DeeVee

I must have said this before, but I have to say it again: VANESSA SLEPT WITH FLETCHER? That guy was the town tramp. There's hardly a woman in town he didn't sleep with or pursue. Maybe the upside of Hope being written out of the show is they most certainly would have paired her with Fletcher at some point. Don't get me wrong, I like Hammer, he's O.K. But almost EVERY woman? No. Don't believe it. It's almost like any time there was an unattached woman, they would say, "Let's put her with Fletcher." Like he was the extra man at a dinner party. 😂

I don't know if I agree with that. They portrayed Jim as almost fanatical about his work. I could see him going off to study some amoeba or something on Antarctica for a year and not even know he had a kid. And Maureen taking her in out of love for her brother and longing for more kids. Besides, if Bridget had been Jim's child, maybe there would never have been you-know-who. I'll give them a pass on Maureen because the fact that it was difficult for her to have kids was a long-term, ongoing conflict between her and Ed. (But the fact that Ed kept saying he didn't want kids meant...Ed never had more kids. Guaranteeing the shrinking of the Bauer pool).

General Hospital did it, at least once that I can think of--Jeff Webber had children off screen who became major characters. Someone mentioned on the Y&R board the other day that they once introduced a character who was a child of a legacy character off the canvas for a long time. The number of characters from core families GL had off-screen not getting married and/or not having children is kind of mind-boggling. Mike, Hope, Justin, Trish, Mindy, Alan-Michael, Jim Reardon (why have Bridget be Sean's kid and not Jim's?). Amanda (until she came back de-aged), then she was gone again and nothing until Roger's death was announced. Was she ever mentioned after that? Another is Nick, but the fact that he didn't have children was explained by his partner being HIV+. The only one I can think of who had a kid off-screen was Tony Reardon, and no one ever thought to bring his kid Tommy on the show. And his birth was basically used as an excuse to write Bea out of the show.

Unfortunately, this happened all too often on GL. Characters who had been off the canvas for any period of time were treated as if their lives had barely progressed. Which is SO dumb, because the past is always a great place to build a story in the present. So, yes, beyond the romantic possibilities in the present story, there was also a missed opportunity to round out Blake's character by bringing her past relationship with Dietrich into the story. I always say that one of the reasons Reva and Josh took off so fast is the way they brought in their past to inform the present. Long was good at that. Maybe she had a plan to bring in Dietrich but subsequent writers were not interested in doing it.

When I was younger I was not really a fan, but over the years I've come to appreciate him much more. He brought something real to Ed that was missing in other actors. Like you said, a warmth. That is really interesting, because Gil Gerard is just the sort of actor I thought they should have pursued to play Alan. Someone with a prime time rep, but who wouldn't think soaps were beneath him. I could see him as Ed. Too bad it didn't work out. This is also a bummer. GL really needed writers/a producer invested in bringing the Bauers more into the forefront.

They're bringing HIM back? Well, that's one more reason not to start watching Y&R again. He's known Nick and Sharon since high school. He raped Sharon and I think some other characters, too. He later FAKED raping Sharon. Of course, Sharon ended up pregnant and Nick thought Matt had to be the father. She lost the baby and it was proved he wasn't, causing a big marital rift between them. And now Howarth is going to play him? Ick.

That sounds amazing.Maybe I would have warmed up to RR if MG had been his leading lady. Speaking of sourpuss Simon, how about some thoughts about a recast for Ed? They face planted when they replaced Simon with RVV. You would have thought getting Robert Gentry back would have been a huge success, but that also failed. I'm kind of blanking out. I have to give it some thought. I LOVED her when she was on Love of Life. She seemed to disappear after the show was cancelled. Would have been a cool comback for her. I could see her causing lots of havoc.

I could never understand why it didn't occur to anyone to put Alan and Holly together. They were both Roger's victims, they both went to jail for things connected to Roger, while Roger got off scott free. Sure, Holly would resent him for not coming forward about Roger being alive. But, hey, that's good conflict. Like not bringing Dietrich into the story, this was another missed opportunity.

For a guy who never showed up in SF, he sure sounds interesting!

Seriously? The guy's name was Dietrich Lindsey? I guess his mother was Swiss-German and his father was Scottish/Northern English? Of course, it's not impossible someone would have that name, but like the Harlan Billy thing, it just doesn't FLOW. Ficitional characters should have names that flow. They needed a consultant to help them name characters. (They do exist. The show Friends used consultants to name Ross and Rachel's baby Emma, because they wanted to pick a trending name that wasn't overused at the time). Almost 40 years later, I'm still trying to figure out how they dug up the name "Sonni" for a girl born in Venezuela. My family lived in Spain for years, my dad's family was from Puerto Rico, my sister married a Venezuelan man, I lived in Miami for over 25 years, I have traveled all over Latin America, and I have never, EVER heard of a Latina girl named Sonni. Again, it's not impossible. Girls named Sonni in Venezuela may exist. And sure, I'll give them props for being more creative than falling back on the name Maria, but they went too far in the other direction, IMO. I think what really bothers me more than anything is it didn't add anything to her character. The name conjures up a cute blond tomboy type from the 1960s. The name Sol or Solita would have not only been more appropriate for the character's heritage, it would have fit the character more. It's possible they would have never written Alan back in if they;d had Deitrich on the canvas, or it would have been another Kyle Sampson situation, where they would have dumped Deitrich in favor of bringing Alan back. But if Deitrich was a successful character he could have saved us from many bad, bad storylines.

