Kane

1 hour ago, slick jones said:

Thank you @DRW50 for the kind words. Sending all my friends at SON a Safe and Happy New Year!

@DRW50 @Paul Raven @Bright Eyes@beebs @robbwolff @John @soapfan770 @vetsoapfan @Vee @AbcNbc247 @Faulkner @Taoboi @depboy @victorlord75 @P.J. @Xanthe @Efulton @Wendy @Errol @Toups @jam6242 @Reverend Ruthledge @dc11786 @Soapsuds @janea4old @Franko @Kane and all the others I may have missed ❤️ ❤️

Cheers to you and everyone else at SON!

5 minutes ago, DRW50 said:

Thanks. I'd never heard that story. Rosie did adore AMC.

She was a gem when it came to promoting soaps. Out of curiosity I looked up the guests from her first season and in addition to Susan Lucci (3 times!), she also interviewed Erika Slezak, Deidre Hall, Genie Francis, Robin Mattson, Darnell Williams & Debbi Morgan (who were on The City at the time), Anthony Geary, Linda Dano, Peter Bergman, Robert S. Woods, Vanessa Marcil, Ruth Warrick, Michael Knight (twice), James Mitchell, Peter Reckell, and Maxwell Caulfield.

1 hour ago, DRW50 said:

@Jonathan An October 2001 Susan Lucci interview on Rosie, and a musical performance from her.

(I checked to see if this was already around but couldn't find it - if it is my apologies)

It starts around 20 minutes.

This person's channel has a lot of Rosie so I'm sure there are plenty of other soap interviews.

As I recall, Susan Lucci was also one of the guests in the show's premiere episode.

I have no idea what season it aired in, but I remember an episode where Peter Bergman was a guest and he told a story about going to the theater in New York sometime after he had transitioned over to Y&R. People in the audience kept recognizing him and calling him "Jack" and Rosie, who was a few rows back, stood up and irately announced, "His name is Dr. Cliff Warner."

7 hours ago, Taoboi said:

I want to say Taggert had one other scene other than the elevator, but I'm probably wrong.

I think his last scene was him meeting up with Trina at Kelly's and then after she left, he took a flask out of his pocket and took a swig.

Some Loving material in the latest round of mixtape uploads:

At around the 51 minute mark of the above there's some footage from Jim & Shana's second wedding, following which there's a short scene with Michael Maguire's short-lived Jeff.

This one features clips from early in Lisa Peluso's run as Ava:

10 hours ago, rsclassicfanforever said:

But there must be a reason why not in the US. Maybe another streaming service will get these episodes for US audience?

@Maxim i will send you a PM

Their FAQ says it's because ABC owns the viewing rights in the US. I gather this means that ABC doesn't own the international rights.

15 minutes ago, vetsoapfan said:

They did bring back Barbara Berger for a while, and had her interact with her family a bit, but the show did very little with her and then just let her fade into oblivion again.

I feel like they brought her back just long enough to establish/re-establish who the character was for viewers so that afterwards anytime Ross and Blake or Holly and Fletcher were busy doing things on screen they could have a throw away line of dialogue explaining that she was looking after the twins or Meg off screen.

1 hour ago, dc11786 said:

Off topic, I had never seen the house Trisha and Steve shared, but it looks like it is similar to Ava and Paul's house in 1991-1992. I doubt its the same location in story, but the set seems to be very similar. 

Parts of that set also turn up in the remodeled version of The Tides.

2 hours ago, dc11786 said:

These two (Shana and Jim) are well positioned with Jim's memory returning just as Shana has learned she was pregnant. I think she miscarries this baby, right? Jimmy is born later, or is this the same pregnancy? 

Shana miscarries this baby after a patented soap opera fall down a flight of stairs, which leads to her and Jim divorcing (pointlessly, IMO, since they end up getting remarried less than a year later). Jimmy is born off screen, between Shana's two runs on the show.

2 hours ago, dc11786 said:

Something I really appreciated in the fragments we are getting is that the writers lean into Lily's childhood abuse in ways I didn't expect. It would be easy to write this story as an old flame comes back to rekindle what once was. There is more at stake for Lily than just that. As an abuse survivor, there have been very few times she has felt romantically safe with someone, which is one of the reasons she talks about with Jack. 

