P.J.

Lola was an ex-hooker. I can't be sure, but Mark Evans may have been an ex-client of hers. She had two friends who actually worked on Nola's wedding dress. Mary Pat Gleason, who played Jane, (sort of a Jane-of-all trades, including being a nanny and nurse/companion) also wrote for the show during this period.

If they're going with the "All About Eve" comparisons, could someone at least get the movie plot correct? Bette Davis did not lose her man and her role to Eve. Margo actually didn't want the part Eve schemed to get, and Bill was never interested in Eve. And could someone remind Kat that she gave up the job Eva ended up with? She acts like Ted fired her and installed Eva.

Well, I've also seen (in some sketchy bios) that Vanessa was supposedly 25yrs older than ****, which is beyond ridiculous. While Van's age was probably tweaked downward with the Dinah reveal, **** is supposed to be older than Dinah. It's all meant to be a crack on Vanessa's age, but at least with Beth's comment I kinda get where that came from. Beth and Mindy are the same age, and Van was a mother figure to Mindy. Ugh...I so hate ****.

LOL...yeah, the fact Van hadn't tanked the company in the six weeks (or so) that he's gone seemed to impress him. He doesn't really pursue her though. Unless he's talking about it in scenes I normally skip through. He's too busy manipulating everyone like chess pieces---Ross/Trish and Reva as well as waiting for Billy/Van to implode. Unless complimenting her business acumen is his idea of foreplay--which admittedly just might be the case.

Sweet baby Jesus---the Ashley for Sainthood campaign is out of control. You know it's bad when her mother is the only one who acknowledges that Derek had reason to think she was back with him out of pity. Shanice vs Dana was pretty good.

Well, McLean Stevenson is the King of this thread, with so many failed sitcoms after MASH that it's some kind of record. I LOVED How The West Was Won, with Arness and Bruce Boxleitner and Fionnula Flannigan. It had started off as a mini-series (or a two part tv movie with Eva Marie Saint as James' sister-in-law) and then followed him as he took the family west to escape the Civil Warl My favorite for this was the short lived Bob, with Bob Newhart as an animator. In the short time between the end of Newhart and this, his brand of comedy had just went off the cliff and it failed to click with audiences.

well, you know me--most things Carly-related stick in the brain. And actually, Ro and Craig (Scott Bryce) scheming against Paul and Meg was very intriguing to me. But I'm sure that was Scotty being back.

Lola was one of those characters that just hung around. I think she'd made friends with Amanda when they were in jail together. There's a moment at Quint and Nola's reception where she must've told Billy he had a call, and she's hanging in the doorway like she doesn't trust him being in the Reardon kitchen. He tells her to save him a dance and she kind of rolls her eyes at the BS charm and leaves. LOL. She's mostly known for wearing hot pants.

She must've been. I think the bomb was meant for her, but went off while Courtney and Andy were near her car.

Well, originally it was written as deliberate. Or if not deliberate, at least reckless and self-serving on Craig's part. Yes, after she went to Switzerland in a coma, got better and returned to town, this time scheming with Craig to separate Paul and Meg. She then goes comatose again after failing to get Paul back. Then she shows up on a cooperative in some remote bumpkin-ville. She said she didn't bother telling her sister she emerged from the coma because she didn't want to be a part of her former life anymore, or some such BS. It's right around the time Carly became a drunk, and then Ro falls into bed with Craig (who is now Carly's fiancé.)

Was she on ATWT before or after Marland died? It was all apart of the Kinglsey-Malta story, right? Her husband was Duncan's partner in something. But I think it was before Damian came to town, and she blamed the Grimaldis? Not that that went anywhere really either. But it was nice seeing her again. Trish really belonged in Springfield.

