vetsoapfan

JC was wonderful as Alice, although at the very beginning, she tended to exaggerate her performances and be too bubbly, which may have been a popular way to portray teens on silly sitcoms in the early 1960s, but was not appropriate for a soap. Once she toned it down and began giving quieter, more nuanced performances, JC was great, and her popularity started to rise. She talks about her experiences on Route 66, and her unrequited crush, in the biography about her that was published by Afternoon TV magazine in the 1970s. Is that the article you read?

It was easy for me to enjoy these CDs, because I had already watched the episodes during the time of their original broadcasts, and could picture the characters and their sets in my mind's eye, anyway.

December 24, 1971 In their kitchen, Jim and Mary Matthews prepare for the holidays. While Jim marvels at how how Mary is able to organize everything for large family parties, she reminds him that she has had 30 years' experience doing so. They discuss how much it means to them to have their family over for Christmas Eve. Later, when the guests have arrived, Jim advises John not to let his growing work responsibilities take priority over Pat and the twins. Russ' date, Dr. Paula McCray, tells everyone that she grew up in boarding schools and always missed out on family gatherings like this one. Steven and Alice discuss her pregnancy, their relationship, and Steve's seeing Jamie...and Rachel. Everyone gathers to sing Christmas carols. May 3, 1974: 10th Anniversary Episode -The remarriage of Steve and Alice Frame. I know. It would have been amazing, but just having these audio recordings turn up was a miracle. Listening to them is like listening to a radio play; thoroughly enjoyable.

AW CD 42:05 The End Of Walter Curtin Various clips, mainly surrounding Walter Curtin's exit (1972), including: -Jim, Mary and Steven discuss John's heavy workload -Walter confesses his crimes to a shocked Lenore, then runs out of the house when she rebukes him -Walter realizes the kind of man he has become, and crashes his car -Russ finds a distraught Lenore and tries to help her and Wally -Pat tells Lenore of Walter's death -Walter's funeral -Mary finds an unconscious Alice, who has fallen from a stepladder, then phones Jim and asks him to track down Steven

