vetsoapfan

Wesley Ann Pfenning. UGH. So many painful, failed recasts in the role of Alice. It's a relief that the show eventually gave up trying to replace Jacqueline Courtney. Add the notoriously toxic Paul Rauch to the mix...what a nightmare. I agree. New writers who come aboard and cannot/will write for a show while retaining its heart, soul, and DNA, should not be allowed to decimate it to fit their own personal likes and dislikes. You cannot take over the reigns of the original Star Trek, and decide that Kirk, Spock and Bones are not good actors, and then be allowed to dismiss them, regardless of how much eliminating the series' core would hurt the show and infuriate the fans. You cannot turn the Starship Enterprise into an interplanetary disco, where celebrities from various planets "trek" to party amongst each other. Forget about exploring the universe! Soaps are a unique medium unto themselves which thrive on continuity, history, and viewer loyalty. Destroy those concepts, destroy the genre. I would say definitely not. To me, the writing started to show signs of weakness with the expansion to an hour, but familiar faces gave the audience a solid incentive to stick around. (It also helped that 1975 was a weak year for AW's principle competition TGL and GH. Viewers getting bored or frustrated with AW would be unlikely to abandon a familiar show, even with it going through a rough patch, for other soaps which were just as bad--or worse--at the time. Plus, the 60-minute format was an intriguing novelty.) With the loss of Courtney, Reinholt, Dwyer and Susan Sullivan, the show's golden days faded. As soon as the competition started to pick up and soar, AW's steady and significant rating decline began. It was engrossing.

I agree. His material was excellent and memorable (from 1971 to 1974, I'd say), but blatant evidence of his arrogance, mean-spiritedness and ego are hard to dismiss, particularly considering how Lemay and Rauch ended up crippling AW before they were through with it. Yep. The potential romance slated for Alice and Willis, proposed to Jacqueline Courtney by Paul Rauch, supports this idea. Of course Courtney objected to it; a romance between them was idiotic and out of character for Alice.

On my screen, we get the picture of the cast on the stairs, and then the "starring" line, followed by...nothing. The screen is blank under the cast list, with no "seasons" listed.

I wonder if just the series Family is region blocked, because I do have Tubi, and regularly watch all sorts of stuff without any problem. For me, it's only Family that has no links to any content on its page. When I do a search for the show in the Tubi search bar, it does not even come up, which suggests I'm not supposed to have access to it in my region (Canada).

The cover page for Family shows up, but there's nothing to click on in order to access any episodes to stream.

There were specific rumors about why he had it out for her, but in the end, who knows? Not all rumors are true. As the writer steering the ship, it was his job to do what was best for the SHOW and the AUDIENCE, not to cater to his own whims.

Yes, McLaughlin's health concerns were no secret, and there had been times when she was unable to fulfil her contractual obligations to the show. By the early 1980s, Jessie had become a supporting player rather than a lead, thanks to the Youth Invasion and emphasis on idiotic science fiction. The network terminated her contract when her personal issues persisted, and there were times when Jessie would go unseen for months. McLaughlin rebounded later on, and during Joseph Hardy's reign as producer, she would appear on average once a week. The network was respectful enough to keep her top-billed in the credits (after John Beradino) and paid her a generous per-episode salary on the days she did appear, but then she got sick again and Jessie simply disappeared, for good this time. The character had been so marginalized by this point, I did not expect much in the way of a tribute, but I did expect GH to at least have Steve, Audrey, Bobbie...ANYBODY who had known and cared for Jessie...to acknowledge her whereabouts/death on screen. No one did, and she remained unmentioned for an extended period until the 30th anniversary episode, when Steve Hardy told Angie about Jessie's passing. I say this very...carefully, but I think Emily McLaughlin deserved a memorial episode or tribute just as much as, say, John Reilly did, considering her huge and original importance to the show.

A petulant Harding Lemay was infuriated that Jacquie Courtney portrayed Alice's acute schizophrenic nervous breakdown so overtly (he said he wanted it to be played as "muted grief" instead of raging emotion), and so ended the story almost immediately. Alice recovered from her breakdown within a few days, went back to normal, and the character began to diminish in prominence, as Lemay brought Rachel more and more to the foreground.

