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We have discussed the bible at length before. It’s been several years since I’ve given a good look because, quite frankly, it isn’t super insightful to the show that Loving becomes. I do wonder if Agnes Nixon generated the bible more so for the network than for the writing team or herself. As already stated, the characterization is paper thin for a majority of the characters and the only characters with substantial backstory are the ones outlined in the three major storylines. It would probably feel different if any of those stories had a long term impact, but most of them were wrapped in under a year with only Mike Donovan sticking around until November, 1985, when he was written out. Jack’s story deviates so much from the original romance with Lily and, for the most part, Jack seems to be more of a stock type with a brief mention of the backstory (being adopted by the Forbes) that becomes substantial to the long story. I wonder if Agnes Nixon ever revised the bible. I have seen several proposals/bibles that have been revised before production. I know the initial pitch for The Young Marrieds was a much broader canvas than what it became in the more slimed down character focused version that was developed by Elward later on. For The Woman Within, Rita Lakin and I believe Jackie Smith have a quick memo that rewrites a substantial element of the main heroine’s storyline by revising her love interest and restructuring the affair storyline at the motel. When looking at Rituals, there is also quite a serious shift in characters from the original concept to the final concept which is outlined, at least partially, in what I suspect was the Corringtons proposal for the series and what became Gene Palumbo and Clifford Campion’s bible. With bibles, I think most writers view them as guidebooks rather than road maps. Often, I imagine this is due to the need for network approval. What Nixon outlines in the three major storylines for the Love bible includes story elements that certainly would have needed network oversight. The incest storyline is described in a way that Nixon could take a softer route (an emotional incest between Garth and Lily rather than sexual), but still suggesting that the dramatic thrust would be the revelation that Garth tried to rape her on the night of his murder. The Merrill projection suggests that Merrill was a woman with a very different view of love than many other daytime heroines with the suggestion that Roger and Merrill’s story was always intended to be temporary rather than end game. Mike Donovan’s story is the closest to seeing most of the elements on air with the PTSD, the affair (though it was Rita Mae and not Shana who he carried on with), the drug ring storyline, and Billy’s impotence (which seems to have survived in a very diluted form from what I can tell in the Italian episodes). Story elements seemed to be repurposed (Stacey has the struggle with morality when sleeping with a married Jack that may have had its origins in Merrill’s original story, the impotence story seems to be repackaged as the attempts of Billy and Rita Mae to struggle to get pregnant, and Gwyn’s proposed alcoholism story was grafted onto the underdeveloped Ann). As much as I enjoy some of what has come up of 1983-1985 Loving (in both English and Italian), I do think that Nixon should have written at least the first few months herself to establish the tone, characterization, and story direction. So much of the first year feels like vignettes, which, at one time, I considered might have been structurally in place from when Dan Wakefield was there. Now, I just think there was not a clear plan on where things were going and there may have been some back and forth between Doug Marland and Agnes Nixon on the directions of stories and character. Watching the Italian episodes, I do think that Doug Marland’s Loving was probably too broad a canvas to tell all the stories he wanted to tell. Though, I do appreciate the amount of dramatic irony that the show engages with in this period which takes some basic storylines and makes them more engaging because the dramatic tension is amplified by the audience knowing things that the characters don’t.