This really struck me as well. I thought that the conversation she and Jack have when she's considering whether to pursue the modeling contract was particularly strong, with her articulating that her trauma (both her abuse by her father and the more recent incident where a date beats her up) makes her afraid of being objectified or doing anything that could invite attention to herself. I wonder if Jack ever expresses any insight regarding how he's pushing her into this in order to give her a consolation prize to make himself feel less guilty about cutting her loose.

4 hours ago, DRW50 said:

Thanks @Franko!

This overlaps with some earlier misdated material but luckily it doesn't overlap very much - those earlier uploads have more of the hostage crisis and Steve being shot.

@Kane This is a real boon for your blog as there are three full or nearly full episodes in this - Steve death aftermath, buildup to his funeral, and his actual funeral. Other important scenes include Harry telling Ned how important he is to him (which may indicate the show had more plans for Ned and maybe Luke Perry wanted to leave) and Cecilia talking with Kate about how she had managed to move on from Steve only to make the same mistakes falling for Rick so quickly. She then decides to leave.

All very rushed so maybe that wasn't the show's choice either, I don't know. It certainly makes no sense to write her out that fast. Kate at one point warns Rick how important Cecila is to her. I hope we get to see more of that relationship someday. There's also a little moment of Rick looking out for Kate. I wish the show had not dropped any relationship between them. 

I'm glad that in 1988 they began phasing out this overly downtrodden look for Kate that looks like something out of 1933. 

@dc11786 These may also be fascinating to you with your analyses of the show.

@slick jones There are a few cast crawls in these. 

Absolutely, lots of interesting stuff in these videos. I recall that a few years ago that channel had some similar videos with mixes of different shows that included footage from the short story where Trisha and Trucker are taken hostage by an escaped convict. That story is from the summer of '91, so they potentially have a treasure trove of years' worth of material that hasn't been seen in decades.

4 hours ago, Franko said:

Oh, I didn't think you were overly critical. I just feared that I was using too much hyperbole. Let's face it, though. Bad is bad, and that was bad.

Wordpress is being annoying with me right now, so this is the perfect chance for me to give a shoutout to @Kane for how much I'm enjoying the Loving blog's continued journey. The recaps brought me there, and the commentary's keeping me.

Thanks! I live in optimism that more episodes will find their way online, but until then I'm happy cataloguing various other aspects of the show.

5 hours ago, DRW50 said:

I don't ever know if it was Colleen Dion's choice to leave but with all the time invested in Cecilia I might have tried more with her too, especially as she was becoming an Ava Jr. 

I think Cecelia had more mileage left as a character, particularly considering her relationship with Rick, who was on the verge of being revealed to be an Alden. Instead of breaking them up, the show could have built them up as a couple and then when the Aldens find out about Rick, he could have felt pressure to break it off, partially because of Cecelia's past with Trisha, and partially because his desire to "fit in" with the family drives him to seek out a woman from an upper class family. The conflict between them could have also created conflict between Alex and Ava (not that they necessarily needed extra conflict since Egypt was on her way to Corinth).

My first soap memory is from Y&R, when Victoria was hiding in a closet and saw Ryan having sex with Nina. I was waaaaay too young to be seeing that, but Grandma wasn't about to turn off the TV just because she was babysitting.

36 minutes ago, Ryanc2 said:

This episode was my first time seeing Cassie which was surprising. I got the sense during all these episodes she is suppose to be the heroine of this story and yet she was barely on in January. However I totally understand and accept how stories would rotate and take turns being front burner, that was part of what I love about classic soap. Maybe I’ll see more of her now that Dinah seems to be losing her absolute [!@#$%^&*]. Dinah is gonna steal that woman’s baby isn’t she? I can feel it. 

I think Laura Wright had a baby at the end of 1998, so that's probably why she isn't on much in early '99.

