EricMontreal22

Reading comprehension is something that can be learned--fear not! What was said was that Ruth (and in the book she clearly is joking here) said she would happily accept an under 5 walk on role just to get Irna to even consider her for an actual role. But that is not what happened.

You sure have a lot to say about how you don't care what others have to say about you. As to "pro-Aryan" it is a term that is now exclusively used in a way that you'd have to be stupid to not realize. Sure, continue using it, but if you want people to actually consider your opinions and not assume you mean something you claim you don't than I'd think twice. Word choice has power. There are lots of terms I could use if I wanted to because I personally don't feel they carry the meaning and weight that others do. But the fact that virtually everyone else feels they do carry that meaning means that the point I want to make will not be made. I'm really giving you the benefit of the doubt here... BTW, you may wanna work on the things you accuse me of yourself. Starting a post with, "I think your comments are awful and you seem like you are trolling. You have gone out of your way to insert yourself in an argument which suggests you either have a lot of..." sure sounds like "lecture mode" (or something worse) to me...

I'm white. I think I have every right to discuss the myriad reasons blacks and other minorities have often been under-represented, and poor represented on soaps. That is NOT the issue people have with you. I am not in attack mode. If I were I wouldn't address you as Jarrod but rather call you by some stupid name reflective of your avatar, or whatever you're doing here with DramatistDreamer. That shows you on the defense. For someone who claims to be smart, the very fact that you used the term "pro-Aryan" as you did, no matter *what* your intentions (look up any use of that term) shows a shocking lack of intelligence at the very least...

Why aren't you letting black people speak for themselves, by that logic? It was VERY clear from her post that she meant that stories about romantic relationships starting with rape are no longer tolerated the way they once were. EJ and Sami may be a couple many people love, but there has also been pushback against them for this reason *from the start*--something that was rarely even thought about back in the 1970s (the true pushback about Luke and Laura didn't really happen until these issues started being discussed more in the 1980s). Incidentally the same is true of romance novels--I'm not a romance reader, but reading a lot about the genre while studying and researching often denigrated popular and pulp forms of art and entertainment, particularly those that are often associated with women (ie soap operas), it was shocking to read about just how many romance stories--by some scholarly accounts surveying hundreds of titles including some that were and are extremely highly regarded like Kathleen Woodiwiss' The Flame and the Flower (which I did read, and even kinda enjoy, in an undergrad pulp fiction course), a good 80-90% of romance novels in the 1970s and early 1980s involved the "romanticized" idea of rape (ie tropes like that the hero was essentially good but he just wanted the heroine SOO much that he couldn't help himself--he later apologizes and they fall in love, etc). *blink* Oooh boy. You sure you're not just a made up persona? *wow* ...I rest my cast.

Well yes--exactly the point I was making and why I think it's pretty ridiculous to consider that actors in her situation would crumple up at having to do Guiding Light (although I should point out her role on GL lasted nearly 2 years and while very much a supporting role as a nurse, was *not* an "under-five").

I'm more than fine with Dusay... As for Strasser--I could see her playing Alex if she made it a bit less Dorian and slightly more like her AMC character (who I know she hated playing).

Toxic, I get that but couldn't they have just filmed a thirty minute soap in six months--filming each day for the length of time they'd do an hour soap? Robb I remember that suggestion as well. Of course not the same thing but when Gottlieb joined One Life to Live she wanted to try shorter featured stories as well and I think the plan was they'd last three months. At least one got done with movie actor Craig Wasson coming on as a wife beater and then the characters leaving at the end of their story--but quickly she realized that that wasn't working out too well.

I never fully got that--couldn't they have done the show without story arcs and still filmed it only six months a year?

This is a trip--Camille Paglia is apparently a soap opera fan and here she is talking about them (and promoting her book which mentions them) back in 1994. Like with most of Paglia's controversial feminism (or anti-feminism as some might say) I kinda agree with her in theory but I don't agree with her very unflinching, black or white take on soaps (she says she admires Agnes Nixon but thinks she's the worst thing to happen to soaps as they should be ALL about the "sleazy" sexual power of female archetypes and not have any dealings with social issues at all--and feels Y&R is the only soap that still does that--ignoring I guess how badly Bill Bell used to do social storylines). Still it's a hilarious and interesting clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okwYLVKsRtQ Dang dunno why it's only coming up as a link

No thoughts on the odd lesbian storyline (I still don't know if their acting is meant to just be a fit with the sometimes incredibly low energy acting that is a Roseanne show trademark or if they're just bad...)

