne Cooper, and I enjoyed the Kay/Marge storyline because it gave Miss Cooper something to play.  (For several years prior, she'd been merely a mother figure to Nikki, a sparring partner for Jill, and the "protector" of Phillip III.)  It was a fairly stupid storyline, but it showcased Jeanne Cooper's versatility in a new way -- she got to portray Kay Chancellor as a captive, Marge as a waitress, Marge masquerading as Kay Chancellor, and even Kay Chancellor masquerading as Marge masquerading as Kay.  Most of Miss Cooper's work during the storyline, in my opinion, was spot-on.  

1 hour ago, AMCOLTLLover said:

Tyrone had such story? When I started he was around for 6 months and didn’t had much to do before he left. Lol

That was Ty's *big story*.  He came on the show as Jazz Jackson's younger brother from law school, and immediately he was involved with (the beautiful) Amy Lewis.  He was soon masquerading as "Leon Monroe", a Cool Pimp Bro who was the polar opposite of Tyrone (and totally unbelievable), then as the straight-laced white man Robert Tyrone (as unbelievable as Leon Monroe, just in a different way.)  Once the *disguises* came to an end, Ty was soon gone.  It was a waste of a decent and fairly handsome actor, but it was the times we lived in.  

On 5/10/2023 at 12:40 AM, kalbir said:

Whiteface Tyrone would not fly today and I don't know how Bill Bell got away with it.

That storyline was part of the mob angle during the H. Wesley Kenney years. Action/adventure was the 1980s trend Y&R got wrong, those storylines didn't suit Y&R.

 

The "whiteface" storyline didn't seem so offensive (or absurd) at the time, because soaps were telling such weird "sci-fi" type storylines.  Between 1980 and 1985, we'd seen shows telling stories about controlling the world's weather, searching for Aztec treasure, sending subliminal messages through video discos, and all types of nonsense.  That's about the time Dynasty even gave us a flashing UFO with space aliens. Y&R was clearly on the wrong track with the whiteface man versus the mobsters tale, but somehow it seemed more "reality-based" than what some of the other shows (specifically ABC) were offering.  I remember laughing at Tyrone's rather nerdy and ineffective disguise, but compared with some of the fare we were getting from the competition, it all seemed fairly benign.  Politically correct? Nope.  The least bit believable?  Nope.  But not as weird as little green Martians abducting Fallon, probably.      

On 4/17/2023 at 7:43 PM, Paul Raven said:

Wasn't that just a stunt photo put out to hype interest and speculation about Bobby's return -with no intention of going that route?

Yes.  My recollection is they scripted a lot of different false scenarios, filmed a few of them, and staged photos of others.  Some tabloid (National Enquirer?) was digging through the trash outside Lorimar studios for scraps of scripts, planting "spies" inside the studio and so forth, in order to get the "scoop" on Patrick Duffy's return.  Anticipating this, Katzman (or whoever was producer at the time) threw the tabloids off-track by leading them to believe Duffy would be playing an imposter, a never-before-heard-of brother, and a mangled Bobby who'd been in a coma.  These were all red herrings to feed the media, though, because they'd always intended to bring him back as Plain Ole Bobby, as that's the only way long-time fans would've been satisfied.  

14 hours ago, Paul Raven said:

Y&R has a history of SORASING characters , giving them half hearted stories and then dropping them.

In recent years we've had Charlie, Mattie, Reed, Moses, Faith and going further back there was Fen,Ricky, Noah...

Next batch up we'll probably see Johnny, Katie and Connor - maybe even this Summer

I never figured out the point of SORASing Charlie & Mattie.  They never had any teen stories at all.  Then they went away to school and have rarely been mentioned since.  

Moses and Faith had a few vague conversations about college and vanished.  

All four of them could've been random strangers, for all they contributed to the fabric of the show.  

The entire writing staff was still credited in the gala scenes.  I've said it before -- most of them seemed lazy and mechanical.   Sorry the breakdown writers lost their jobs, but they weren't exactly knocking it out of the park.  The gala scenes highlight that.   

23 hours ago, Paul Raven said:

So can anyone explain the Phyllis story?

She has faked her death, which in itself has been glossed over, for what reason?

 

Plus she went on a long diatribe in the GCAC about, "And, YOU, Diane -- you let your son believe you were DEAD!!  What kind of mother does THAT to her children?!  I could never, never do that to Dan-yell or Summer."  But then she did.  

In addition to the "social relevance" of his rape stories, Bill Bell seemed to find rape a convenient way to pop the cherry of a virginal heroine.  In Cricket's case, Daddy wanted the character to be sexually active (Danny and then Paul), but likely didn't want to write a scene where Princess willingly gave it up and enjoyed it.  

Not to mention, Melody Thomas made some phenomenal Miss Piggy faces during Phyllis's rant.  

About time!  It ain't an anniversary without Shimmy.  

29 minutes ago, ranger1rg said:

I think that font change is much too small. I prefer the current, new font…perhaps a little smaller.

And again, I think the skyline is fine. Overall, the new open is a success in my eyes.

I agree about the font.  Never cared for those tiny names with no capital letters.  

34 minutes ago, Antoyne said:

Gosh I feel so spoiled by this episode with a big moment with a lot of the cast AND extras. These gala episodes are going to make when we go back to empty hotels, empty crimson lights, and empty society; extremely jarring.

