soapfan770

Susan was featured quite a bit more so than even Bob, but aside from the original Ric Decker story she was usually a sounding board for Emily and Alison.

A lot of the photos I've seen always look like a fun and colorful cast! Not to mention I know Dan and Kim's courtship there in 1975-1976 helped kept the show running fine. However it didn't help though that Soderberg & Sommer were the Cryptkeepers of daytime at that point.

Makes sense especially how stagnant the show had become by that point. I've heard a lot of good things about Reilly's Dan although Reilly sounds almost too sexy for 1970's ATWT.

Was there any particular reason why Dan Stewart was killed off? I know it at least let Ellen de-age a good bit as she then only had her much younger daughters to deal with.

The ballerina was Dana, and from the 1979 episode on the ATWT DVD's I agree Carl she was boring lol. I read that Dana's ex-husband later died of a heart attack while having sex with Dee Stewart! The actress was married to AW's Rick Porter after playing one of the Holloways. The Holloways on AW were so pointless, the show already had the Cory's yet added an alleged "billionaire" family that served no purpose. Karen was a high priced con artist played by Leslie Denniston that Bob got mixed up with. Denniston of course would later marry Hastings in real life and later come back to ATWT to play Carolyn Crawford. I've only read a few snippets about it from the old 1978 ATWT synopses that SOD had posted on their website in the late '90s, I don't know if there is anything on Youtube about the story or not.

I always found something likable about Elaine Princi but unfortunately she was only used as a rent-a-diva for the 80s there for roles that weren't very good. I noticed there was a trend in the late '70s and early '80s for Bob to get paired up someone on the "wild" side i.e. Valerie, Karen Peters, so perhaps this was a continuation of that.

I was watching a 1994 episode the other day and Lucinda had called to check-in on Bianca who apparently was out clubbing in NYC. BTW, regarding the 1981 episode what did people think of Steve and Carol being together? If I recall right, she became James' mistress and then later was gunned down by a goon working for James and Mr. Big. I know McLeod is often cited as an example of how Another Life hired "actual soap actors" in 1982 to help propel the show. Other than a recurring role as a doctor on Y&R in the mid-90's McLeod didn't have any other daytime roles.

The first half of 2002 was a complete mess, the second half was a significant vast improvement. Although I never felt the heat between Ryan Brown(I didn't like him as GL's Bill either) and Kelly Kruger in hindsight I believe we must have been too harsh on them; the torpedoing of their love story remains unjustifiable as it destroyed both characters for good.

It didn't help that to watch the Ralph story was also like taking a waking nap. Scuttling the Mac/Amanda/Ralph plot was good, though it was also sad, since a story with that much potential and buildup should have been handled a lot better. Duff and the actor who played Ralph were indeed poorly cast, I do believe a pair of more veteran soap actors might have handled the material better. Then again, I remember reading Robert Kelker-Kelly was in the running for the role of Ralph so maybe not! Unfortunately for us viewers, Smith would retool/recycle elements of the Ralph story just a few years later with Terrible Tom. The original Amanda that appeared briefly in early 2000 seemed decent and mysterious but they dropped it for almost a whole year.

Actually, why are names like Kurtzman, Orci, Harberts and Berg still running around at all? The former two have bounced from show to show leaving a path of destruction, while the latter two probably should have been banned from TV production after their involvement in Shonda Rhimes' massive flop Off the Map.