I mean personally I would have loved that lineup, but ultimately by the late 90s I don't think it would have done anything to change the current soap status which has devolved into what it is in no real part because of its lineup. Incidentally Wendy Riche has said she was responsible for Port Charles getting the dreaded early time slot--she was buddies with the then head of ABC Daytime and in Dec '96 they were talking about how The City was expensive and didn't seem to be improving on Loving's numbers. Riche said they could do a soap on the cheap using GH's existing sets, set it in a different wing of the hospital and that she felt (since she had a background in programming for Fox and how to schedule things) that PC should start the ABC soap block and GH should end it, effectively causing GH, or some semblance of it, to bookend the lineup. I can't comment on the story arcs as I think I stopped watching after Time in a Bottle... (not really due to lack of interest just due to lack of time).

Keep in mind that virtually every actor on Citizen Kane was new to movies (including future film regulars Agnes Moorehead and Joseph Cotten). Ten of them came from Orson Welles' own rep company, Mercury Actors. Ruth Warrick in fact was one of the few with prior, minor, Hollywood work (Warrick thinks he cast her because she looked like his mother when she was young). It also was a commercial *flop* big time and only a mild critical hit. To go from Citizen Kane to GL ten years later, before Kane had really earned the reputation we now give it, would just seem like business as usual, really.

Ah I haven't compared the DTR Karen on the Stand with the time it was shown in the Farewell marathon though I have both on DVDR--but yeah, I was surprised to see with the AMC episode how they chopped out different scenes--I would have assumed they'd just use the same edit or something. I first noticed it back when Agnes Nixon's website still had their videos up and I saved those AMC kinescopes which I've since uploaded to YT (how I wish I had thought to save all the video on that site--they had her complete Museum of TV seminar from 1988, the twentieth anniversary of OLTL, online which now seems only possible to view of you go to the Paley Center and I could have really used for my research essay, but I digress). They all run nearly exactly 23 minutes without commercials, whereas the two kinescoped episodes of AMC that aired as part of the first I Love Lucci SoapNet marathon run about 19 minutes (which I think is the current standard for amount of programming on daytime for a 30 minute soap...) What's funny is often at least with the themed SoapNet marathon the stuff that would be edited would be the stuff that didn't fit the "theme" (for example, in the I Love Lucci marathon they'd air a 1983 episode but when they went to trim scenes those would be from the storylines not about Erica). But usually it was those less well known side stories and side characters (not that the Brooks' sisters should be considered side characters but by 1984 they were) that get trimmed...

That’s where I think it was from too. All the Daytime to Remember episodes were of course edited for time (some hour episodes were only shown in one half hour slot but all episodes had a scene or two shaved for more commercials just as they would for SoapNet marathons—in fact I noticed one AMC episode shown on DTR had a scene that was cut when it later showed up on SoapNet yet the SN airing had a different scene that DTR cut—I believe it was on the 1979 Tom confronts Erica about her birth control pills episode). But this one more than I knew at the tile as it originally red just a few months after OLTL went to 45 mins. Still at the time I was just thrilled to see the first Dorian!

Remember for a while there she was very against the idea of returning to a soap (I think she felt the work wasn't important enough)> She did AMC for six months (with a special title card in the opening credits with her image) as a favour to Agnes Nixon who only convinced her to do it when she said her character, Amy Tyler, could and would speak out against the Vietnam war and reflect Rosemary's own political beliefs. She also did How to Survive a Marriage in 1975 when it started because it was being contextualized as the first truly feminist and progressive soap that wouldn't show women dependent on romantic fulfillment (some people said this is partly what killed it--many long speeches that didn't feel natural, etc). I *believe* she played a marriage counselor (I'm not even sure if she lasted for its brief run--the focus seemed to move to other characters and it quickly changed writers). She also wanted to focus more on theatre, etc, as well. Of course, like many actors who leave soaps for a variety of reasons, after some time her feelings about them seemed to mellow (and perhaps she also appreciated the steady income they'd provide) and I'm sure she would have returned to ATWT on a more permanent basis... That all sounds vaguely familiar. It did seem like suddenly they were getting very ambitious (did they ever release AW sets?) and then *boom* they closed up shop. You're right, of course, that it's pretty common for companies to want to sound as hopeful as possible about a future return, etc, even when that doesn't seem likely... Frustrating.

