wonderwoman1951

with some stiff competition from jackie zeman

the best of everything — novel to film to soap (premiered on the same day as ‘a world apart’

insightful consideration of micki grant’s impact on theater. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/27/theater/micki-grant-i-cant-cope.html?action=click&module=Well&pgtype=Homepage&section=Theater

micki grant’s ny times obit: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/25/theater/micki-grant-dead.html?action=click&module=Well&pgtype=Homepage&section=Obituaries

re lois smith: one of my favorite actresses. check her out in in the wigs series ‘ruth and erica.’ can’t remember where i read it, so i don’t remember the details. but lois smith wasn’t available, so eileen fulton was cast as ‘world turns’ lisa. hard to imagine how that role would have evolved had smith been cast.

if it were only a working relationship that bell was leaving, yes, irna’s grudge would be petty. but, as i noted about, there was also a longstanding personal relationship between bill and irna, so i’ve always felt that puts a different spoon on irna’s grudge. i had forgotten the details. i just looked at his oral history of television interview, where he talked about ted corday approaching him about days… bell talks about not being able to do 2 shows, days.. and guiding light. but, by that time, he was working with irna on ‘world turns. have to keep in mind that interview took place in 1998, and it’s pretty clear that bell was already deep into the alziheimer’s that would kill him in 2005. also going to reread ken corday’s memoir to see what he has to say.

she felt betrayed when bill decided he couldn’t continue writing both days… and ‘world turns and chose days… from then on, she saw him as competition. there’s even a school of thought that she agreed to do ‘love is a many splendored thing’ because it was airing opposite days… and she (and fred silverman) thought liamst would destroy days… in the ratings. when that didn’t happen, irna left the show.

indeed! but her relationship with bill bell was complicated. unlike agnes nixon, who was in philadelphia and worked with irna from a distance, bell sat at the card table in irna’s living room for almost 10 years. so she likely missed his company. and over those 10 years, he had provided a lot of support for irna with her children, with whom she had a difficult relationship. i also think irna may have thought of bell as something of a surrogate son.

it’s been a while since i read ken corday’s memoir, but from what i remember, he said that it was irna who encouraged his father to create his own show. she is credited as a co-creator of days… i know there were some lawsuits filed over this (one, i think by her daughter, after irna’s death). i believe irna’s son is still receiving royalties. i also recall that when ted was diagnosed with cancer shortly after days… premiered, irna helped to take up the slack. but, when bill bell took over as headwriter after ted’s death, irna took that as a personal betrayal and, according to bell, the two never spoke again.

don’t know about marland and carly, but according to the kindle single, as the world stopped turning… “When As the World Turn’s head writer, Richard Culliton, first pitched the character of Carly Tenney to executive producer Laurence Caso in early 1995, both saw Carly as the troubled girl who would eventually bring the complexity and longevity of Reva Shayne to Oakdale.”

i did wonder if he had might have bought a paid obituary in the times. one afternoon i was in copley square with some time to kill, so i stopped at the boston public library and looked through the january 1974 ny times on microfiche — found nothing. i suspect someone misread what he had written and it took on a life of its own — one more urban legend.

except lemay did not write her obituary, and did not say he did in ‘eight years…’ here’s what he did write: "Bob Short phoned me the Sunday before Christmas to tell me Irna Phillips had died unexpectedly in her sleep. The news surprised and saddened me for she had seemed indestructible after forty years of creating concurrent worlds of love, divorce, disease, desertion, and illegitimate babies. I glanced through the New York Times for her obituary for several days but none appeared. Dorothy [Lemay's wife] called the newspaper and informed them that the grand old lady of soap opera had died, a fact that some of their readers might find of interest. A week after her death, a brief obituary appeared but it did scant justice to the woman who almost single-handedly evolved the storytelling form that dominates daytime television screens. I did not get along very well with Irna Phillips, but my admiration of her had grown immeasurably as I fought to win acceptance for my ideas. . . ." the obituary he referenced was written by the associated press, and indeed, ‘did scant justice…’

i know that, at least for a while (and i don’t remember exactly when), it was in eileen’s contract that she was last in the credits, and for a time it read just ‘lisa.’

came across this interesting about the seriality of ‘family.’ https://www.wattpad.com/843593336-beyond-seriality

oh yes! he started at atwt in february 1995. in may laurie caso was replaced by john valente. would love to hear what that was like.