Actually, there are several audio CDs of audio recording from AW's first decade floating around among collectors. AW CD 56:26 RACHEL'S BOMBSHELL Various scenes from 1969, mainly centering on the story of Rachel's pregnancy. Highlights: -At home, Sam remembers reuniting with Lee upon his release from prison. -After hearing that Susan and Fred Douglas are romantically involved, Aunt Liz throws a major hissy fit and promises to speak to Susan alone after Fred leaves. Fred refuses to be bullied. -At a farewell party in their honor, Bill and Missy say goodbye to their family and friends in Bay City. -During Steve and Alice's engagement party, Rachel corners Alice in the bedroom and takes vicious pleasure in telling Alice that she's pregnant with Steve's baby (Robin Strasser spits venom like no one else). -Over his protests, Alice proclaims her disappointment in Steve, and breaks up with him. -Susan marries Fred; Aunt Liz attends, but makes her displeasure known by giving them a tacky wedding gift (a check). -After waiting for a time when he and Mary can be alone in the house, Jim tells Mary the shocking news: Rachel is cuckholding Russ, may be pregnant with Steve's baby, and Alice broke up with Steve because of it. Mary goes berserk, in a well-written and brilliantly-acted scene. -A thrilled Pat, after believing for years that she was sterile, announces she is going to have a baby. -At the hospital, Russ tells Ada and Ernie that Rachel has just given birth to a healthy, "premature" baby boy. -Rachel tries to force Steve to give her money "for the baby's sake". She's furious when Steve shows her nothing but disdain, and kicks her out. -Wayne Addison proposes to Aunt Liz. -Sam and Lahoma reunite when he professes his love for her. -Russ tells Rachel some news she doesn't want to hear: his parents are not going to endow the baby with a large cash trust fund as they had originally discussed; instead, they are going to set Russ up in his own medical career, and buy his office equipment. Rachel is aghast at this and says she wants the MONEY instead. They have a heated argument in which Russ finally lays down the law and puts her in her place. -To prevent Russ from being suspicious about the baby's parentage, Jim and Mary feel cornered into setting up a trust fund for Jamie after all. Alice is bitter when she hears the news, and procliams that manipulative Rachel was won yet again. AW CD 56:22 AUNT LIZ UNPLUGGED/LEE'S DEMISE Various scenes from 1969, mainly centering on Liz' atrocious behavior and the circumstances of Lee's death. Highlights: -Liz visits Steve in his office and makes it clear she thinks his luncheon date with Rachel was suspicious. Steve doesn't care, doesn't let her manipulate him, and ushers her out. -In John's office, Liz enjoys spreading nasty gossip about Rachel and Steve, until John reprimands her and reminds her that Bill's near-fatal accident was a direct result of her gossiping. -On the day Sam and Lahoma are to be married, Sam, Lahoma and Lee all awaken to thoughts about what the marriage will mean to their lives. -Sam and Lahoma's marriage and reception. -At Bill and Missy's new home, Bill offers a straightforward (and unpleasant) opinion of his mother's character. Liz reacts badly and screams at him on her way out the door. -At home, Liz is further annoyed by Susan's negative opinion of their mother/daughter relationship. Liz screams (and screams) at her too. -While driving, Lee has hallucinations and crashes her car. -Sam hovers over Lee in the hospital, and hears her confession of love before she dies. -John phones Pat and tells her about Lee's death. -Lee's funeral. AW CD 50:21 RACHEL ON WHEELS Various short scenes, starting in December 1968, and focusing mainly on Rachel's attempts at manipulation and social-climbing. Highlights: -In their bedroom at the Matthews home, Russ and Rachel argue about her selfish behavior. Russ tells her he cannot allow her to remain a scared child forever because it will negatively affect their marriage -In the car outside the Randolph home, Sam reassures Lahoma that Lee is in his past, and that it's Lahoma he really wants -Rachel, on the phone with Ernie, tries to avoid accepting an invitation to a party for Ada -Sam comes to the Matthews house and lambasts Rachel for not wanting to attend Ada's party. He orders her to go, period -Lee and Lahoma discuss Lahoma's upcoming wedding -Rachel tries her hand at social climbing by showing up unannounced at Aunt Liz' house and volunteering to help with Liz' fund-raising work. Aunt Liz makes it clear Rachel wasn't born for that kind of activity -Rachel visits Steve in his office, pretending to be an important part of Liz' society circle. Steve sees right through her, and lets her know it -Russ informs Rachel about an appointment he made for her with Dr. Clater. He wants the doctor to assure Rachel she can go ahead and have more children. Rachel refuses to go, but Russ gives her no choice -In Dr. Clater's office, Rachel tries to manipulate him into agreeing that she shouldn't become pregnant again, but the doctor assures her that she has no health problems preventing future pregnancies -At the hospital, Russ overhears Alice talking to Lee on the phone, and he realizes that Alice is avoiding spending time at the Matthews house. He asks her if she doesn't want to go home because Rachel is there -While Mary is preparing dinner in the kitchen, Russ quietly asks her oif he and Rachel can be excused from eating with the rest of the family. He feels it's best if they take a tray up to their room. A somber Mary understands there's trouble in her son's marriage, and agrees to his request -Jim and Mary visit Pat and John for a game of cards -After yet another fight with Russ, Rachel storms out of the Matthews house. Russ wants to chase after her, but Uncle Dru steps in and advises Russ to let Rachel go

I felt that Cenedella put more emphasis on story mechanics in his writing, whereas for Lemay, character delineation was key. The first few years of Lemay's reign were particularly engrossing; we had believable, multi-dimensional characters with complicated motivations. Even if we did not agree with or condone their behavior, we could usually understand it, which left the audience with mixed loyalty and emotions. I loathed Rachel to the nth degree when she was using and/or abusing Russ and Alice (and even Aunt Liz), but then I'd get mad at myself for feeling sorry for her even though she was a BITCH. The biggest mistake soaps ever made was discarding their adult, nuanced, complex storytelling based on interpersonal relationships, and replacing it with gimmicky, low-brow camp. It destroyed the genre.

