EricMontreal22

Yes, I believe in her unfinished soap memoirs, McTavish makes those claims, and mentions that Nixon did have an "executive" credit (well uncredited credit.) She certainly was at meetings like I said--I think she only stopped regularly going during McTavish's second infamous run (and of course she then briefly replaced her for the Bianca story, etc) (It was only under Pratt that Nixon was actually officially BANNED from attending those meetings and "interfering" with suggestions.) McTavish was a flashy writer but the balance was still solid in the early-mid 90s (so says me--of course that was when I firmly became a soap obsessed fan) and ratings held steady until the end of her run when it was Behr who was looking for any opportunity to get her pushed out. (And there started to be one too many doppelganger stories, the bomb stuff, etc.) However, I am firmly of the belief Who Killed Will was McTavish (and I did love that mystery at the time.) It seems like her, for one thing, and... McTavish repeated so many of the same story beats for her Who Killed Michael Cambias mystery (that Eden Reigel mentioned at that same panel) when she returned for her third stint (which actually started off... kinda good? Her third stint I mean.) But Janet herself was Nixon I'm sure--it seems like Nixon at her most soapy OTT, and it led to the whole Natalie in the Well (on the formerly unknown Wildwind estate) and the whole Gothic Wildwind storyline (Angelique in the attic, etc) that we were discussing is classic Gothic Nixon. In the last (and maybe only) Washam interview (is it still online? I'd love to re-read it) he basically said that he just REALLY did not like that woman. I think she tended to just railroad over the other writers, is the impression I got. I assume Broderick felt the same. In that same interview Washam says he didn't write a single thing for GL. Broderick, because she's such a great lady, gave him the job because he needed something like 6-12 more months of steady WGA soap writing work to get a full pension, so she just had him on the GL staff long enough so he could get that. Let me echo everyone else's sentiments, that it's tons of fun to read your recaps/reactions and how much you're loving the show. I'm not sure how many more consecutive episodes are up--I haven't checked on YT in years (partly because I know I don't have time to revisit it all right now, and the temptation is big) but you have years of good stuff to go. (I did run across a Margaret DePriest episode recently and it wasn't bad... But you could tell she had the mandate to make the episode much more "action") For anyone interested, in the Loving/The City thread we got talking about crossovers (specifically the 1992 AMC/Loving crossover that got me hooked on Loving too) and I posted scans of the pages from the 1998 AMC trivia book that covered (most) of the crossovers AMC has had with the other ABC soaps (they don't mention OLTL's Anna Wolek visiting her "good friend" Joe Martin in the early months of AMC--which you can see in one of the 1970 episodes on Youtube.)

I certainly still have no idea who Claudia Cohen is! Of course cross overs to try to bring over viewers to the ABC/Nixon soaps is nothing new. We have that early episode of AMC where Joe Martin's friend Anna Wolek stops over (I have to wonder if they actually advertised that at all or if it did make any OLTL fans check out AMC or if it was just a cute idea--I mean they didn't even air close together back then.) (And OLTL had a GH crossover in their first year, didn't they? Which would have taken some planning to bring John Baradino to NYC to film... And then there were cases like Paul Martin coming to Llanview for the infamous 1979 trial--but I think that was done more because the show needed another lawyer character (I could be wrong but I think Paul wasn't even currently on AMC.) In the 90s when the Labines (??) brought Marco Dane to GH was that crossover advertised at all? The character had been off soaps for 10 or so years... As for Adam and Dorian I *think* they only met during the babyswitch AMC/OLTL storyline (since they were both grandparents of the babies...) I *do* like the idea of the soaps being in the same universe (and certainly I think, even without crossovers, Nixon thought of her shows being that way) although I admit things like the Babyswitch just went on too long, and sometimes casual short crossovers are the best. From the AMC and then the OLTL Trivia books, there are brief bits about the crossovers (including things like Jack from AMC on The City dating Sidney). They don't even mention Anna Wolek on AMC and I SWEAR there was some sort of OLTL and The City crossover (maybe even after the City ended?) involving some crime storyline... And you're right, Adam and Elaine Princi's Dorian did interact (but I don't think I saw that...)

Thanks so much for all this! I know I certainly watched during that era and a lot of the details came back to me (including Marian Seldes and her role.) Was that church the same one where... someone had their wedding in the snow in the 90s? (Was it a Stacy wedding? God I should remember all this better...) It always seemed random to me. I did like Lorraine a lot, though more so on The City, and actually I even started to like Danny on The City--not sure why but I just found him more appealing but he fit better on it.

There was definitely one in 1988 for OLTL's 20th (I swear!) But now find me the videos!

What was the finale of Gilbert's storyline? I have some scripts from his early appearances (which were close to supernatural--and credited to Agnes Nixon) but don't fully remember.But I agree that Addie Walsh's stint following Agnes Nixon was mostly really good (or I thought so at the time) and she followed the tone well. Honestly I don't really remember Brown/Esensten's work until the Loving Murders started in full. I think on my old half broken laptop I have some of the James Kiberd Vietnam stuff (including him at the Vietnam memorial) as well as some other good stuff like the Jonathan supernatural stuff, and I'll try my best to get that off the laptop and uploaded.