The captions in the Italian Loving episodes are decent enough that I have been able to make it to the start of part 32. While clearly not every episode is present, it does seem like the show may have phased out Patrick Donovan for a bit in the spring of 1984. I wonder if the original actor only agreed to several months because the original plan was to kill off Patrick Donovan from his heart condition. But they had already killed Johnny, Roger, and Garth so maybe a fourth father dead in under a year seemed like overkill. With that said, Teri Keane as Rose Donovan is a delight. She is deliciously judgey in an early Maeve Ryan way with eyeing up Doug and Edy and there unusual living arrangement and discovering Edy's clothes drying in the bathroom. In both sets of Loving material we've gotten this summer, Keane has been phenomenal. I wish she was utilized more in the final years. The Doug / Edy material is hard to get through given the recent passing of Hayden Paniterre. Lesley Vogel's Edy makes sense in sense of the overall canvas and Bryan Cranston's Doug. Merrill was so stiff and sterile so giving Doug someone lighter and more carefree makes sense. I think they try a little too hard to make her light hearted, but while Roger's plane crashes, Mike is having PTSD flashbacks, and Lorna is having complications from a secret abortion, this is a welcome tonal shift. There are a couple references to Edy being almost like a witch with knowing things and I cannot help but wonder when they decided to go the supernatural route with Jonathan. I do like the Alden family material from this era. The dramatic tension from what the audience knows vs what the characters know is quite delightful. For example, when Lorna is sick after Roger's death, Cabot insists that the doctor come to give Lorna a sedative, while Tony, thinking she is pregnant, navigated around it while Curtis, knowing about the abortion, looks on in horror because he knows Lorna has gone to her follow up. It also leads to a delightful moment where Tony Perrilli tells his new mother-in-law Ann about the baby in hopes of lifting her spirits after Roger's death leading to Ann pointedly stating that Roger's first grandchild is proof his legacy will continue. Some of the Shana / Dane stuff feels like it was left over or reheated A New Day in Eden material about land and highways with Dane nearly attacking Shana after Mike calls off their dinner date to be with Ann. I believe Maggie Sullivan's Miranda was involved with rapist lawyer Emmett Clayborne in a land deal involving a highway project. When Dane suggests Shana call Cabot as a gesture of good will, Shana overhears that Mike is present at the Alden home which leads to a sad moment with Shana in her suite looking melancholy while Mike bangs on her door unaware she knows he was with Ann. Roger's funeral has some nice tension with Teri Keane giving the stink eye to Lorna and Tony while Stacey is more cordial. Dane's presence is a nice touch. He is slowly worming his way in with Ann and speaks to Jack about the possibility of working at Forbes Construction, which Dane now runs. The varying opinions of Dane is nice. I don't think I knew that Noreen and Warren were so cordial with Billy and Rita Mae. I think Noreen and Warren leave in about 2 months after the scenes in this stretch. Billy and Rita Mae are dealing with their fertility issues, which seems to be the new variant on Billy's impotence that was proposed in the bible. The Stacey / Curtis thread is still enjoyable to me with Chuck Ellis trying to go after Stacey to get back at Mike. Curtis worried about Stacey, but Stacey still mad because Curtis skipped her meet, to be with Lorna when she aborted Tony's baby in New York. It's a delightfully messy situation that should have been continued.

I think something I've struggled with digital soaps (audio and visual) is that the short form requires small, intimate casts. So many seem to be vanity projects or expand to a point that it is incredibly hard to build multiple story threads when you have 6-10 episodes a season. With that said, I thought Worlds Apart was brilliant and the three episodes a week at 20-25 minutes was enough space to tell story. I was very sorry that this didn't continue because it was very modern and seemed to be finding a nice groove. In terms of writing, so many of the audio serials I have tried have been written as if they are just visual series that are recorded. Radio and television serials have very unique styles that can crossover, but you need to really adhere to a specific format. More than 5-7 characters per episodes is unmanageable for an audience in many cases. Worlds Apart capped every episodes at 5, and, while I found it limiting at first, I think it made a lot of sense and helped the listener to really get into the story. I like radio dramas. I really think the 1970s Radio Playhouse is a hidden treasure especially the General Hospital-lite To Have and To Hold. In late 1980, Lynda Hirsch reported that NBC was rumored to have bought the rights to both The Secret Storm and Love of Life. I don't think anything was ever confirmed or denied. @Matt wrote the Return to Rosehill, a Love of Life continuation in spring 2007. It was in the recently abandoned Blogs section of Soap Opera Network. I remember the year because he had Leann Hunley's image for Betsy Crawford and he planned on recasting because Hunley was returning to Days of our Lives for the first time in many years. Soap reboots after many years are so difficult to navigate, in my opinion. On this board alone, I know I have seen people do as you suggested. Modernizing the original concept with a more diverse cast and inclusion of character types that woudln't previously have been used. I think that with a show like Love of Life, I think it would make sense to replay, and modernize, stories that were cultural milestones for the series with a Meg / Van situation, Van marrying Bruce and dealing with her nasty in-laws, possibly a young love story about like Bill and Tess, and/or the bigamy plot with Ben / Betsy / Arlene. Both of the writers have posted on this board in the past and I think they might now as well. I wish them well. I do think with growing podcast industry that there could be more interest in our little niche genre being revived in its original form. I just hope there is a commitment to writing audio for audio rather than writing visual and just recording its audio.