And at the time in '83 when Trish steps into Spaulding, Alan and Vanessa are on the outs. Vanessa had wormed her way into a Vice Presidency at Spaulding after Amanda is booted out. (This is when she, Ross and Josh form LTA) But Van then turned around and tried to force Quentin out of town and Henry's life by making it look like he had informed Alan about Vanessa's double dealing in the Jocelyn Electronics deal (when she and Henry had blackmailed Alan, over the affair with Rita, into buying a company and got a kickback.) She left a memo outlining the deal on Alan's desk, and he then fired her. (Quint threatened to expose her actions to Henry, and tell him that she knew he was her brother. Vanessa backed off, telling Henry that she'd left the altered memo naming only her in an effort to protect him. But back to Trish---I don't know why it didn't launch more story for Trish either. She and Ross were starting to get somewhere, and it went NOWHERE. That's technically a lie---we all know the reason---The REVA vortex. The Lewises suddenly revolved all around REVA. Since Trish wasn't male, she wasn't going to be blinded by Reve's "charms".

Oh, it was. And it seemed to be a handy excuse to write Cady McClain off when she wanted to go and do other things.

a couple of add-ins: Rosanna got baby fever after Carly had Sage. Craig resisted, but eventually pretended to cave and agreed to look into adoption. He actually sabotaged the first attempt (I think it had something to do with him "accidently" exposing his own past actions in kidnapping baby Dani, but my memory's fuzzy). When Ro left him over it, he arranged to buy a baby, and passed it off as a quick, legal adoption. What he didn't know was that James had set him up. (Why...again, the why never quite made sense, it was probably mostly to get an in with Rosanna and set up his grandchild to the Cabot millions.) When Rosanna found out the adoption was illegal and was forced to give back the baby, she left Craig. He again tried to lure her back by faking a heart attack. They took him to Memorial, and Ro dutifully went there to check on him. He made her promise to stick around, and as they wheeled him away, she fittingly said, "the last words between us were a lie," and prepared to leave town. She leaves Carly a blank check (to use to fulfill her dreams) and disappeared for about a year. When she returned, Carly had just agreed to design for Paul at BRO. Paul wanted to throw his mother out of BRO, not knowing she was going blind. Carly agrees, but then Ro sweeps in and tells Carly it would be a betrayal, and Carly in a sisterly moment, agrees to back out. Ro changes her mind though because she can use Carly to get closer to Jordan. Jordan has started falling for Jennifer, and Ro gravitates toward Paul, who she had befriended when he'd been accused of Rose's murder. The four eventually agree to cooperate to keep Cabot safe from James. James found out it was a lie and kidnapped Ro and Cabot. James put them in a cabin set to explode, and told Paul he could only save one. Paul got Ro out, and when he went back for Cabot, the cabin exploded. Everyone believed Cabot had died. Ro blames Paul and refuses to speak with him. (This is all around the time Jack went off the bridge and was also believed dead.) While Carly ends up searching for Jack, Paul comes over to help Ro (who's watching Parker and Sage) and they rebond and agree to marry. It's Paul and Ro's wedding that sparks something in Jack's memory. (but I'm getting off track.) James is again angry that Paul and Ro have defied him and then there's some wacky stuff with Babs giving Em drugs to terrify Ro with reminders of Cabot, and James then forces Ro to "admit" that she drugged Emily, in exchange for Cabot, who he reveals is alive. Ro and Paul break up, Ro leaves town. When Cady McClain returns, we find out that James has Ro prisoner in Hong Kong. Craig finds her and they leave with Cabot. But realizing that James will never stop using Cabot, they hide him with unknown people in an unknown country. (how they arranged it escapes me) Since they don't t know where he is, they expect that James won't be able to find him either. THE CABOT SAGA ENDS. Then there's the Billy/Rory/Baby Johnny story, where Craig knocked up Jennifer, switched his live son with Gwen's dead baby, adopted it with Rosanna. Rosanna found out and while driving away from Craig to tell Jenn, had a car accident and went into a coma. Paul then allowed Jen to continue to believe her son had died, knowing that Craig had switched babies and Carly and Jack were raising his nephew.

Because randomly meeting in a field or abandoned playground seemed stupider? Some of those Peapack sets...RME. Alexandra Spaulding eating random Quick Mart hotdogs....the world shudders.

There is so little up with Alan/Trish, it's hard to tell what exactly drew them to one another. Early Van was a lot like Alan, in that she had that roving eye. I guess the difference was that Alan always reverted back to type, while Vanessa fundamentally shifted after Billy. The only time she had a couple of brief affairs, she ended up nearly getting raped.

