EricMontreal22

It did seem to be one of the few storylines from McTavish v.2 that got some traction, to be fair. Certainly not Palmer's stolen Nazi art.

Yes--even if the execution didn't live up to her lofty ideals, I gotta respect the thought she put into this, as well. I would love to know what Marland made of it all (or was he already planning his exit at this point? For some reason I get the feeling he may have been...)

What's interesting is the story outline for the supernatural stuff is from November 1984 when I believe Doug Marland was still HW. But actually the storyline played out over a year and a bit when all is said and done... The story starts Summer 1984. He “dies” in November. Comes back soon after as Keith. By spring you realize Jonathan is back. He has his finale in Nov 1985. (Douglas Marland was off the show as HW I believe in June 1985 when his two year contract was up.) Here's the story proposal/treatment's first few pages--message me for more if wanted. Over half of it is Agnes Nixon, God bless her, detailing classic literary precedent for her story, etc--I doubt JER did that when he pitched the Marlena possession storyline .

There actually was a problem with uploading several of the full episodes--YT kept flagging them due to copyright issues and Mike couldn't figure out what needed to be edited out so this is probably the best compromise, although I agree with you that it's always nice to see these stories in context and how they played opposite all the other stories.

I love how in the car chase, etc, sequence it goes all 1980s cheezy horror film which is not remotely I think what Agnes Nixon intended

During COVID some of us Loving fans managed to get (from a kind fan) and watch a good chunk of the episodes from this infamous storyline but for various reasons weren't allowed to share them. So I'm so glad that this fan edit of the story at least was just made now. And though she wasn't credited as HW at the time, let's all remember this IS an Agnes Nixon storyline at least at heart--I have a copy of her lengthy story outline for it (including her reasoning for it) copies from her archives.

Oh you're absolutely right about Bill too, and we have heard how Dani quit her modelling career when she married him, but it seemed more like it was her decision (though one he would have wanted) and not as blatant as with Martin.

I'm with you--given it was 1992, I thought it actually worked well (and it truly was groundbreaking to feature the AIDS quilt, the first time a scripted program was given permission to feature it and something I'm certain most of the viewers had no knowledge about but shows so clearly the scope of devastation of that disease.) I guess as a young viewer at the time, I never really thought it did make me more sympathetic to Sloane (actually I did like that it gave more compassion to Andrew and explained his reaction despite being a priest) OK but now I have to ask--I completely missed Eva la Rue's brief run on GH. Anyone give me a quick rundown? If we're talking homophobic OLTL storylines we have to look no further than Higley and the Daniel Colson storyline where a man in the 2000s who by all reports otherwise was a good guy, was driven to MURDER to hide his sexuality (and they even brought back that short term "love shack" Malone/Griffith x 2 character as his BF which just made the storyline all the more confusing because if he had a bf who was keeping his secret... why was he killing people? Was his name Mark? I think he was played by Matt Cavanaugh who at the time had a major Broadway career--including Tony in the last West Side Story revival, but seems to have completely disappeared from stage and film a while back) Talk about a storyline that belonged in 1981 (and would have been tasteless then anyway.) Sidenote--I did like Riley, Daniel's son who I think also came out of the Love Shack--was that the name?--storyline and recently saw the actor has a lead in the new Amazon Prime trans sitcom which was the last thing Norman Lear did. This was all a part of my MA project, because I compared the Billy storyline with the gay story four years later on AMC. (When I interviewed Hal Corley he swore that when planning the story they never brought up the OLTL storyline.) Which did make a concerted effect to involve more of the canvas and to last longer (it did--starting with a focus on teacher Michael Delaney, then when that played out moving to Kevin coming out, and then keeping him on the canvas--including the first "gay conversion therapy" storyline on US TV--as much as they could until of course McTavish returned as headwriter and he disappeared. But as far as AMC storylines go that has been overshawdowed by the Bianca storyline a few years later when they finally were allowed to have a core character come out--though I argue they did somethings with the Kevin storyline better... ) RIGHT, this is what I was trying to say but you said better, especially about Andrew. But wait--who was Natalia? LOL