Totally agree

I see what you did there. I think it was about the mix AMC had. And like I said, some of the soap press in the early days did NOT approve. Later on Schemering would laud the show for its mix--but I believe also felt that sometimes it could be jarring going from scene to scene. About the recap of the Paley Center talk, when Agnes Nixon's web page was launched, the most exciting thing were the two kinescopes of early AMC in such good quality (the page said her son found them in a closet when they were moving her into a condo from her house) and I DID save those (and posted them years back on YT as have others--I like to think from my saved videos but probably not ) But they also had other clips as I mentioned earlier--lots of not too exciting things (later anniversary episodes of AMC and OLTL that we've all seen) but they had at least two of her Paley Center--then the Museum of Television (Broadcasting?) talks from the late 80s for the anniversary of OLTL and then later from their Worlds Without End exhibit (I have the companion book) where Agnes Nixon spoke for a good hour, with others speaking and clips, about her shows and they were FASCINATING. And I wish I had had the foresight to save those videos too--withoin a year the videos were all gone from her site and no one was updating it and I've never seen the videos of these two panel discussions resurface since I believe the dates are roughly November 89 to early Summer 1992? I started watching very late 91 and I specifically remember when Agnes Nixon was no longer listed as HW but Megan McTavish was (although to my young soap watching brain I didn't feel the show changed tone very much at the time--at least not at first, and Nixon was still involved in story meetings as she would be during the Broderick subsequent era--when I interviewed Hal Corley he said she was almost always at meetings offering input and would even phone him up a few times at 2am with sudden story ideas. So maybe her involvement made the transition smoother, although in hindsight even in that first successful era, you see some of McTavish's more stunt heavy, and arguably mean spirited writing come in.... And there's some discussion that McTavish wasn't Nixon's choice though she got along with her at the time--Broderick and Wisner Washam, who had both assisted Nixon on her early 90s return, did not--Washam retired as we know and Broderick went to... GL?)

I believe she is on Facebook...

That's a good question. But it does seem like Corrie is continuing to trim away their "eccentric character" types that they were always known for (but have been losing for decades, to be fair.)

This makes sense (also, maybe it had already changed, but giving Corrie a regular weekday time slot and not one that jumps around by 30 minutes depending on the day, makes sense.) I do wonder what it will mean for the CBC/Canadian airings I've watched with my grandma for years. It could give us a chance to finally catch up (for a while now we get 6 episodes a week--2 on Fridays--but we're permanently about a 4-5 weeks behind the UK which means I hate to look up anything about the show online or even here due to spoilers.) I mean the only soap I follow where I'm thankful for 6 episodes a week is The Archers, and that's a 13 minute show I can listen to on the bus to work As for Dev, I actually sorta feel kinda defensive about him as he seems so hated online. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a big fan (though my grandma finds him often very funny which might add to why I feel some defensive ness) but I think like DR said he certainly works as a supporting (VERY supporting) character with his kids, even mostly with Bernie. Exactly--it seems like they try to recreate aspects of it anyway basically every single year (it reminds me of American soaps when they started to all get serial killer stories.)

Yeah she was perfectly fine. It's hard to invest in a character like that, especially when we know she's just going to be on for a limited time. I will say her acting style, etc, fit the show better than Mischa Barton who always seemed like she came from another planet. I like the Seb actor well enough too, but I agree with you. Out of the major storylines right now, it's the worst offender at a story I just can't really muster any interest in (and the addition of the new sister character is *not* helping and really just makes Seb's character all the more confusing. She was engaged to him??) Curtis is such a non character, I had to look up who he was as I didn't recognize the name (but he did have some lines this week. And he's fine for what he is, I just don't think the show has any interest in ever expanding his role from random school assistant.) But you do make a good point I've noticed since watching Neighbours since the reboot (I watched it fairly regularly for a few years 10-15 years back partly as I was dating a guy from Brisbane who loves soaps, knew I loved soaps and wanted me to watch with him, and it was easy to find for a brief time here in Canada.) The guest characters who more often than not you don't want to get too interested in even if you like the character because, again more often than not, they're simply not going to be expanded into anything more.

I agree with all of that. It's interesting, obviously I started watching Loving before I was on the internet, so I wasn't really aware of any reaction. I did start being aware and making notes (because I'm a nerd) of when the headwriter listing changed. I did always wonder if there was a reaction to the AMC crossover and if it made *any* impact on ratings? To be honest, I'm not sure why Loving didn't try to have a crossover from the start. (That video links to a nice scene between Kate, Dinah Lee and Louis. Even if it is about Gonorrhea LOL) I'm not sure that anyone would recommend Pine Valley as a place to take a vacation from trauma...