Yes, this was Nancy Wickwire, who was my least favorite Aunt Liz. Audra Lindley was like a ferocious force of nature in the role. When her temper got the better of her, she would scream and scream and SCREAM. It was pretty scary at times. Irene Dailey brought out the pathos and deep loneliness in the character, which was quite effective too, although the difference between Lindley and Dailey was marked: vehement, bitter shrew to over-emotional busybody. Wickwire was simply cooler and more reserved, and IMHO lacked any actual spark.

It's my pleasure. I adored AW from 1964 to 1975 and kept huge scrapbooks about AW, Y&R, DAYS, SOMERSET, HOW TO SURVIVE A MARRIAGE and other soaps, filled with pictures, interviews, plot synopses, etc.

Just for historical accuracy, Wayne Addison was an unscrupulous manipulator who was determined to amass wealth any way he could. He romanced a lonely Aunt Liz in hopes of getting his hands on her fortune. He manipulated various men like Walter Curtin, in hopes of swindling money from them. Wayne and Lenore never had an affair, but he took gleeful delight in tormenting people with the implication that he and Lenore were indeed an item. When Walter stormed over to Wayne's place to confront him about his unethical behavior, Wayne laughed in Walter's face. He tossed Walter a woman's scarf which he announced was Lenore's, and crowed that Walter could now give the scarf back to her, because Wayne had finished using her and was ready to cast Lenore aside. The insecure, jealous and emotional Walter snapped, and in a fit of blind rage hit Addison over the head with a heavy statuette, killing him on November 24, 1970. Walter ran home and hid the scarf in his safe, to which Lenore conveniently did not have the combination. (Far-fetched, that.) Contrary to Harding Lemay's caustic, sarcastic account (the writer was wont to denigrate...well, basically everyone except his personal pets), Walter did not continually sob into the scarf. It happened, when Walter was remembering his crime, but it was not a consistent, everyday activity. Lemay just liked to mock, even if he had to put a creative spin on reality to do so. Aunt Liz, who believed Wayne's account of an alleged affair between himself and Lenore, was hell-bent on making Lenore pay for supposedly taking Wayne away from her. She told the police that Wayne and Lenore were involved, and that Lenore was the likely killer. Poor, pregnant Lenore was arrested on circumstantial evidence, and endured Christmas in jail. When she was finally set free, she came to suspect her own husband was the real murderer. Walter fell apart under her questioning, and in a weepy, emotional monologue, confessed he had bludgeoned Wayne Addison to death. He then ran out of the house (supposedly to give his confession to the police), but was killed in a horrendous car crash. (His car rolled down a cliff and burst into flames on February 4, 1972.) Knowing that the police would now never hear her husband's confession, which would have proven her innocence beyond any doubt in the world's eyes, Lenore went berserk and tore her living room to shreds. (Susan Sullivan was epic in this episode.) Three years later, Lenore had married architect Robert Delaney (March 28, 1974), which made her the target of the vicious Carol Lamonte, a scheming woman who wanted Robert for herself. Looking into Lenore's background for some dirt with which to drive a wedge between Lenore and Robert, Carol came across news clippings about the Wayne Addison murder trial, and Lenore's involvement in the case. Carol had no actual proof of anything, but she started to gaslight Lenore by sending her anonymous messages referring to the murder and Lenore's trial, asking if Lenore wanted "the real truth" to come out after all this time. Terrified that her son would one day find out that his father was a murderer, and not knowing what sort of unhinged psycho was targeting her, Lenore packed up her son Wally and went into hiding, not even telling her own mother exactly where she was, at first. Lenore was last seen on December 29, 1975. Whew!

Walter killed Wayne Addison by whacking him across the head with a heavy statuette, actually.

Lionel Johnstone, who played Michael Randolph, had been advised about the storyline concerning his character's homosexuality, and he was on board to play it. The problems arose when a nervous P&G vetoed the plot, infuriating Lemay.