I'm in January/98 in my own viewing and as much as I like Wright on Loving/The City, I'm finding Cassie kind of annoying and tending to side with Dinah in the Dinah/Hart/Cassie triangle, even though I've never been much of a Dinah fan and she's done some pretty offside things. Of course, I'm also finding myself rooting for Annie because Cynthia Watros is so entertaining now that Annie has gone completely off the rails. Can't wait to see  her grand finale.

1 hour ago, alwaysAMC said:

My Kim Zimmer book just came in the mail today 😂 

Very cheesy cover, but she got some good names to give quotes on how great the book is: Susan Flannery, Alec Baldwin (random), Pamela Long, Paul Rauch, Robert Newman, TV Guide, Soaps In Depth, and others. I'll have to let y'all know what I think when I get around to reading it haha.

She and Alec Baldwin were on The Doctors together.

I hope you post your thoughts on the book as you have been on the show. I've thought about giving Zimmer's book a read for a while, but I've never gotten around to it.

26 minutes ago, DRW50 said:

Roger mostly just had a conscience if it affected him, although there were a few bits here and there. Didn't he look out for Tangie out of loyalty to her parents? 

It wasn't that altruistic. He made Tangie a substitute for Blake and was apparently so creepy about it that Tangie spent the years in between getting away from him and running into him in Springfield believing that he had purchased her to be his child bride. It was only when she got to know Blake that she realized that she realized his feelings for her were paternal and suddenly she and Roger became friends.

1 hour ago, alwaysAMC said:

A-M and Lucy are on their honeymoon, boating around Bermuda, and they hit a storm and they’re becoming lost at sea. Honestly, this story came out of nowhere and doesn’t seem to have a strong purpose - it’s just happening.  There isn’t really a story involved in it, it doesn’t move story along and doesn’t really involve others, so it seems a little odd.  And then they’re saved by some mystery person, who they assumed was a member of the National Guard, but then the Guard says they didn’t dispatch anyone. But now they’ve been back in Springfield for over a week and no more mention of this mystery person. I really hope they revisit that and explain more, or I’ll really be disappointed because that was odd. It couldn’t have been a ghost, and it’s not Christmastime so no magical Santa Claus haha.

It turns out to be much dumber than that.

The purpose of this little side adventure was to introduce the mystery man, though I believe the original plan for the character may have been different from what ultimately ends up happening.

22 hours ago, alwaysAMC said:

Oh and Lucy and Bridget/David haven't had a scene since Marian tried to get 'a room at the boarding house, which is weird because we haven't seen Bridget react to Lucy being alive. I don't even know if Lucy even lives at the boarding house or with AM, but it's sad pretending like Lucy/Bridget/David were never close friends.

I'm pretty sure Lucy and Bridget never even have another scene together for the rest of the time they're both on the show. Bridget isn't even invited to the wedding! The lack of community feeling and continuity of non-romantic relationships during this period is very jarring. Characters suddenly only seem to interact with a handful of other characters, rather than characters across the canvas.

I'm deep into 1997 in my watch right now and find that it's even stranger because the show goes back and forth between ignoring history in order to manufacture some kind of separation between characters (for example, at one point Amanda refers to the Coopers as a family that the Spauldings "barely know," despite her and Alan spending the better part of 1996 going to war with Buzz over 5th street, and Alan has absolutely no reaction when he finds out about something bad that's happened to Abby, which seems pretty out of character given how close they were in 95/96) and ignoring history in order to create a sense of community that doesn't quite fit (characters who couldn't stand Amanda are suddenly acting all buddy buddy with her). The wheels really feel like they're coming off in 1997 (although I know some would argue that the wheels started to come off years earlier).

5 hours ago, DRW50 said:

nothing else was done with her beyond singing and the relationship with Marcus that Rauch never cared about.

Marcus is a character who got a lot of buzz early on and then the show lost interest (again). 

Watching the Marcus/Dahlia romance again from a 2025 perspective is so weird. Marcus is a full grown man who must be at least in his mid-20s and he's dating a teenager who is not only still in high school, but is still fully a year away from graduation, and no one says anything about how creepy that is.