I wasn't here (I don't think? COVID is kinda a blur to me) but will have to look those posts up. I think you're right that it had that element from the start (I wonder if some of that is Marland's influence. As much as we associate him with families, etc, in ATWT he always seemed to have that angle--as of course New Day in Eden makes clear.) And that said, I do think the show still had moments of heart (I mean The City now)--like Angie and the baby storyline, etc. I also thought that it had one of the better realized younger casts on a soap at the time (of course I was 15-16 watching 20somethings so am not sure how much of that would have actually been realistic.) DC your point about Tracy's storyline missing the beats about how she genuinely was upset about being cut off from her family make sense. I admit, I wasn't (and have never really been) a GH watcher, so the character was new to me when she joined The City--it was only AFTER The City's cancellation that I saw her on A Daytime to Remember. I think this is a fair take, although I will say as a teen viewer I found it riveting. And part of that was because Loving had never gotten any love--as I've said already I didn't even know it existed until the Carter Jones crossover with AMC--Growing up in BC Canada, we used to get ABC via the Seattle feed and Cindi Rinehart (who I just realized recently passed away ) used to cover all of the soaps. Except Loving--even though it aired on her station. The only time I remember it coming up was when the AMC crossover happened (and back then for some reason our VCR couldn't record KOMO--I was fine with AMC and OLTL because they were simulcast on CBC in Canada. So I actually reached out to the mother of one of my brother's friends who I knew was a big soap opera watcher and asked if she would record it for me--so for a month she recorded every episode...) Anyway where was I

I mean people do age differently now (I even read a scientific study that said part of this has to do with the increase in life expectancy.) There's a reason no one would cast a modern production of Sunset Blvd with a 50 year old actress. But I admit I still was surprised to look up just how old both actresses were... Was that after Robin Strasser was cast? Because I was gonna say with Claire Mallis' Dorian I would have had no doubt she'd sleep with Matt.

Wow I wish this had been filmed and released. Agnes Nixon briefly had a website with videos of her talks at the Paley Centre (I believe one was for OLTL and one for AMC) that I wish I had thought to save like I saved her AMC episodes that were uploaded. Grr Certainly the early 90s under Nixon. I also think highly of the mid 90s when Broderick returned as HW although there are weird stories in that midst--95-97.

Thanks for doing this--Chris himself didn't seem to know when they were from! I agree with your last statement. And... I agree that Brown and Esensten's stuff WAS nihilistic--by design, I would argue. I ended up really liking The City in its final six months, but I completely understand your sentiment.

I completely agree. I guess they were replaced due to Brown/Esenstein already taking over with The City, and I admit watching the Loving Murders, for all its issues, *was* exciting. It's frustrating because Chris Marcantel was by far the better actor--and on a superficial level, I think pretty cute. But it sounds like ABC wanted "soap opera hot" which they did get with Robert Tyler. Curtis was always meant to be the anti-hero anyway, as written, so I'm not sure why ABC didn't see the example of Tony Geary as someone worth casting.

I love you forever for this quote. You're right! I'm just glad I managed to save some of the WOST rarer releases. Lance is the best!

I was lucky to be a fly on the wall for many of those Loving zoom meet ups--but it was clear how much everyone involved loved Loving (and seemed clueless about why it wasn't catching on, though they mentioned how erratic the writing was.

Thanks for posting these--I'm not sure why YT wouldn't let me. They were given to me by Chris Marcantel himself, who during the pandemic was such a cool guy, trying to bring together the Loving cast, etc. Unfortunately I had hours of episodes from that time that have been lost with my old laptop So I'm happy these are out there. Chris Marcantel says that Agnes Nixon asked that he return to the role when she took over as HW in late 1993. Before then he had resigned himself to not being "hot enough" to be a leading actor on an ABC soap. Which says a lot...

Thanks! I actually have a question which can probably be easily answered... Before ATWT stopped being live, what was the previous soap opera to stop airing live?

As a big fan of The Best of Everything the novel and movie, I always wished some of that survived. I admit, I never got why noon was an issue. West coast All my Children aired at noon and growing up I knew so many people who would watch it on their lunch breaks--which is how I discovered it because I went home from school for lunch. Her Stories is a great book, and its author Elana Levine was a lot of help when I was doing my MA. And you're right to point out that even back then they were distinctive brands. I remember back when there was the WOST site, people laughed that the creator refused to call LA filmed soaps, well, soaps... But I kinda get it. I will add that I just found it really illuminating to see those early 70s P&G soaps. When I read all the articles about AMC and OLTL taking off on college campuses, I honestly wondered if the college people were deluding themselves--all the talk about how "these shows aren't remotely the same as my mother's shows"--but in a way I get it. If you were just flipping channels some afternoon they would come across differently.

In hindsight I think it was a great year. At the time, I believe the network was concerned as ratings were dipping a bit--a bit why they insisted on hiring outside the show and making Margaret Depriest HW in 1989 and hiring FMB for EP (of course she had a great history with the show.) And we know how that went--Agnes Nixon insisted on returning as HW herself later in 89.

Totally agreed!

No, I know that. Trust me, I'm NOT a fan of ReRon...