Except that PB said another actress was hired, and then fired because TPTB were displeased with her work. A potential recast being discussed in theory, but never actually happening, does not correlate with Bruder's account. There are many long-gone actors and facts from TV's ancient past that are hard to track down on the internet. Even published books dealing with soaps' histories make egregious errors and omissions. If this recast happened way back in 1961, and she only lasted a minute, LOL, it doesn't really surprise me that she's unacknowledged today.

Bruder specifically said that the show replaced her with another actress, but they were not satisfied with her, so they asked Bruder to return. The only two actresses I ever remember seeing as Ellen were Wendy Drew and then Patricia Bruder, so if the story about Bruder's replacement is true, that actress must have come and gone in the blink of an eye. Bruder says the replacement actress appeared as Ellen while Bruder did The Sap of Life in an off-Broadway production, which would have been 1961. There is no confirmation that I can find (in any of my soap history books or on the internet) which verifies the existence of a third Ellen. Still, you would think Bruder would know.

At the time of the Williams' family introduction, William J. Bell gave the breakdown of the kids' ages as follows: Steve was 25, Todd was 22, Paul was 19, and Patty was 16. I've always remembered this because it mirrored the ages of the Brooks sisters when they were introduced in 1973: Leslie was 25, Lorie was 22, Chris was 19, and Peggy was 16. I still have the press releases around here somewhere.

Tom Hallick was hugely popular on Y&R, but he's right: leaving the show was the biggest blunder of his professional career.

Right, there was a bit of "testing out" John and Gina, but never (to my knowledge) Stuart and Gina. William J. Bell had an annoying habit of simply dropping characters (even important, beloved, core characters) from the canvas without any on-screen justification. I mean, Peggy ceased to exist (for all intents and purposes) and went unmentioned by everyone three separate times. Stuart, Liz, Tommy Horton on DAYS. the list goes on.

The original cast of Y&R was very well chosen. Some of the actors were somewhat green at the beginning, but they all had a certain spark, a certain charisma, and grew quite well into their roles. Others, like Janice Lynde and Trish Stewart, were excellent from the start. The replacements paled in comparison. Janice Lynde played Leslie like a wounded fawn, fragile on the outside but seething with emotions just beneath the surface. Victoria Mallory was gorgeous, but lacked the depth and vulnerability which had endeared Leslie to the audience. Trish Stewart was warm, vibrant and charismatic. Lynne Topping was perfectly adequate in the role, but her Chris lacked spark, and came across as humorless. The Gregs who followed James Houghton were all bland (like Brian Kerwin) or downright repugnant (like Wings Hauser). David Hasselhoff was adequate, but lacked William Gray Espy's smoldering sex appeal. Apparently without even trying much, Espy was able to project the qualities of vulnerable strength. Hasselhoff was a California beach bum with a stethoscope. Dennis Cole played Lance as though his head was filled with Cheese Doodles. While I did have vested interest in the original characters, when the replacement actors left the show, it was almost a relief. I was not comfortable with the "fake" Leslie, "fake" Chris, "fake" Snapper, etc. I wanted the original, exceptional cast back and I knew that was not going to happen. I was very disappointed when Jaime Lyn Bauer departed, however, and very annoyed that TPTB dumped Robert Colbert and then had Julianna McCartney appear only sporadically (later dumping her too). Those actors deserved a place on the show, and could have been woven into other stories with other characters.

The internet is awash with blatant misinformation, unfortunately. I am convinced that many contributors to soap sites just make sh*t up, to fill in the blanks about history when they do not know the actual facts. People accept the misinformation as gospel, in lieu of having credible and accurate sources from which they can learn about soaps' true history.

Peggy was raped on June 16, 1976. At least once, she was listed as just "Liz Brooks." There were lots of little inconsistencies back then. We can assume Stuart died sometime along the way, but at the time, he just vanished into thin air, without explanation.

Grover was awful too, IMHO.

GH was excruciatingly bad and tedious for a few years leading up to the arrival of Marland and Gloria Monty.

Missy! Uncle Dru! Jim and Mary! AW at its finest, woohoo!

Oh God, Mel and Ethel Brez. Legendarily awful.

I think Lorraine Broderick was writing the show at the time. She was not a good fit for this show at all, but at least she was...less bad than many who came after her. Yep.