vetsoapfan

How depressing it is to rehash the dreadful Peapack years, and to remember how totally gutted, crippled, and unrecognizable TGL was during its final years. It staggered to cancellation after being dealt so many serious, egregious death blows. Sigh. I'm actually surprised it lasted as long as it did. To me, the Light really faded after its core was decimated and identity gutted by Gail Kobe and Pamela Long in 1984-ish. I was ready to see it end then, but was glad when the show rebounded in the late 1980s-early 1990s, and then again (briefly) under Millie Taggart and Carolyn Culliton in 2003. Alas, the last six YEARS were basically unwatchable.

Thank you for the link. It's all coming back to me now. Eeeeek!

I am trying hard, but cannot even picture him in my head, and I cannot find anything about him on the internet.

In the end, whatever happened to Evans' stalker?

It must be said: Faulkner deserves applause for valiantly keeping this thread awash in hotness, while so many of us are slacking off and not contributing as much as we should! Keep up the good work!

You are correct on all three counts. I'd love to know whom she rattled on OLTL, to get fired early. And someone should ask Zimmer now, after the fact, what she really thought of all those crap-tastic stories dumped on Reva over the years (the clone, the time travel, the ghost, etc.)

By the time Rauch's reign of terror on OLTL was over, the show needed extensive and immediate major surgery, so I am glad it happened so quickly. In my recollection, the only other times that soaps changed so drastically, so quickly, were when Gloria Monty came aboard GH and changed...almost everything right away, and when Gail Kobe and Pamela Long took over TGL, and destroyed its core within a year or so.

This is a fairly good sketch.

Mary Student's complete record album.

Yes. She was very wispy and inconsequential, and projected no force or grit on screen at all. It was quite an downgrade from Robin Strasser, who was nothing if not determined and strong in the role. I knew immediately she was woefully miscast, and what made it worse, we also lost the wonderful Sam Groom as Euss Matthews in 1971, and his replacelacent, Robert Hover, was just as weak and poorly chosen as Impert. Imagine Tori Spelling replacing Genie Francis as Laura Webber on GH. Paris Hilton replacing Judy Garland in a sequel to The Wizard of Oz. Painful. Fortunately, neither Impert nor Hover lasted long. VW ultimately worked out as the third Rachel, and while I always found David Bailey bland and colorless as Russ, he was better than Hover. The odds were stacked against Lynde on AW. The writing was weak, her character was not particularly well defined or interesting, and she had no chemistry with her bland leading man. On Y&R, none of those disadvantages were present, and she fared so much better.

Neither did I, but he was very charismatic. The actor had been on the short-lived FOX soap Tribes for a while, and although the series was dreadful, I kept watching until the bitter end, largely because Greg Watkins was so adorable, and looked so enticing in the super-tight jeans he used to wear, LOL.

Well, to be fair, once I have my heart set on a certain couple being together, it's always hard for me to accept either one of the characters involved with anyone else. I did not fully get on board the Penny and Neil train, but maybe other viewers did. Rosemary Prinz was always featured heavily on the show when she was there, and they always seemed to be able to wrtite for her. As most of her family disappeared around her, I was very worried that ATWT would eliminate Ellen, whom I adored and wanted to see more, not less, of. She became a total talk-to over time, but we still saw her on a regular basis up until 1996. I had been expecting her to get written out for a good decade by that point, so we were lucky to have her for as long as we did. Yes, Amy did visit Oakdale again many years after her initial visit in 1973. Didn't she meet Lien at Nancy's wedding to Mac? Excellent. Reilly was very charismatic and had chemistry with everyone, including Masters and Patricia Bruder. He was a wonderful Dan, better than the original actor IMHO.

You are right! According to IMDB, Horgan is credited as playing Anton Cunningham in 1986-7 and again in 1998. That's weird. I do not remember him appearing AT ALL during those years. I don't think he joined Penny for her parents' 50th anniversary or for her mom's birthday, and there would be no reason for him to show up without her. Does anyone remember?

I loved Penny and Jeff and was REALLY annoyed at Nancy for trying to keep them apart. Nancy could be such a shrew in the early years. Mark Rydell as Jeff was not traditionally handsome, IMHO, but he had sparks with Rosemary Prinz and their on-screen chemistry was undeniable. I think a lot of us in the audience lived vicariously through their romance; we all wanted a love like that. Neil Wade was okay, but it was hard to accept Penny with another leading man after Jeff died in a car crash. Following Steven Frame's death on AW, Alice just never clicked with anyone else. It was a similar case with Penny. After Neal got hit by a car and died, Penny left Oakdale, vowing never to search for love again. I did not mourn Neil the way I mourned Jeff, because the sparks and chemistry with Penny had not been as memorable. We later heard via Nancy and Chris that Penny had married race-car driver Anton Cunningham in Europe and adopted a Eurasian child named Amy. Amy visited Oakdale briefly in 1973, but did not do much and did not stay long. Penny was on-canvas and shared no scenes with Amy that year. I don't believe we ever saw Anton.