Some of her money may have come from that. I mean, she bought a TV station. But when she was young and totally infatuated with Roger, she used her money to get him out of whatever current jam he was in. Yes, I also wondered why Mr. Lindsey never showed up. Especially the years Alan was off the canvas. They could have used a rich, suave millionaire on the show. He could have been a rival for Roger when it came to Alex as well as Holly.

I would say it began when his marriage to Peggy crumbled. Plus, he hated Ed for taking his place as Christina's father. He also became very ambitious when he married Holly. It wasn't mentioned much, but Holly had a lot of money, from an inheritance, I believe. So besides hating that Holly still loved Ed, who was Christina's father to the rest of the world, he also wanted to be successful so he could have as much or more money than Holly. He was jealous of Alan's success while wanting to be like him at the same time. That's why he relished blackmailing him. So it was a tsunami of things: losing Peggy and Billy, forced to watch Ed in his place as Christina's father, watching his two ex-lovers Rita and Holly mooning over Ed, feeling inadequate as a breadwinner. A lot of people might experience similar things in their lives and not become a total sociopath, but Roger was always an iffy guy. This stuff all together pushed him over the edge.

The way I see it, her "friendship" with Roger was a way for her to spite Holly. And Ed, too. I think by late in her marriage Mo was sick of being so goody-goody and always putting up with Ed's crap, even before he slept with Lillian. Which to me just emphasizes again what a stupid idea it was to kill her off. Mo finally free of Ed and shaking the suburban housewife persona could have had some interesting possibilities.

I think Bert tried to be accepting of Roger when he married Peggy because she thought she was going to straighten him out. When their marriage fell apart, he was like, well, I may as well be an @sshole again. Peggy to him was the love of his life. Of course, they rewrote history later on and tried to make Holly the love of his life, when that was never true.

Found a Roger and Peggy wedding picture! And there is the lovely large bouquet covering Fran Myers' pregnant tummy!

I can't remember if they ever mentioned if Nola finished high school. If she did, I would assume she was a year or two older than her. I can't see a girl Morgan's age (when she first came on the show) becoming that friendly with someone much older than that. Honestly? I had a hard time imagining Nola and Quint as a couple when he first arrived on the scene, and somehow it worked. So who knows? Maybe that would have worked, too.

Well, this is embarrassing. I completely forgot that was during the wedding. And I watched that only a few months ago. My mind must have blocked it out. 😂 This is why I tend to have more sympathy for Vigard than the soap mags had back then. Soaps made very young girls play these kinds of scenes when they weren't ready to deal with them yet. Genie Francis talked about that very candidly in interviews.

Another factoid about Vigard is she was in the musical Annie on Broadway. She was a working actress/singer from a very young age. I saw her interviewed about the Annie experience in a documentary about the young girls who were in the show. Mostly it was about how difficult it was for children that young to work on a Broadway show. At least some problems she had later on probably stemmed from that. I think we talked before about how the soap magazines were really hard on her; saying she was a terrible actress, etc. But there's no denying she and JWS were very popular. Honestly, most teen actors thrust into major storylines at this time were usually pretty green. We make fun of older actors playing teens, but IMO it's preferable because they can handle the challenges better. That's probably why people like JWS and Lisa Brown were more successful in the long run. Case in point about green teen actors. Genie eventually grew into a decent actress, but all three of these young ladies were thrust into the spotlight with little experience and many times it showed. Hmm, I would not have ever called Morgan "torrid," LOL. But they had to sell magazines, I suppose.

No, I have not seen it. Thanks! Ugh, little Christina being at Alan and Hope's wedding adds another layer of ick to Alan and Blake's hook-up years later. I saw their wedding. Maybe not when it first aired, but definitely in a flashback, possibly after Roger was married to Holly. I think Fran Meyers was pregnant at the time and had to hold a huge bouquet in front of her to hide her belly.