So the dynamic they seem obviously to be playing up is the most typically male chauvinistic (in terms of how they're spouse should behave) character on the show isn't any of the straight men, but is Martin who seems to want a 1950s housewife in Smitty? I get it... It's actually an interesting take on gay marriages, though annoying at the same time lol. I did actually like the kids, and their complete siding with Smitty on the subject... I still am not 100% sold on the relationship as played out (I laughed when all of the other husbands/boyfriends have had much more... revealing sleepwear than Smitty's 1950s, again, pajamas...) but actually did enjoy their storyline beats today. As for Eva and "Leslie" I'm actually enjoying the over the top soapiness of it BUT it does have me wondering how she raised Eva (and successfully, it seems) for all of these years until now (and we've heard her husband/partner wasn't very paternal so we can't chalk it up to him.) Still, I gotta say, I took today off and was nursing a cold in bed, so did check out all the remaining soaps for the first time in a while, and Gates, for all the things I'm not completely sold on, was far more compelling than anything on the three other shows, and had better dialogue. I know it's only in its third week so is hard to judge, but... (I also didn't mind a break from Dani.) AND despite my praise, I 100% agree with absolutely everything in this post., We definitely have to start having Derek and Ashley interacting more with the others as, despite what we've been told, they still don't seem to have any connection to the others (Nicole talking to Ashley didn't seem very personal--more like co-workers at the same hospital, which they are, but not someone who presumably grew up knowing Nicole as her best friend's aunt, or whatever...) The gambling storyline also is completely islanded/isolated from the main focus stories as well (and I guess we can see what's gonna happen to Vanessa's storyline but I'm not sure why she went from apparently randomly hooking up with men in roleplay situations--stupidly at the bar her friends all hang out at--to sleeping with a key staff member of the country club they all practically live in...) I actually thought for a long time they would do this as a 30 minute soap (if anything to pair with B&B) and I agree that probably would have been the best way to launch the show.

Interestingly, looking at the episodes on archive, despite what other sources have said, it looks like Agnes Nixon doesn't start getting credited as HW until the start of 1990, which was also AMC's 20th anniversary and when the new credits premiered. I'm definitely with you on lighting and sets (which really became basic and lacking personality in the 2000s) Ha you're right--McTavish's second run did have those ridiculous Gothic storylines... Oh Erica's mask, and the Camille mess (which was not helped by having a terrible actress from what I recall.)

It actually lasted for several years, didn't it? Inexplicable (I mean I know Sunset Beach used it initially but that was to try to make it look like the Spelling primetime soaps and they dropped it within a year...) The final part of Pratt's run on the show was close to the show's nadir for me, but you're right--it started with a lot of potential, surprisingly. I remember he also brought something that the show had been missing previously (were Brown/Esensten the previous HW?) and that was classic AMC--*humour* I remember posting, probably on here, about how in his first few weeks he really brought that back. But... Maxim thanks for the tip of the AMC episodes on archive--WOW, I wouldn't have thought to look... I haven't seen a lot of this since I got sent dozens and dozens of VHS tapes in the 90s from someone online

I dunno--I was a bitter gay teen when it was airing, but I never thought we were meant to sympathize with any of Greenlee's behaviour. But like a lot of stuff of that time, I have no doubt that it wasn't clear in how it played. And I was an obsessive viewer at the time--admittedly with a short history with the show, but from what I remember there was virtually no material with her and Phoebe (or other tentpole characters) to re-establish her connection to the canvas. I never had any idea who she was and, like I said, I watched very closely back then. I definitely feel the same way Christopher Lawford was a wonderful guy by that stage, after dealing with some demons (I've heard this from Corley and other people I've interviewed--partly when I made the mistake of saying that I thought casting him was a mistake...) Ha I actually have the Masters of the Universe DVD (don't ask) and never made any connection.