Even the Dark Shadows cast said they played it straight. Before Sheffer's dumb antics, ATWT was not known for low-brow camp...thank God. I know Leslie slept with both boys on Y&R, but did Lorie sleep with Lucas too, or just Lance? Yes, Lisa was hugely important to ATWT in the 1960s and '70s. Fulton was a true superstar.

P&G had allowed Pat Matthews to have an abortion on AW, but back then, girls who chose that option had to suffer horrible consequences like sterility afterwards. I figured from the start that Lisa would end up either not being pregnant at all, or would lose the baby naturally via a miscarriage. A character having sex with multiple partners from the same family is rather revolting, but it happens often in daytime. Laura Spencer and the Horton brothers on Days, Leslie Jackson and the Bauer boys on TGL, Reva Shayne and all the Lewis men, TGL, Brooke and the Forresters (B&B), Bob and the Sullivan sisters (ATWT). I've always found it icky. I could never sleep with my husband's brother or father. Ewww.

Yes and yes.

I think La Fulton was being a bit...theatrical in her description of Lisa's "phantom fetus" story. It did not play out as dumb as she describes it, LOL, at least to me. While dating Donald Hughes, Lisa began experiencing signs that suggested she was expecting. She thought she knew the symptoms after having had two children already. She did wonder aloud how she could possibly be pregnant, when she had been celibate recently. I'm sure Fulton felt the storyline went on forever, but keep in mind that particularly back then, time was pretty elastic on the soaps. A few weeks in Oakdale could stretch out for months in real life. So Lisa was perplexed about potentially being pregnant, worried about it for a few Oakdale weeks, and then was diagnosed as having an ovarian cyst. Voila, the mystery was solved. It might have been improbable that a woman could think she was pregnant under such circumstances, but we have seen crazier stories on daytime TV. Before hooking up with Donald, Lisa had had an affair with Dr. Michael Shea, who was married to Ellen Stewart's mother Claire Lowell. This destroyed poor Claire and was the genesis of the decades-long bitterness Ellen felt towards Lisa. (Ellen continued to snipe at Lisa for YEARS.) Dr. Shea was a self-serving villain who initially refused to divorce his meal-ticket Claire even when Lisa ended up pregnant. After Claire was told about the baby, she divorced Michael and told him to marry Lisa for the sake of the child, but by then, Lisa had come to realize what an awful person he was, and she did not want Michael anymore. Unfortunately, Michael discovered that Lisa's son Tom was involved in drugs, and by using this information, he blackmailed Lisa into marrying him. He wanted another rich woman to use, and he was not going to take no for an answer. Lisa, being Lisa, did not take this lying down. She may have been blackmailed into marrying Dr. Shea, but she could not resist tormenting him and making his life miserable. Knowing what a horndog he was, Lisa would get all dolled up and parade around in front of him in sexy negligees. Once he was aroused beyond endurance, Lisa would march into the bedroom--alone--and bolt the door. "Do you want me, Michael? Do you want me the way a man wants a woman?" "Oh yes, Lisa! Yes, yes, yes, YES!!!!!!!!" "Well, THAT'S JUST TOO BAD!!!" SLAM GOES THE DOOR. It was hilarious, and the audience enjoyed watching Lisa taunting him. Eileen Fulton played this material to the hilt, let me tell you. Viewers who only saw Lisa in the show's later, declining years, when the character was an irrelevant talk-do, don't know what they missed!

Mart Hulswit's Ed was adorable! At the time, Vanessa was shallow and flippant and I thought Ed was too good for her.

I was SHOCKED when she returned. Thrilled, because I adored Penny, but shocked that Prinz agreed to do it. I guess enough time had passed and some of her bitterness had faded. I remember her saying that she would only return to ATWT if her father were in a Nazi death camp, and her reappearance as Penny was the sole way to get him released. I would say that way back then, the women on the show were portrayed as more emotional and neurotic, while the men in their lives were the stoic ports in the storm.

I was just about to post that picture of Dorin. In this shot, she is not wearing the little facial mole the show had her wear, to look more like Prinz. But you can see the resemblance. Ha! I wish someone would interview Fulton now, about Sheffer and the damage he did to the show. Without fear of network or sponsor retaliation, I'll bet she would have a thing or two to say!

Phoebe Dorin was a decent actress and actually looked a bit like Rosemary Prinz. I thought if she had been cast as another character, she would have found greater success on ATWT. However, Prinz was BELOVED by the audience, one of daytime TV's first real superstars, and I knew from the moment Dorin first walked into the Hughes' kitchen that the audience would reject her. She lasted less than a year, as I recall, in 1971.