Sure has been nice the past few days to see a show that resembles Y&R.  And yes, it'll be jarring to go back to the desolate, tumbleweed version of Genoa City.  

20 minutes ago, Dylan said:

It was in 2019 so I sorta forget now but, I think he and Joll separated at that point. He hired Amanda to come in, pretended to be Chance and challenged the will. Forget how but it was changed, made to look like Cane inherited the billions not Devon

 

Seems like the idea was that Tucker had somehow improperly gotten the will altered to ensure Devon inherited the *billions*.  But really Colin was playing a trick to get the will switched so Cane would inherit the *billions*.  Devon thought Tucker had engaged in some trickery and signed over the *billions*, and then Colin left with the money, laundered it (?) and then redeposited it in Devon's account -- or something like that.  It was too stupid for words.  

I agree about Jack.  They keep him in the heart of the story, but I think his usefulness as a leading man is (long) over. 

To be honest, all of those old high-priced actors from the 1970s and 1980s (Nikki, Victor, Paul, and Jack) should still be seen sporadically in recurring capacity, while a new generation should've been groomed (years ago) to drive the storylines. 

It's a case of running on the fumes of past glories, I guess.    

Yeah, I doubt there was an malice toward him.  He was playing a somewhat peripheral character, and he was a highly-paid veteran from the Big Salary Era.  They couldn't keep him on contract; that was obvious.  The writing had been on the wall for a while.  

They didn't KILL HIM OFF the way they did Don Diamont's character.  They basically said, "We can't afford you right now, and we don't really *need* you right now.  We're going to put you aside.  When we have a scene for you, and when we can afford you, we'll give you an episode."  That's about the best they could do.  

He should be out living the good life -- doing other things, such as stage work or nighttime guest work -- and when his schedule allows, and when TPTB can afford him, they'd be more than happy to work him in for a day or two.  

No reason at all to be bitter or to feel slighted.  

If the show lasts a few more years, we'll undoubtedly see the same thing happen to other, more ingrained veterans (such as Nikki, Jack, and Victor).  

15 minutes ago, Paul Raven said:

he needs to be more positive on his page and share anecdotes about Paul

My sentiments exactly.  I don't believe anyone in the audience hates Paul or even especially dislikes Paul.  Most of us have been his fans at one time or another.  A positive attitude on his part -- even if it's fake -- would create more anticipation for his return and more nostalgia for the role he played so well for 40 years.  

Oh yes.  Kids in my class used to call her "that bitch Lauren".  It was practically her proper name.  Whenever Traci would appear happy for a day or two, viewers would start saying, "I wonder when That Bitch Lauren is going to slap her back down."  

Bill Bell realized pretty quickly that she could play vulnerable as well as haughty, so he started mixing it up with her.  She'd be utterly hateful one minute, and the next minute she would realize her mother never loved her, she'd cry, she'd yell at whoever was around her, and then she'd run call Traci a fat girl.  

It was only when Shawn came onto the scene that she became "pitiful" -- but even then, you couldn't help noticing that she "used" Shawn to gain herself publicity and fame.  She became a sort of "unintentional victim", and that sort of turned the tide for her in a more positive direction.      

3 hours ago, Paul Raven said:

 

I think Kristoff,CLB and DD were all made recurring and asked to keep quiet and that they would be included in the opening and shown as contract in the credits.

 

Yes, I believe Christian LeBlanc is recurring, although he's still featured in the credits with the contract cast.

CLB often has only one appearance per month. 

But he doesn't seem especially bothered by it.  He still participates in show activities, he posts positive things about the show on his social media accounts,  and he seems free to do what he likes (such as appearing in the off-Broadway production of "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof".  During his diminished airtime, he's remained a team player, and TPTB seem to want to include him.  

Intentionally or not, Doug went in the opposite direction, retweeting negative things that fans passed along to him, complaining about not being appreciated, sharing tweets that make him appear critical of the show.  He also adopted a sense of "finality" -- I guess they don't want me anymore, I guess I'm finished here, I know where I'm not wanted.  

This probably reinforces SONY's position that he's better off excluded.  

1 hour ago, vetsoapfan said:

Suzanne Lynch was another hard-to-take-seriously plot point character. I've always thought she was used to garner sympathy for Katherine, after all Mrs. C's egregious, earlier behavior. 

I would agree with that.  Suzanne graced our screens strictly to make us feel sorry for Kay Chancellor, just as Shawn Garrett popped-up a few years later strictly to make us feel sorry for the bitchy, smirking Lauren Fenmore.  

Vanessa was more of a plot point than a character.  Bell wanted to "redeem" Lorie to a certain extent -- she'd been pretty awful in her earlier years -- and the best thing he could come up with was a Wicked Mother-in-Law who would manipulate Lorie, making Lorie come across a Hapless Victim for a change.  

I always thought the Vanessa Prentiss role was an utter waste of KT Stevens.  

2 hours ago, edgeofnik said:

@Paul Raven Thanks for the great info on intros.

I wonder if TEON (June 1980) was ahead of Texas and GL for P&G soaps. Of course, TEON always had a skyline in its intro. Maybe that's why I like it a little more than some.

I never watched Texas, but EON was ahead of Guiding Light.  When EON debuted its "faces" in June of 1980, Guiding Light was still using the "sunshine through the leaves".