Also how come so many names (with Lemay getting an "and" credit) get the first grouping, then the break down writers and script writers. Does the WGA make it so that everyone who contributes to the longterm story has to get that first credit? (The people I was surprised to see were Lemay--as I thought he was a silent consultant--Gillian Spencer who i had no idea was ever on the OLTL team and Tom King)

Randomly watching bits of episodes from the BELOVED Jill Farren Phelps era of OLTL, and specifically the 8 month period between Pam Long and McTavish's HW stints when there was no credited HW, these writing credits caught me by surprise by a number of names listed--including one person who I had always thought had just been an uncredited consultant for a brief period...

That's all well and good and in theory true--but it isn't whatsoever what Jarrod was spouting.

Oh Hugh, calling Debbie Reynolds' appearance "bland"! The Debbie Reynolds Show was one of three attempts by creator Jess Oppenheimer to recreate his success on I Love Lucy with sitcoms around a bored wife and her schemes/fantasies based around a minor female celeb (Angel, and Glynis being the other two). His son, Greg Oppenheimer, has a YT channel and has uploaded high quality copies of some of his father's stuff, including a ton of episodes of Angel (1960-61) which actually reversed the I Love Lucy concept a bit by making the wife the foreigner who mixes up English words and expressions. Watch at your own wish (I wish they'd upload some of Glynis if only because I adore Glynis Johns...) All I've ever found of Glynis (she played a mystery writer who helped her husband solve mysteries)

I wish I knew more about the deal SoapClassics made. They licensed their stuff for... a year? It seemed a very brief amount of time, anyway (none of the P&G soaps have ever been *my* soap, but I did plan on at least buying a few of the box sets except that during that time I was deeply in dept and I always assumed, while I knew they were around for just a limited time, that they'd be more easier available a *bit* longer than they were--BTW is there a site that lists exactly how many different box sets they DID ultimately release and which episodes? Everything I can find online, now that their site is gone, seems very incomplete). At any rate, they seemed to be a very small company and yet I gather the DVDs did sell at least as well as expected. Surely this shows that such releases of classic soap episodes is very possible and would do decently? (The only commercial release I know of that has been done in N America are the B&B sets...). All very frustrating. Oh, and I agree with everyone else about ATWT (and to a lesser extent GL) around the holidays and how missed it is. I was never a regular viewer, but would always watch during Christmas break (and especially enjoyed the vintage episodes they usually aired on days off).

SHe deserved a better show than one written by a novelty songwriter, but I've always loved this performance. Ed Sullivan (SOFA Entertainment owns the rights I think) *really* needs to do something with the hours they have of brilliant musical theatre performances. A lot of us theatre geeks have bootleg copies of the stuff (when I was a teen one of the first bootlegs I got was a present of 8 VHS tapes filled with them--all with a timestamp like this has), and most of it is on Youtube if you look hard enough though SOFA has been known to every few years wipe them all out. They release ONE hour long DVD (with promises of more) with a few of the iconic ones, but it would be great to have them in the best possible quality (unlike the soaps and so much other TV, I believe every episode of Ed Sullivan, at least from 1955 on, was saved on video). Just so many gems, and so often recreated with the original costumes, staging and choreography and some remnants of the original scenery for shows and performances that otherwise would be completely lost.

Tight trousers indeed!

I'm impressed that she seems to remember so many story details off the cuff from 30 or so years before this interview was done--full character names, etc. Seriously, so many soap actors can't do that (and I don't blame them).

" Also you have no idea if I am multiracial/multicultural. Or others on this board. We are not shoving our ethnic heritage front and center in the majority of our posts. I think you get a weird satisfaction from going round and round in circles about race. I am not against a good dialogue about race, but you have to start saying something new, something different, not beat the same old drum all the time. It alienates others who would likely be on your side because they believe in progressive issues as a whole. I feel sorry for black people who over identify with being black; I feel sorry for white people who over identify with being white; and with gay people who over identify with being gay, etc. It's only one part of who you are. Stop narrowly defining yourself and clinging to victimization. Be truly progressive and move yourself forward. The second A in NAACP stands for advancement. Advance yourself, stop pulling yourself back and allowing yourself to be defined by one part of yourself that you can't even be positive about, a part that on some level must seem like an inescapable curse. " This is the most inanely bizarre thing I've read on this board in a VERY long time. And that's saying something. Sure race or sexuality is only "one part of who someone is"--but it IS one big part, and it is you Jarrod, who has the problem if you find it irrelevant that someone would bring it up on here when discussing how they've seen different storylines handled where it becomes incredibly relevant.

Ah I missed that--had no idea ABC even acknowledged the online versions....