wonderwoman1951

look forward to hearing your thoughts after you watch the interview.

cbs sunday morning (19 january) includes a segment on ‘beyond the gates’ hosted by nancy giles. while i love the show, i’ve always resented, and, frankly, never understood, the short shrift they’ve given the p&g soaps over the years. they acknowledge the recent deaths of gh and days actors, yet ignore the passing of p&g actors who were on cbs for decades - kathryn hays, elizabeth hubbard, lisa brown, jerry ver dorn — i’m sure there are others i’ve missed.

re james lipton and soaps: interesting to watch his response in his interview for ‘television: an oral history.’ he explicitly downplays the importance of soaps in his career. at 41:43, he says, ‘you’re asking me too much about the soap operas…’ james lipton on soaps

the incoming baby in chief and his suckup free link speaker of the house orders capitol flag raised for inaugration

haven’t watched any of the daytime talk shows in ages, but i hit the mute button wherever that commercial where she screams ‘bingo’ comes on. same for that lume commercial that is on ALL THE TIME.

here’s irna on ‘to tell the truth’ in 1958: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LgjdA3L19hA

really makes me wish i had photocopied his gl longterm. anyone close enough to madison to drop by?

i was working on a ‘world turns project in 1996, when i came across marland’s original gl longterm with his papers at the wisconsin historical society in madison (the atwt longterm is not — why i don’t know). stupidly, i did not make a copy. the only thing of note that i remember is that he originally intended for nola and kelly to be the end game — a story i would have to seen unfold.

True. But wasn't he at GL for a much shorter time than he was at ATWT? I think he was at ATWT for 8-years. Perhaps he had plans to mine GL's history, but did not have the opportunity. thoughts on marland’s long term from tom casiello. here’s the link: https://casiello.blogspot.com/2009/01/great-marlands-ghost-part-one.html “a treasure trove of long stories I've accumulated from different shows over the years. Some of them are long stories that made it to air... some of them didn't. Some of them were written by the head writers who were working for the show at the time, and others were "auditions" by people who hoped to one day hold the title. But there is one I value more than any of the rest, and that's Douglas Marland's proposed long story from 1985. I discovered it when I was cleaning out the filing cabinets from the CBS Studios on 57th Street before World Turns moved to Midwood, Brooklyn in 2000. My inner fan in a state of shock, literally salivating over the gold mine I had just discovered, I quickly made a photocopy of it and packed it away with the rest of the documents. I plowed through all one hundred and fifty seven pages that night, and then sealed it up in an envelope and put it away on my bookshelf, my mind spinning with everything I had read. And there it sat, until last week... when I rediscovered it.“

i believe this is what’s called a specious argument.

even through the height of oj, there were fans (myself included) who poured over weekly and digest. when i interviewed laurie caso in 1996, he told me that the plan was to bring all of the snyder kids back to the farm. i’ve talked with him a number of times over the years and always found him to be a straight shooter. were there budget issues? maybe. but according to caso, it was lisa brown who leaked to weekly and the fact that an actor knew about the fire and hit the panic button suggests (at least to me) that the show was serious.

cannot make this up… the guests on the first episode of ‘finding your roots’ are lea salonga and amanda seyfried. not only were both on ‘world turns, but lea was there in 2001 and 2003, amanda 1999-2001. so the two of them may have been n oakdale at the same time.

just read of peter yarrow’s — peter, paul, and mary — passing. free link: peter yarrow obit

there are so many examples, but this one really illustrates that point. in her locher room interview, she had the audacity to compare herself to steven bochco. she was address the ‘friends of jlll’ issue and said something along the lines that ‘well, bochco had his stable of actors, so why shouldn’t she.’ well, jill, yes, bochco often brought to people into his shows — BUT THEY WERE NEW SHOWS! — not soaps that had been on the air for decades, where viewers were emotionally invested in characters and who resented when those characters were pushed aside for jll’s favorites. while this is a rather blatant example, it perfectly illustrates how the people in charge of making — and fixing — soaps have absolutely no understanding of why viewers watch soaps.

What survives of Lemay's AW run shows very wealthy characters who have rich inner lives and react in believable ways. And in Marland-era ATWT, you had many rich characters who were still grounded and felt real. The funny part is that the whole idea of soaps being about camp and OTT and glamour became bigger just as the budgets became smaller. Even Y&R and B&B, which were the most "glam" (although outside of some location shoots I always thought B&B looked a bit cheap to be honest), did not survive without huge slashings. You also have to ask what DOES glamourous mean in 2025? Kim Hughes sitting down in her Patterns chair had glamour...does a never-ending supply of veneers, Botox, Ozempic, and wearing American flag bikinis at Maralago? Does the increasingly desiccated Bravo circuit? That's why I don't really need whatever turgid idea of camp or money is around in recent years. I'm happy to save that for whatever Jamey Giddens/Ron Carlivati parody project is in the works next. interesting observation that as budgets decreased, camp and glam increased. and, yes, what does glam even mean these days? didn’t watch much of aw’s later years, so i can’t say much there. but as for doug marland’s ‘world turns,’ he inherited both lucinda walsh and james stenbeck, but brought on the snyders (based on his own family). and while no one in oakdale was likely to wind up on food stamps (even when the snyders were in trouble, someone always bailed them out), the hughes and stewarts all worked for a living.

not so much about economic status or class, what i miss is soaps with characters grounded in reality and emotional authenticity. apple tv+ opened their vault over the weekend and i watched ‘shrinking’. the characters were largely well-educated, extremely well-paid professionals. but the relationships between and among the characters were grounded in familiar and relatable emotional conflicts — parent and child, spouses, friends, colleagues. would be nice if ‘behind the gates’ is at least emotionally grounded, but i’m not holding my breath.

this OTT phenomenon began in the early 80s, with the ascent of primetime soaps — dallas, and in particular, dynasty — that coincided with the ‘luke and laura’ juggernaut. but soaps had already been around for 30+ years — something that get often gets lost in the shuffle. soap fans of a certain age:) remember — and pine — the time when soaps focused on intimate interpersonal relationships between and among family and friends — rather ordinary people familiar to many viewers. here and there some of that slack has been taken up in primetime and streaming. i’ll have a look at ‘behind the gates’ if only to see tamara tunie, but, and i’m paraphrasing here, i have to agree with the poster above who said that in daytime, that ship as sailed

you’re a better reader than me! i’ve never been able to get through it.

link to ajc cartoon: eternal reunion

agreed about that monstrosity around reva’s neck. but, oh what a treat to see such long scenes — in particular, frisco and tony on gh.

whit’s murder trial unfolded while i was working in clinical research lab that had a meeting friday afternoons. ordinarily, we would have ended in enough time that i watch the show in the patient lounge however, that day there was a guest speaker. since i didn’t have a vcr, i excused myself for a potty break and never returned my feelings exactly!

@Soapsuds thanks so much for posting this episode. what a treat! some many memories of what soaps used to be

much as i loathe the health care industrial complex, i’m with vanessa friedman regarding the sexual objectification of the shooter: “But in all the hoo-ha over hotness — and, potentially, the way such stories often get rewritten and recreated by history — what gets lost is the violence, as well as the victims.” here’s the free link: luigi mangione jimmy kimmel went into even more detail: jimmy kimmel outs his staff

i can’t remember lisa brown and john wesley shipp ever sharing a scene as iva and doug on ‘world turns, which i assumed was because it was only a few years after their time on guiding light as nola and kelly.

interesting piece in the ny times (free link). of the six, three were on general hospital. glad to see kathryn hays included so many times the p&g actors aren’t deceased soap stars