Whaaaaat? I had no idea that's who played the clone doctor! I thought he was some rando who was never seen or heard from again, trying in vain to wipe that stain off his resume. 😅

Yes, those were the cringiest parts of the clone story, when Bethany Joy Lenz played teen Reva clone. But she got a permanent job out of it, impressing the soap critics and TPTB so much they cast her later as Michelle. Still, it was really gross to sit through it. Weddings on GL were mostly dull because they were just...weddings. They rarely had much drama going on, until I think Kyle and Reva's aborted wedding. (Kurt and Mindy had an insanely fancy wedding, but it didn't have much drama). Then in the 1990s they had big sh!t going down at some weddings, like Josh and Annie's and later Alan and Annie's. (Oh, and let's not forget the masked Roger swinging on a rope into Phillip and Blake's wedding, LOL). It took a lot of soaps a long time to realize that fans wanted big, dramatic weddings for their favorites. The writers were like, let's just get them married. Even though the Luke & Laura wedding was a ratings bonanza, that's one lesson it took them some time to learn. IKR? It makes Mormon wedding dresses look immodest in comparison. I have never seen a wedding gown with that high a neck and sleeves that long before or since. It was like they were covering up the heartbreak of psoriasis. LOL, so true. When she was on the Locher Room, Kristen Vigard (Morgan) said it was taped like a year before it aired because all the locations scenes they shot at "Laurel Falls" were done during a 3-day period. Which is why they had to keep her on the show until the wedding aired. Then they almost immediately dumped her afterwards. But I did like her dress. Which she said she almost ruined by stepping on it and ripping it because they had to climb up a very steep hill. I guess they didn't want to waste all that effort and that's why they showed everyone wandering around so much. 😂

I would call it sick. The clone was still a sentient being; trying to turn her into someone else...yuck. It's the kind of thing villains usually do on soap operas. That they had their de facto hero doing it...🤮 That clone storyline belongs in the dumpster fire of soap history. Maybe it wasn't the worst of all time, but it was definitely a contender.

I found a picture from Hope and Alan's wedding. Somehow they found a vintage wedding gown that was even fussier than the average 80s wedding gown. It didn't suit Roussel at all. I didn't like it then and I still don't like it. The cake is actually nice, though. My memory had it as a plain Publix 2-layer cake, so nice job, Bert. 😂 Unfortunately, I couldn't find any of Alan and Jackie's wedding. I'll keep checking my Pinterest feed, lots of interesting obscure soap opera stuff ends up there. I think the reason their wedding was so crummy is because they weren't Marland's characters. Kelly and Morgan had that big wedding at Laurel Falls shot on location. (Morgan's vintage gown was gorgeous). The only other wedding that any effort was put into during his tenure that I can remember was Ross and Carrie's. Carrie being his pet character that's no surprise.

There's a lot of things wrong with that wedding dress bit: You can't just take a wedding dress out of storage after what we must assume was at least 20 years, pop it on and expect it to look the same as the last time it was worn. Or that it would perfectly fit. Ask any woman who has tried on their mother's wedding gown. 20 years before would have been the 1960s. That dress was definitely not a 1960s style gown. It looked like a typical wedding gown made in the 1980s. Who wears a traditional wedding gown to a party unless it's a costume party? O.K., so this is nitpicking, and there was a valid storytelling reason to do it. (Something about Beth puts Phillip in mind of Elizabeth, which is kind of sick if you think about it, but considering how their relationship progressed over the years, that seems appropriate). But this wasn't the only time they did this. When Hope married Alan, Bert gave her a wedding gown that was in HER attic (maybe Mama Bauer's dress? I don't remember exactly). Also in perfect condition and ready to wear. I wouldn't be surprised it ended up in the Spaulding mansion attic, too. Along with Jackie's wedding dress, which I also remember. She didn't get married in a traditional gown. I think it was made of gold lame, or something like that. To round everything out, Harley found Alex's wedding dress (that she never wore), in the attic of the Spaulding mansion. Speaking of Alan and Hope's wedding--I have not been able to find the episode(s) anywhere. I don't think it's available on YT or the German or Italian channels. But I remember it. It was the SHABBIEST affair. They got married in Bert's house. Bert baked the wedding cake, and their first dance was to Bert singing "Let Me Call You Sweetheart." I kid you not. Alan and Jackie's wedding was on a yacht off the French Riviera. There were like Saudi Arabian shieks and other super-rich people in attendance. Phillip (still a kid at this point) walked Jackie down the ailse (if they had one on the yacht). It's just so funny to compare the two weddings. One was what you would expect a multi-millionaire to do for his second wedding, the other is something you would expect for a couple of kids who could only afford to stay at a motel for their wedding night.

The name HB was definitely Marland's invention, along with Billy. But I'm very certain it was never revealed to stand for "Harlan Billy" until Long took over the show. In fact, I think it was around the time Reva was introduced because Reva always called HB "Harlan." The only other person who ever called him that was Miss Sally, IIRC. (Now that I think of it, how odd that all his children called him "HB." Is that a Southern/Western thing?)