The show even FINALLY addressed the vanishing of Jessie Brewer, who had simply ceased to exist without explanation after Emily McLaughlin passed away. Hearing Steve acknowledge the character's death on screen, during the 30th anniversary telecast, brought quiet closure to a character who had once been a beloved and integral component of the series.

They may not have known specifically where in the building he was being kept, after being moved to solitary, but everyone knew the name and location of the prison and that Steve was in that building. After Alice's breakdown, Lenore drove out there and tried to convince the authorities to let her see Steve, so she could update him on Alice's condition.

I thought that completely abandoning the Gerald Davis character was a wasted opportunity. Rachel had a half-sister on her father's side, named Pammy Davis, who also could have been used to create reams of dramatic conflict with Rachel. Many, if not most, writers and producers on soaps do not mine the past effectively, IMHO.

She clearly loathed Hogan Sheffer too. And she criticized Jean Passanante in a group interview as well.

No.

I don't understand what you mean. Everyone knew where Steven was: he was in prison for conspiring with Gerald Davis to lie in court during Steve's divorce hearing from Rachel. While locked up, Steve got into a physical altercation and was put in solitary confinement, which meant no one could see or speak to him temporarily.

I don't remember that bit about Myrtle at all. Thanks for the info.

Paul Martin was the defense attorney when Viki was on trial for murdering Marco Dane, but I don't recall Myrtle crossing over to OLTL that year. Do you have an idea of why she would have gone to Llanview?

After all the painful recasts of Alice Frame on Another World, I was relieved that when the character returned for her final three stints (1984-5, the show's 25th anniversary and then for Mac's funeral), the part was played by Jacqueline Courtney. And when Mickey Horton and Bill Horton died on DAYS, the flashbacks used were of John Clarke and Edward Mallory. It all helped wash the bad taste of poor recasts out of the audience's mouth. Just like, as you say, with Mary Ryan. And having Kate Mulgrew participate in Ryan's Hope's final episode was a special treat for fans.

Ryan's Hope's recasts were a mixed bag. Some were great, but certain others were dreadful. I thought Daniel Hugh Kelly was excellent as Frank, but John Blazo just creeped me out as Pat Ryan. Anyway, TPTB using flashbacks of Mulgrew after Mary died was the right decision. It helped cement her as "the real Mary" in the Ryan's Hope universe. (Which, of course, she was!)

I agree. William J. Bell had been writing the show for a year by then, and DAYS was really rockin'; mesmerizing to watch. I imagine that the show's lack-luster first year had been disinteresting to soap fans who had tried it, so it took the audience a while to give Salem a second chance.

Mulgrew did return years later, as a "ghost" during the years Yasmine Bleeth played her daughter. KM agreed to participate in the show's finale as well. The idea of reprising the role temporarily must not have been distasteful to her. I guess we'll never know for sure if TPTB approached her about coming back for Mary's death storyline, but it would have been so much more meaningful and effective if an actress we knew and loved in the role had been playing her in that end. With NG, I felt no loss when Mary Ryan passed. (And I might have cheered if the character had died while KT was there, LOL!)

Me too. I thought--given decent, percept writing, which the the show usually did not have after the 1970s--that Hunter and Thomasina might have been interesting. There were a lot of dropped and/or missed opportunities over the years on AW.

Exactly. Then the show's going for a THIRD replacement, after Tolan, was ludicrous. They should have offered Mulgrew the MOON to return, even for a handful of episodes, and let her be the one who played the role upon Mary's death.

Mary Carney was both lovely and a good actress. It's a shame she was replaced. Kathleen Tolan, who was neither attractive nor a good actress. It was painful watching her constantly flubbing and stumbling over her lines. She had no chemistry with anyone. She probably lasted as long as she did because the show did not want to admit their mistake in hiring her. Of all the recasts among the main Ryan-family characters, KT was the worst.

🤮 💩 Hold back my hair, I'm gonna hurl.

That picture is tiny and my ancient eyes are weak, LOL, but I agree with Vee: it's probably Trish van Devere.