I feel like the buzz around Marcus gave the illusion that the show was more invested in him than it ever actually was. Even during his "big" story where he's arrested for Cutter's murder, he actually doesn't appear on screen very often. He's imprisoned, Griffin is brought on, other characters make a fuss about trying to get him out, but there's a long stretch of time where he doesn't appear at all. I've been keeping episode counts while I watch and between Cutter's death in mid-November of 1995 and the end of the year Marcus/Mambo only appears 7 times (and of that only twice in December).

2 hours ago, alwaysAMC said:

 

Will Abigail always be deaf?  I don't know how long she's on the show, but she's a contract player per the ending credits, and I just can't see a long-term future for her if she can't talk or read lips.  She doesn't know ASL and only can speak to her Amish family through their "made up sign language", which btw is so cringe.

Abby becomes a speaking character and stays on the show until about 2000. She's one of my favorite characters of this era and I find her evolution over her first couple of years very compelling. Quite a bit of that will happen in 1996.

2 hours ago, alwaysAMC said:

I'm still sad that many characters are barely used - like Gil!  In the 9 months I've watched so far, she's averaging 3-4 episodes a month, such a shame.  Holly/Fletcher have been pretty MIA since their July wedding (only sad bc of Holly).  Nick was barely used post-Mindy until he just met Susan, but that's a bit of a bore.  Ed isn't used much anymore post-Eve except to give Rick advice.  Lillian is only background in the hospital unless she's giving Annie advice.  Nola, Bridget and David aren't really used much lately except a random day in the boarding house to play referee to Vanessa/Matt/Dinah.  I've only seen Hampton like 6-7 times in 9 months.  Oh but I still LOVE the Towers set and wish I could have been there back in the day haha.

I'm currently in July '97 and can report that Holly/Fletcher will remain MIA, that Nola will be criminally underused (although I know that she has a story coming up), and that Bridget gets quite a bit of story in 1996 but it's terrible and leaves you wondering who had it out for Melissa Hayden behind the scenes because of how insultingly Bridget is treated.

1 hour ago, DRW50 said:

She is also the maid of honor at Ava's wedding to "Clay," for some reason.

She and Ava were friends. Cecelia lived in the Rescott house for a while after her father died and before she and Steve got married, and Ava was her confidante when she was scheming to hold on to Steve, which put Ava in an awkward position since she knew Clay (Alex) would be angry if he knew she was helping Trisha's rival.

19 hours ago, Franko said:

You're welcome. I always forget to tag everybody. And I agree with you -- these new discoveries are a real treat. @Kane is going to have a lot to work with!

Love it! Hope people keep 'em coming.

19 hours ago, Franko said:

It sounds like Sam was meant as either a fill-in or tryout replacement for Maggie (Constance Shulman).

This sounds about right. DTJB only ended up appearing in 3 episodes from January-March, 1993, so they must have decided a replacement wasn't necessary. Realistically, even Maggie herself became less necessary once Hannah came to the show and Dinah Lee's friendship with Ava was established. Dinah Lee didn't really need a recurring character as a talk to at that point.

20 hours ago, DRW50 said:

I just realized through the blog that Albers was the second longest Curtis. I do think he was a decent fit for the part, even if they never did anything of worth with him (a running theme with Curtis, sadly). 

Albers is my second favorite Curtis, as I felt like he came the closest to Marcantel's version and I thought he had really good sibling chemistry with Noelle Beck. I think that the Curtis/Rocky/Todd triangle was okay (although I'm mostly basing that on reading it through SOD recaps and the clips that Albers posted ages ago), as it seems like it was at least a little bit balanced, but following it up with Curtis/Rocky/Rio, where there doesn't seem to have been a sense that Rocky was in any way torn, was a mistake. If they had to move Curtis and Rocky into another triangle together, it should have been with Jeff. The show had the set up for him being redeemed during his time in Dunellen and establishing a bond with Rocky while she worked there, which could have transitioned to her trying to help him reestablish himself outside the institution and developing feelings for him, but feeling guilty about it because of everything he did to Trucker and Trisha and sticking with Curtis (for a while) as a result.

43 minutes ago, alwaysAMC said:

Question - who is this amazing sax player that plays the GL theme song at the end of this July 4th episode?  I've seen him in maybe 2 scene between Feb-June '95, working at the Towers, but curious if he has a backstory and was a main character at some point?  Btw, I LOVE the Towers set, so glamorous for the time and I love how everyone dresses up.