My introduction to Cecily was when she was brought back for Christopher Lawford's Charlie Brent, who already was a character that baffled me. At the time I had friends who had been watching AMC longer because their mom was a fan, and they said how the Charlie he replaced was so cute (I don;'t think Christopher Lawford's looks were exactly something 14 year old girls--or 13 year old gay guys--would find appealing.) And then Cecily, who, yes, seemed very annoying, came on without much of an explanation of how she was tied to the show... They were going for a cutesy Nick and Nora thing with the two of them after, and I hope I remember this right, a very early You Got Mail rip off storyline where they didn't realize they were talking to each other, but I remember even as a relative soap newbie and a teen never thinking it worked (and then they were written off anyway...) Cecily certainly would have been more appealing if they were able to give her more interactions with Phoebe and maybe that was down to the health issues Ruth Warrick was having off and on by that point.

Well 18 year old me LOVED all that (yes, kinda antiquated) class structure stuff. It's not my reality, but I thought it fit the show in a way the later yacht club etc didn't. I also loved early Greenlee (I know we disagree on this DR that's ok, we can disagree sometimes.) But Greenlee was not being presented as a character whose views we were meant to relate to or agree with, there's a big difference between her being homophobic and Becca being. I'm always amused on Broadway message boards when younger members are AGHAST to find out that their heroes were smoking (or sometimes still smoking) well into the 90s. We get the show repeated later as well so I'll see if I can check it out. I think I've told the story on here (probably several times) of literally bumping into Jill Larson when I was at LaGuardia Airport about 8 years ago and how gracious and lovely she was, especially when I recognized her (and went into "stammer" mode.) I know you were a long time AMC fan and came from a completely different perspective than I did, but I still think compared to virtually every show, it kept its identity the best throughout the 90s.

I was just going to say, among the major prime time soaps anyway (and shows that were specifically primetime soaps, so not serialized dramas like the Herskovitz/Zwick shows which were all character) Knots Landing--at its best--was the one that had the most in common with that daytime soap opera tradition although that was increasingly lost in later years (notice to that in later show the show started to bump up the glam quotient.) Henry and the Chinese restaurant--which we learned had LONG been one of Joe Martin's fave lunch joints. Who knew! I mean honestly that had potential, and I actually thought (I know I'm in the minority) some of the Adam and Liza therapy sessions with Lysistrata were genuinely funny. But the show really was *odd* under Rayfield (when Cascio joined it slightly improved) not that they had much time to prove themselves, but it somehow often felt more like a... dramatic sitcom? I remember when McTavish came back (with a fourth of July episode I believe) to her credit the show *suddenly* felt much more like Pine Valley. That did not last very long, but... (And to give Brian Frons some unearned credit, when he returned to ABC Daytime he did make some decisions that looked good on paper. According to Lorraine Broderick herself, she was asked to return to AMC but at the time was burned out--I guess her last stint had been the odd co-HW era at OLTL which leaned into camp--and so Frons looked at who else had written successfully for AMC in the past couple of decades and chose McTavish. For OLTL he hired Griffith who finally convinced Malone to join him. All decisions that made a LOT of sense--but without the infrostructure that those regimes had when they were at their best in the early 90s it of course wasn't the same--not the least because of Frons' own interference. Still, I thought McTavish's first year had a lot of good stuff, despite things like her immediately trying to replicate her Who Killed Will mystery with the similarly plotted Michael Cambias one...) Are you watching on YT>? I couldn't find the episode--but would like to revisit more of the Margaret DePriest brief era, which it's been fun following in your summaries. Culliton actually seemed quite interested in revisiting (in a way) history--I remember he had a hunky recast of Timmy show up (at the hospital?) with some mystery and then (typical of the stories of this time) that was just all dropped. I wish he WOULD talk more about his year on the show, but whenever it comes up in Zoom interviews I've seen he genuinely seems to just blank lol I agree with you abotu McTavish's first year. And yes what's amazing about the Rayfield era with all those newbie actors is... none of them seemed to show ANY potential at all, (wasn't MBJ actually McTavish though? Or am I wrong? at any rate I think he DID show instant potential.) Seyfried whose character (Joanie?) was dating Jamie also showed potential so it seemed a mistake to sideline her storyline as merely supporting to the teen story of JR and Alex Daddario's character (Laurie??) Laurie's storyline seemed another attempt to play short term social relevant stories (sorta like Gottlieb and Malone tried when they first started at OLTL with a wife abuse story) with Laurie having an abusive drunk of a father.