Late to the party on the isolation parts, I'll share my thoughts on it later on why I loved it so much. But first, a few things : CATCHING UP WITH DIANA BARTON (EX-MARI JO MASON, 1994-96) March 26, 2007 3:14PM Soap Opera Digest: What made you get into making skin-care products? Diana Barton: I was out of everything else and I was already combining different products to create different textures. For years and years I’d been mixing face creams and scrubs. I thought that maybe I would try to create something myself. I was in Morocco in the kitchen of a friend’s house and I put a few things together in a bowl and started jumping up and down and realized I’d invented something I’d never felt before. After I refined the recipe, I realized I’d created something that wasn’t on the market. I’ve been fascinated with cosmetics for years. It’s a lot like cooking. Digest: Are you still acting? Barton: Oh, no, not at all. When I felt the consistency of my scrub, I knew it was time to retire and quit acting, to quit thinking of doing anything else other than this. I was getting an overwhelming response from people in my own life. When you hear from perfect strangers that the product is changing their lives, it’s time to move on. I left acting behind a number of years ago. The invention happened to me. Now the emphasis is totally on running Diana B. I have a wonderful team to work with me; actually, I’m really working for everyone else. Every time I pitch to a new department store or chain, I get the same butterflies I did when I was auditioning. I didn’t ever want to audition again. Ever! By the time I got done with Y&R, I was so through with that feeling. I did a few other things after Y&R, but I didn’t really want to do that anymore. Digest: Do you keep in touch with anyone from Y&R? Barton: I still talk to almost the whole cast. The character’s still locked away in the psych ward. What’s funny is, she was the art director for a cosmetics company, for Jabot. I became very friendly with all of my co-stars and had a very good time. One of the interesting parts of being on Y&R was that you were always directed by different people, so the interpretation changed on a daily basis. That’s very much like real business. On any day, the presentation that worked yesterday will not work today. It’s also an incredible discipline … I learned about showing up, being on time, being focused. Digest: Do you have a favorite storyline of Mari Jo’s? Barton: The last one, where she ended up in the psych ward. The one I went out on was the most intense. Overall, it was a great run. I got to go on two location shoots, to St. Thomas and Pennsylvania, where we shot a car chase. I went with Eric [Braeden, Victor], Peter [Bergman, Jack] and Doug [Davidson, Paul]. I was the only girl [laughs]. They toughened me up a lot! They’re great. I learned quite a lot about what I’m doing now from those experiences. I run a company and work with wonderful people and it’s very political. It’s good to come from a background where you learn to deal with people on a professional level. Digest: What was your most interesting real-life experience in relation to being on the show? Barton: One of the most interesting experiences I ever had was when the entire nominated cast walked to Radio City Music hall together for the Emmys and I sat right behind Oprah. It was a powerful time and show which transformed the complexion of my life for years. For as long as eight years after I left, I would go anywhere and people would stop me. It’s good, hard work and teaches you professional ethics. Digest: Would you consider returning to Y&R for a guest visit? Barton: I would have to be approached in a way that’s both a service to the people I work with now and the people who run the show. Digest: Jabot could do a real-life crossover with your products. Barton: I’ve never seen them use a real-world product and wouldn’t expect that. That would never happen!

I missed the whole the Barbara, Kim, and Lisa friendship during ATWT's last decade. It was sad when Sheffer decimated their friendship when Kim and Lisa disowned Barbara after the aging spa mess and we rarely saw the three ever interact together again after that.

I was just noticing the original Dani the show had cast there in 1994 was definitely way too old looking to be a teenager, passing for her 20s quite easily! Even though I grew to hate her, at least Ashley Williams looked her age.

Thank you for sharing!!! Nothing like spending a lazy weekend watching old ATWT and GL on Youtube. LOL well put! How many actors played Jason Benedict over the years anyways? 4? I remember Olivia Wycroft better than I do Jason. It was strange to me Iva got paired up with him, but then again I felt Iva's exit there in late '93/early '94 was rather rushed and unnecessary.

I do like Rutherford and I suppose the show had to give Steven a child to fight over in keeping in tradition with the original series. The character just feels a little bit beneath Rutherford though.

Ho boy, the first Alexis/Cristal cat fight occurred and it was actually pretty decent. The exposure of Cristal overhearing Alexis and Hank was classic, however the actress who plays Cristal(just got married to Zach Roering I hear) remains dreadful. I'm sorry but I can't buy Kelly Rutherford's obviously fifty-something character being pregnant for one minute at all. I love Sheridan and Gillies, and the actor who plays Sam is smoking hot; the rest of the show has just been meh to me. Jeff and Monica are interesting, but their matching glitter disco jump suits they wore in last night's episode were downright embarrassing.

I had wondered why they simply didn't bring him as a back from the dead Lujack as opposed to creating Nick but who knows really. I did like the original Nick and Mindy story and loved their wedding disaster as one of the highlights during the Blackout story. However I can see why McKinsey grew disillusioned with it as Alex plotting revenge on Mindy eventually just reduced her down to a scheming, controlling mother. Although I like Irizarry as an actor, the character of Nick just never grew on me and all the stories i.e. Eve and her Mindy wig, George, Ann Hamilton's Mindy, Nick and Mindy's 1994 wedding fiasco--it all was just bland, uninteresting in my opinion and often felt so perfunctory at times. I loved the Nick and Susan story though but sadly to my surprised they were shipped right off right after the Brent/Marian story ended. GL never took the advantage of using them again.