 

That's Hamp, played by Vince Williams. He was introduced as an old friend of Billy's and was married to Gilly for a while. I believe he was still contract at this point, though he didn't appear often after he and Gilly divorced and his daughter, Kat, left town. Williams passed away in 1997.

4 hours ago, Franko said:

Well, sorry for the spoiler, I guess. 😜

Genie wouldn't return to GH until Oct. 29, 1993. (I'm grateful that ABC didn't call her bluff in 1992 and bring back Laura as a recast.)

They did, yes, from November-December 1991. Jeremy & Ceara then married on AMC on Dec. 31, 1991. @Kane's site has the details.

https://lovingsoapopera.wordpress.com/2021/09/03/character-profile-jeremy-hunter/

It's funny that there's all this talk of Ceara's demise, as I actually just wrote the recap for that episode of Loving.

21 hours ago, alwaysAMC said:

Great memory!  So yes, the Christmas miracle and looking up at the angel, man I was right haha.  I can envision that scene perfectly now that you confirmed it and reminded me of the angel.

We must be near the same age (I'm 41).  My grandma and mother both watched AMC religiously, so I grew up with it at home and just fell in love with it.  Even my dad hate-watched it with us every night with dinner.  He never wanted to admit it, and would always talk about how AMC was on the TV, but then ask 'what happened to this character' - he was invested  

But I think when you start watching soaps as a teenager, you find that you'll always hold that era in high regard.  We're so impressionable at that age and it just really sticks to you as you learn things about life and grow up.

I totally agree with this. I'm 42, started watching soaps in '93 (although I have some memories of seeing soaps before that, thanks to my mom watching Days and GH and grandma watching Y&R) and watched pretty religiously through the rest of my teens and the '90s is always what I gravitate to first when I'm looking to pick up a new soap playlist.

8 hours ago, Khan said:

To me, Kate Collins and Natalie were never better than when she was with Jean LeClerc/Jeremy.

I know that it's because Collins and Kiberd had chemistry, but I've always found it kind of strange that after building the Jeremy & Natalie pairing for years, on and off, they finally made it official and then split them up with no question of ever returning to it.

25 minutes ago, alwaysAMC said:

Buzz's obsession with 5th Street is too much. 

Brace yourself because 5th Street becomes a whole story in 1996.

26 minutes ago, alwaysAMC said:

Did people not enjoy Ron Raines as Alan?  In the almost 3 months I've watched now, he's only been on in small doses and doesn't really have a storyline going, but I do enjoy his banter with Alex and he seems like a strong presence.  

Raines was the only Alan I ever saw and I thought he was okay, though I never really felt like he sparked with any of the love interests he had during the time that I watched.

20 hours ago, alwaysAMC said:

I feel so bad for Lucy right now, and the actress is doing such a great job with the material.  She just confided to Bridgett about her date and how Brent went too far, but denied being raped.  Bridgett doesn't fully believe the story and is really giving Brent the stink eye.  

I really like those scenes. It feels very authentic that Lucy, inexperienced and still struggling to process what happened and reconcile what she thought she knew about Brent with what he did to her, would second guess herself as she talked it out. Really nice supporting work by Melissa Hayden as Bridget tries to guide her towards seeing it for what it was. There's a similar discussion a month or two later between Lucy and Nadine as Lucy continues to come to terms with it.

On 3/23/2025 at 4:02 PM, alwaysAMC said:

Are you watching the episodes through this same YouTube link that I am? 

I'm watching the Blake Marler channel.

3 minutes ago, DRW50 said:

That's a great idea about recasting Mike - maybe bring Ann back when Jack died and have Mike return to support Stacey. I know the canvas was very full and younger by then, but it could have been a short stint to give Ann some closure. Maybe she and Mike could have left to see if Jack was still alive. 

My thoughts exactly about bringing them back after Jack's death. As you say, the cast was full then, however, I think room could have been made to play out a short story arc. I mean, there's a stretch of time in the summer of '92 where it feels like the only two stories are the Giff saga and the haunting of 35 Maple.