don’t know that scott was trying to dictate story — just observing what many fans (myself included) felt. as for actors bring story ideas to writers, it can go either way. actors do know their characters best, and it behooves headwriters to at least listen to actors’ thoughts, especially when it comes to character and story continuity. ‘world turns actors used to complain that they brought doug marland a story idea for their characters, he would use it, but for another character — something i can confirm from first hand experience when a story i suggested for margo and tom went to ellie and kirk. you are not. i noticed it, as have a few people who mentioned it to me.

and then there’s the barbara bloom factor, who arrived at cbs daytime in 2003 and escalated the ‘abcification’ that madd had begun. i’ve heard from a couple of insiders her arrival coincided with goutman’s decline. and, not for nothing, it’s worth noting that both scott and martha were replaced my abc daytime actors. as for eileen, i agree. she always saw herself as the ‘world turn’s star, even after her star had faded. her marriages all ended in divorce, she had no children. it seems as though her life is made up of ‘world turns and her cabaret act, along with her dogs, which is kind of sad.

interestingly, in early 1966, just a few months after irna’s appearance on kup’s show, billy dee williams began on ‘guiding light’ as dr. jim fraizer, and james earl jones joined the cast of ‘as the world turns’ as dr. jerry turner. jones left after a few months, according to helen wagner, to workshop ‘the great white hope’ at the arena stage in washington, dc. atwt did not recast the role of jerry turner. when jones returned to ny later in 1966, he replaced williams at gl, and played the role until returning to washington for ‘hope’s opening in december, 1967. regarding p&g’s position on integrating their soaps: the story surrounding the first african-american actor signed to a contract, rex ingram, is revelatory. in august 1962, ‘the brighter day’ (created by irna phillips) signed ingram to a contract role. a year earlier, p&g had turned over production of ‘brighter day to cbs. production of the show moved from new york to los angeles. several actors chose not to move; characters and stories were dropped and so did the ratings. eventually, not too long before signing ingram, ‘brighter day was moved from it’s late afternoon time slot to the morning, and the show lost half its audience and cbs cancelled it a couple of weeks after ingram premiered. what’s significant here is that it was cbs, not p&g, that decided to integrate the show, which explains a lot about why irna was aiming at p&g, but not cbs.

re irna’s daughter and kathryn hays, that’s a coincidence. however, given what irna told the late robert laguardia about the character of kim, she certainly saw something in the actress that she saw in her self; or far more likely, wished she could have seen in herself. Kim Reynolds is really me, at a much younger age. She's fiercely independent, as I was, and she won't settle for second best. She looks in the mirror and refers to herself as "lady in the mirror." Well, that was her other self, which no one knew about: the true me, the person I always hid from the world. She's having a child out of wedlock, which will only be hers. I adopted two children – Kathy and Tommy – without a husband. We're both the same. And she's going to have that child to prove that a woman can do it alone.

while irna doesn’t mention it in her unfinished memoir, ‘all my worlds, it certainly seems likely. tom hughes was born in 1961, when irna’s son was 20. what’s even more interesting is another character irna named tom. ‘another world’s’ tom baxter, who would impregnate pat matthews. after a botched abortion that left her sterile, pat shot and killed tom. in all my worlds irna tells an affair with a doctor that left her pregnant — a pregnancy that ended with the baby dying in childbirth and irna sterile. reading tom baxter’s character description in the aw bible, then irna’s description of the doctor who ‘left me with next to nothing,’ the connection is hard to miss. in the memoir, irna is candid about her difficult relationship with both of her adopted children, so you have to ask: how her relationship with her son changed between 1961, when tom hughes was born, and 1963-64, when irna was creating ‘another world.’

the royalties irna phillips got were for the shows she created, not the characters. and because she was the co-creator of days…, i believe her son is still collecting royalties. and you are certainly right about executives (and others) saying things or passing rumors around.

i know what she said… but i when i was a freelance writer, any of my former editors would have insisted on independent corroboration before publishing it as fact. so, would love to hear from someone else — or have a look at the contract.

pretty sure headwriters getting royalties for characters is an urban legend. i’ve posed the questions to several headwriters over the years, all of whom said they didn’t. but she’s certainly right about the the exodus of actors after john (the hatchet man) valente replaced laurie caso

lynne adams was on secret storm in the early ‘70s

misspalmer: i got the kindle edition from amazon, but try this: https://www.e-bookdownload.net/search/eight-years-in-another-world