I love Zimmer, but she definitely went through some trials and tribulations there from about 2005 onward through the show's end. I remember her late 2007 interview where she spoke quite happily about her 4000 calorie diet, flaunted her obesity and said her favorite meal is a double cheeseburger with bacon on two sugar powdered chocolate filled doughnuts with an extra large mountain dew to drink and fried Twinkies on the side. Which is sad because in the early '00's she had been on SlimFast commercials regularly and looked good. I'm glad she got better though when I've seen her in more recent appearances she looks much fitter and healthier than in those final days of GL. Ho boy, I remember just about everyone here at SON including myself made quite the number of KZ fat jokes ten years ago, something to which we're all going to hell for lol.

Speaking of Bianca, it's funny that even 1995 fans couldn't remember her! https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/rec.arts.tv.soaps.cbs/RrkoADiK0eU

LOL, this article appeared in the 3/22/00 issue of Soap News: Oakdale - The City of Lost Children During a recent chat I had on the Internet at the Mediadomain Board, a poster mentioned the most over-used plot device on soaps: the long-lost child. Well, if not the most over-used plot device on other soaps, the long-lost child and variations thereof certainly is on AS THE WORLD TURNS. Here, updated, is a post from March 1998 where I listed Oakdale's "Lost Children". So, as we enter the year 2000, welcome once again to Oakdale, Illinois, the heartland of America. Oakdale: where strangers are treated like family, because there is a good chance that they are! Everyone in Oakdale has an unknown or secret child, parent, or sibling. In May 1992, we were introduced to Lisa's long-lost son Scott. When he couldn't accept Lisa as his mother, Margo confronted him and said "Do you think you are the only person this has happened to?" I laughed, and after reading the list below, you may laugh as well, for Oakdale, Illinois truly is The City of Lost Children. Lily - Adopted, her biological parents are Iva and Josh. Iva - Adopted, her biological parents were the Carpenters. Josh - Learned his father was Cal Stricklyn, not Henry Snyder. Aaron Snyder - The son Holden didn't know he had with Julie. Abigail Williams - The daughter Holden didn't know he had with Molly. David Allen Stenbeck - True father is James and his mother is ??? Paul Ryan - The son no one knew Barbara had until James first came to town. James Stenbeck - Not really a Stenbeck, his mother is Greta Aldrin. Gunnar St. Clair - Switched at birth with James. Dusty Donovan - Learned Gunnar was his father, not Burke Donovan. Margo - Discovered as an adult that John was her father. Ian Dixon "Duke" Kramer - The son John didn't know he had. Lien Hughes - The daughter Tom didn't know he had. Adam - Learned Hal was his father, not Tom. Sabrina - Unknown daughter of Kim and Bob. Jennifer Munson - Her biological father is Darryl Crawford, not Hal. Nikki Munson - The daughter Hal didn't know he had. Jenny Wendell - Julie's daughter, whose father may have been the late Linc Lafferty. Linc - Discovered his father was Woody Hutchinson. Scott Eldridge - The son no-one knew Lisa had. Sierra - The daughter no-one knew Lucinda had. Betsy Stewart - Discovered that Dan Stewart was her father, not her uncle. Dan Stewart - Adopted, learned his biological mother was Ellen. Dani Andropoulos - Her true father was Steve, not Craig. Steve - Discovered his father was spy Michael Christopher. Juliette Hanovan - Steve's long-lost half sister. Bryant Montgomery - His father was Craig, not Tonio Reyes. Damian Grimaldi - Learned Bettina was his mother, not Orlena. Carly Tenny - Turned out to be Rosanna's half-sister, not her cousin. Teddy "Ryder" Hughes - Adopted, birth parents were Grant and Joyce Colman. Allison McDermott - Her biological mother is her "sister" Emily. Beatrice - Learned that Duncan was her father, not her brother. Melinda Gray - Unknown daughter of Bob's late wife Jennifer. Lord Stewart Cushing - Unknown son of the late Paul Stewart. Samantha Markham Anderson - Royce's unknown twin and Lucinda's half-sister. Baby Snyder - The child Meg miscarried. The father turned out to be Josh, not Tonio. Royce Keller - Lucinda's long-lost half-brother. Neal Alcott - Lucinda's long-lost half-sister. Bianca - Lucinda's adopted daughter that she has forgotten about Connor and Evan - Unknown grandchildren of Lucinda's late husband, James Walsh. Also, Evan's mother tried to convince him his father was Alexander Cabot. Kirk McColl - Learned his mother was actually his father's housekeeper, Dorothy. Hutch Hutchinson - Learned his late mother was alive and was cookie maven "Aunt Mary". Georgia Tucker - Daughter no one knew Samantha had. Eddie Silva - Learned that Alec Wallace was his father. Parker - His father turned out to be Hal, not John. Hope - The unknown daughter Andy Dixon. Faith Snyder - Switched at birth with Hope. Camille - She does not know who her father is. ??? Baby Stenbeck/Walsh - The child of James and Lucinda who might be David, someone else, or may have died at birth. Two children I would love to add to this list are Caleb and Ellie Snyder. When the Snyders were introduced, Emma had only four children. I still recall the scene when Emma told Iva she was adopted. Emma said that after she had Seth, she was told she couldn't have any more children, so Iva was adopted. Then Emma later gave birth to Holden and Meg. No mention was made of Caleb or Ellie. Suddenly the never-mentioned Snyders returned to the farm from Chicago. It took me a year before I could stop screaming at the TV set, "Emma has only four kids!" And what about Jack Snyder? He and Caleb look an awfully lot alike to be only distant cousins. Hmmm... And is Daniel Stewart Hughes really Tom's son or is he David's? Time will tell. I haven't listed the stories of the ANOTHER WORLD characters that have appeared on ATWT. Let's just say they would fit right in. In Oakdale every year brings a new lost-child or two. Talk about overkill. -Margery Scott