I can't say for sure, but given it was episode 41 I'm gonna guess it's the first one, Kate Harrington. However the second Kate, Christine Thomas was also at some time in 1970 and then Kay Campbell was late 1970. As Agnes Nixon was known to do at that time there was a fair amount of recasting early on.

Oh wow!! Well I had missed that and will take what I can get!

Wow!! And thanks for making us aware of that

You're spot on about Becca. I'm a huge Agnes Nixon fan and, I fully realize, sometimes too much of a defender and I think the problem with her return as HW/co-HW at this time was for whatever reason (one, I think being, the health of her husband) while she very much wanted to remain a part of her beloved show, she didn't really want to be a HW again and all the time committed to that. So, like Becca as I said was a throwback to past characters, but maybe especially 1970 Tara when really, unless you did MORE with that type of character, in 1999 the character was a pretty archaic and out of touch trope. Even nearing 80, I suspect Nixon would have been able to make her less so, but I don't think she was invested enough to do so. (AND yes, if Nixon had more time to devote but also was working in the soap world of 20 or really even 10 years earlier, they could have made an interesting and workable storyline with Becca's homophobia--remember in when they had "good" characters like Tom picketing the abortion clinic? Or even in the Kevin Sheffield storyline we had some good characters express homophobia and more morally questionable characters like Palmer stand up for it--something James Mitchell, an out gay man of course, requested of his character) Among the many things the execs didn't realize about soaps when they became more involved (and saw just how much of an audience stuff like Luke and Laura could attract) was that if you want sustained long term ratings you have to build audience rapport with the characters. I know as a teen why I loved AMC (and OLTL and, yes, Loving) was honestly at least as much for the remaining scenes of just character interaction we got (of course I was also huge into theatre already, and that was the closest tv got to theatre.) And yeah, I think Pratt is the extreme example of a writer who simply doesn't do vertical storytelling. This was why he did relatively very well in primetime soaps (Melrose Place's success was really due to when he took it over, for example) where, especially in his brand of primetime soaps, you really just plow through story story story. That doesn't work for the longterm on daytime (I did always find it interesting that there was a very Agnes Nixon element introduced on the show during his run with the character of Brock, played by a real life disfigured army vet, which even included at least one scene at a support group for other real life vets--AMC would do this once again with the... not great but I suppose still somewhat groundbreaking for its time, Zarf/Zoe trans storyline which also had a suppoirt meeting scene something that always makes me think of the infamous youth drug centre sequence on early One Life to Live--which I so wish had been saved somewhere.) I remember that! It was still when she was in bandages, I think? I wonder if that was really McTavish's doing? Because yeah, AMC at that time was filled with surreal dream sequences and let me tell you, I LOOOOOOOVED them

Right, 1994 would have been when I was introduced to the character via that sequence. I am 99% somehow he made a nightmare/Hell cameo in an episode from 2001. Actually this 1993 nightmare sequence is probably when I first saw Ray because at the time I was watching (very secretly--we were forbidden at 12--) the Nightmare on Elm Street movies and I remember thinking how ray was like a toned down Freddie Krueger, even having his victim strung up as a marionette like in Nightmare 3 (OK, in a far less gristly fashion for those who know that film...)