I don't think Van and Holly interacted when they overlapped in '80-'81ish. Van certainly knew Andy and Barbara. Holly would've been in prison for shooting Roger during some of that. When Van returns in '89, she doesn't recognize Holly, and mistook her for Nadine. There were definite story bubbles back in the day. I never got the sense that Alan really "knew" Vanessa. He saw someone of his class, who was supposed to abide by certain "rules". And that was enough. That he ever expected her to turn a blind eye to his attraction to Reva says to me he had no clue how territorial or jealous Van could be. He wasn't going to be able to control her any more than he could really control Reva.

Well, Ross' ambitiousness kind of got buried after Carrie. It seems to me that as Mike's role diminished, other people suddenly found reasons to hate Alan. Alan and Van had never really gotten along, Billy and Ross both feel screwed over by him, and then Alex comes to kick him out of the kingdom. Well, there's a clear difference between Spaulding (or Lewis) awkward and what's awkward for the Bauers. LOL.

While I criticize their hiring, I fully recognize that they didn't hire themselves. TPTB hired the actors and wrote for them. And no, no one would've been able to step into Bernau's shoes. Pilon at least conveys a certain Machiavellian menace . RR is just wrong for the role, but the subsequent writers all seem obsessed with pitting Alan and Phillip against each other over women. The Lewises, no matter what you think about them, only passed one woman 'round. Alan and Phillip passed around three---Blake, Beth and Olivia. There is a moment when Van tells Alan--if we marry, don't screw me over or you'll regret it. So I wouldn't doubt that Van would've been the trigger in Phillip's takeover had Maeve stayed. Instead, Henry ends up tipping the scales, while Josh kind of gums up the works (I guess, I haven't watched all of it, I don't think most of it is up.) If they wanted a triangle, they had one--Alan/Van/Ross. With Alan and Ross' history, it practically would've written itself. Maybe our thinking is wrong...maybe Long would've put Van and Ross back together, and broke them up to set up the triangle. I do think they were flirting with the idea of Rick/Chelsea after Johnny left. There's a point when Mindy comes back to town where Chels thinks Mindy doesn't appreciate Rick enough. I just think that it would've been too weird, having Rick fall for another one of Phillip's ex's, and Mo being her sister and his stepmother. Y'know I am all about any story that gets Van away from ****. Developing amnesia, becoming a bad lounge singer named Panessa who performs poetry in the park. ANYTHING. Did Roger and Billy ever have a conversation after Billy got out of jail? I know Roger told Vanessa he'd been paroled, but I'm not sure they truly crossed paths again. Part of that's timing, but I also think TPTB really just didn't want to bring up that past directly.

In that way, at least we were fortunate. The Daniel Pilon/Ron Raines decisions...not so much.

Well, I can't help but think it would've been written different with CB still there

Ugh...right? At least if Chris Bernau had been able to continue in the role, it would've been intriguing to watch Alan manipulate Reva.

Yes, it was. Dinah had started to soften after Henry's heart attack in March. After Paige Turco took over the role, the attitude is turned way, way down. The thing about Vanessa was, she could be very territorial. If Dinah had gone to Lillian (who had befriended Dinah before she knew Vanessa was her mother), that would've stung a bit, but Van probably would've understood. But Dinah getting advice from Ross' new girlfriend would not have sat well with her, the same way Van later bristles anytime Nadine tries to stake some kind of role in Bill's life. @DeeVee I know it's been brought up before, but I hadn't really connected Long breaking up Ross/Van to the fact that she'd neither created that backstory or been responsible for giving them a love child. I wonder what she would've done had she been there when Jordan left, and had to break Billy/Van up.

Then 87 is the year you're looking for. Vanessa leaves town in Jan 88. When I saw Jenny counseling Dinah about George making the pass at her, all I could think was that Van would be pissed Ross' latest fling was advising her daughter. Cop or not.

Yes. Why? I don't really care. Vanessa is also acting dumb, trying to run between tables, on a date with Ross in one room and a business meeting with Alan in another. One of the few times Van is written as less than the smart woman she was. Although I'm nearly positive the Slut of Springfield dress is white. I don't know when "Reva Red" really became a thing.