@DramatistDreamer Thank you so much! I loved Nadine, although pairing her right up with Daniel Pilon's nasty Alan was rather awkward as it should have been more fun really. I do like Carl Evans and never understood why GL never attempted to ever ask him back as A-M. Evans was in NYC and even did a stint on ATWT as some crazy ex of Molly's in 2001-ish, kind of like how the show just ignored Jay Hammer(I was never a Fletcher fan but still) for so many years.

Thanks for sharing these @YRfan23!!!! BTW, who was Blade's friend that photographed Dru towards the end of January that kind of ignored her at first? I didn't catch his name. Neil is such a jerk early on btw but it's good set-up for Neil and Dru's later problems come 1996-1998. As much as I loved Victor and ED's Ashley together, their marriage really was doomed from the start. Not from Victoria's interference but their interest in others(Nikki, Brad) really showed too much. Watching the 2-14-92 episode, I'm surprised they didn't have Sheila simply lock Scott up in a dungeon or have him tied/chained down to a bed, and then have Sheila just lie to everyone that Scott left her and left town. I suppose after Brad in a cage it would have been overkill to tell another type of story like that, but Sheila would get her day with James on B&B a few years later in Houdini's basement. Scott's a jerk too btw, probably rather deserving of his fate actually. She was quite the dark haired raven beauty and interesting character but I don't remember her interacting with Brad at all. I don't think she was destined to do much other than to be a subplot. Like Diane Weston in the David Kimble story she was pretty isolated to the Michael/Christine story. I don't think she was going to be anything long term other that be Michael's friend/lover and then wife of convenience though. Like how Diane's feelings changed eventually turning against David to help Christine out, Hilary's feelings changed eventually turning against Michael to help Christine out.

Thanks for sharing too!!!! I've seen the Christmas 1987 episode several times but have never seen the follow-up. I was wondering if Rex knew that Katherine had Nina stored hidden away in the mansion. Great seeing early Leanna with a darker edge early on. Her and Lester's Jack have fun chemistry though, I can definitely see them writing Ruthless together down the road. Ashley looked a hot mess though. Always a bit off whenever I see Lauren's late '80s blonde hairdo. Marc Mergeron is a such a Dynasty character I wonder why Bell even brought him back, especially to be involved with Joanna. Marc's French accent is noticeably a lot heavier than in his first run.

Finally too! I'm grateful we've been able to see a lot more of 1990-1994(the show's third golden age!) material to point so many gaps have been filled up. I had actually thought of you I had not too long ago re-watched the farmhouse week from May of '92 and was a little taken aback this re-watch of how marginalized the story felt in terms of everything else going on back in Genoa City with Jill/Katherine, Neil and Dru, and Newman & Abbott family and corporate drama taking up the bulk of most of the episodes. It was like watching two shows in one. She left town by late '87/early '88, I don't think she had exit as her role was basically replaced by Fay Hauser's detective Salena(who was given nothing to do) but actually came back to visit Nathan in early 1990 right before Olivia and Dru came on.

!!! I love Airplane and I had no idea that was Amy Gibson! It's funny I do know that a good number of actors have done both Y&R and have memorable comedic roles. Phil Morris himself is probably best known for his recurring Johnnie Cochran spoof character on Seinfeld. An odd bit of background on Miguel is I do remember reading in 1984 synopses was that he was interested in Esther and the two went out on a date but the show never followed up on it at all.