Well the fact that i made you specifically a fan is all the reason to be thankful for her run, I guess! Even though you were new to soaps, it wouldn't be long after Summer (September 2001 in fact) when one of the more awkward transitional eras for AMC was happening with Culliton finally coming in. As a newbie viewer were you aware of that--or were the behind the scenes stuff just completely off your radar? (I was a weird kid--even at 11 getting into AMC in 1991, very soon on I wanted to know more about how it was made and started watching the end credits--I found it frustrating that they only had them sometimes--to look for changes, etc.) Completely agree with you, no surprise, about vertical storytelling and how missed it is in soaps. Of course it also has to be well scripted, but that's a slightly better issue. It's ironic--Harding Lemay first pushed for AW to expand to an hour (and then disastrously 90 mins) for this very reason--he wanted the opportunity to have longer scenes and to not need every scene to be pushing plot (as he said he wanted to be able to write a short Broadway drawing room drama every day.) So the expanded length WAS done for this reason, and I think, at least, Nixon (by this time already with Wisner Washam) were well aware of trying to use the expanded hour with AMC in similar ways, when she reluctantly gave in to demands to expand it. I also love how Passanante says at this time Nixon was no longer even required to give in detailed story outlines etc (and even in the 80s I find this true--I have copies of a few of her 6 month soap outlines and boy are they vague by that era--often saying "well we might go in this direction, or we might go in that direction") As soap fans we often find it frustrating when it's clear that a writer is making up a storyline as they go along(especially a problem with mysteries.) But I think this speaks to how some soap writing can be way TOO goal oriented instead of really living in each character and story moment.

Sadly, I don;'t think she was willing to commit to a long lead story by this time though there are a few (mostly comic) gems still in store for you. Her last real main one I remember I wanna say was near the end of McTavish's first run (so 94-95?) involving a scam on a high end retirement community, though they'd still use her when they could--later on when Marian Colby tries to enter PV "society" for example. (One good thing about AMC, and I suspect this had to do with Agnes Nixon always being present with the show--well except when Pratt was HW and had her physically locked out of the writer meetings--was how they treated their vets. Ruth Warrick, Eileen Herlie, James Mitchell, etc, all were kept on contract until they passed away, and brought in when they were able to and wanted to work. Which during that era the other shows were NOT doing with their vets...)

Yes, and I think there might have been a cameo from Ray Gardner (trying to sneak in from Hell?) Unlike One Life to Live's Heaven as some sort of spaceship, AMC had it as some weird all white garden party or something--complete with swings and Commedia dell'arte circus performers. I mean I know these people had to envision Heaven on a budget, but, OK... (Though if I had to choose which Heaven to end up in, I guess I would choose it over the austere cult/spaceship of OLTL ) Like I said, at the time I think fans WERE happy to see all the past characters. The problem was the story went on too long and started to effect the fabric of the "realistic" non Heaven stories (Actually didn't the angel from Vicki's OLTL story briefly go down to Llanview too?)

I really did think they'd take a bigger break (maybe they thought with just four episodes a week, it wasn't needed?) It DOES seem like suddenly streamers, but especially Amazon Prime, are all in with their main non binge-format programming being reality and game shows (I know Pop Culture Jeopardy has been a huge hit.) I can't help but see the irony of reality pushing out scripted shows...

It was actually Eileen Sigel, Patricia Roe. Not Anna, Doris Belack which is what I might have accidentally said elsewhere... It was on one of the 1970 episodes (episode 41) that I rescued from Agnes Nixon's short lived website 15+ years back (the explanation was her son found two early 1970 AMC kinescopes in her storage when she was moving from her house to a condo.) I uploaded it to Youtube 8 years ago and since then OTHERS have uploaded it as if they did all my hard work. Here's the segment (notice the first, totally uncharismatic compared to Kay Campbell, Grandma Kate Martin.)