That article would be from August, 1965. This is when the show went from A Flame in the Wind to A Time for Us. When we look at the TV Guide article from July, 1965, about the revamp, I'm pretty sure Lesley Woods' Miriam Bentley speculates that Leslie is off having an affair. If the Courier posted this in a 1966 paper, which is entirely possible, than they were behind a whole year. There seem to be quite a bit of cast changes throughout the show's run, including in 1966. Seeing the work done on The Young Marrieds makes me suspect that there were more changes that we are not even aware of. It would seem highly unlikely that Berett Arcaya stays very long as Linda Driscoll, and, until recently, wasn't credited anywhere in the role. There could even be a Linda #5 for all we know. I found a newspaper clipping from early December, 1966, asking about why Tom Fielding left the role of Steve Reynolds, which makes me suspect that there was a Steve Reynolds #3 that we have never identified as Steve is around when Jane Driscoll Reynolds dies in late November and mentions coming back after a lengthy trip to South America. Linda is not mentioned at all in the death sequence saying that Al and Martha will be all alone after Jane's death. Also, the newspapers credit Frank Andre's Dom Corso as a lead for quite a bit of time. He was a club owner. I imagine he was involved with Arcaya's Linda at least briefly. I wish this show had found its way into someone's script collection.

Betinna appears to be the Marshall Westheimer character. Elisabeth Ansingh would be Nell who first appears in episode #4. The nurse might be Irene, who I believe is later Renee's love interest.

I guess I didn't look that hard. Season 1 is online. Here is the first episode. I usually have ignored material like this due to spotty translations, but the AI they seem to be using has advanced where it is decent. The first scene at the bar was a bit rough, but the second is better once you get past the patient who is speaking another language. I haven't watched all of this yet, but it seems like it follows the Ryan's Hope script pretty faithfully. Bennie Carstens is Bucky Carter. Jurrian van Elst is Jack. Margot Reitsema is Mary. I haven't caught who the name of the Ramona Gonzalez character.

@DeeVee asked about Onderweg Naar Morgan (the Dutch adaptation of Ryan's Hope) in the Guiding Light thread. I only read about the show. At one time, there was most of season 1 available online after it had been released on DVD. It's not there anymore. I did find this among other episodes: In this episode, Bob arrives at the apartment of Victor Couwenberg (Roger) after it has been ransacked. Bob and Victor are both concerned about the missing Daphne (Delia) who has run off with Jannes (Little John). Joyce Couwenberg (Jill) comes to visit her sister, Renee (Faith), who is pregnant with Gyman's (Clem) baby. I believe this is via artificial insemination, but I do think there was a romantic history between Gyman and Renee as well. Supposedly, in Claire Labine and Paul Avila Mayer's bible or early story projections, Faith and Clem were going to be married. Anyway, Gyman is trying to determine if he has some muscular disorder that he fears he might pass on to the child. Bettina (Nell) tries to help him, but is of little use. Bettina's last name is Wertheimer, a variation of Westheimer, I believe. Marshall Westheimer was the hospital administrator and was Nell's cousin. Gyman goes to visit Ed Couwenberg and Aafke (Maeve) to talk over the results. In this version, Ed and Aafke have married after the death of her husband, Jan. I'm not sure if they have married yet. Anyway, they also have an illegitimate daughter who pops up later in the series, Babette I believe. Joyce tries to make a play for Paul (who I think is a new character). Jill Coleridge would be mortified to see how desperate her Dutch doppelganger is. There is mention of Cor (Nick Szabo). And the older male waiter at the Angel (Ryan's Bar) is JP, which was the name of the original bartender before Kevin was introduced. Frank is also worried about the missing Daphne and he is hanging out with his new beau, Julia (another new character). There is a nice scene with Victor visiting Pim (Pat) at the hospital wondering if Pim will turn him in. Roger would also be mortified how weak Victor is, but, honestly, this seems more honest and self reflective like Roger is in the early 1980s. So maybe only Ron Hale would be mortified.

I may be wrong, but I assumed that Labine meant that either Holly or Olivia would fall in love with the other and it would be unrequited. There may have been a rumor element, but I don't think it necessarily had to involve children, especially given Holly's role as the Nursery Rhyme stalker. Incidentally, in the Dutch adaptation of Ryan's Hope (Onderweg Naar Morgen), the Faith character Renee Cowenberg eventually comes out as a lesbian.

@DRW50 Thanks for sharing that as I probably won't watch it. Hunt Beldon is such a horrendous character. I will give Jeff Tratcha credit for not trying to find the light in such a dark character, though, from what we are seeing, there really isn't much layers to the writing to even allow such flexibility. At first, I think there might have been some suggestion that Gwyn was going to support Hunt as the Beldons were old money Corinthians and both Gwyn and Trisha had known Hunt prior. Some of this matieral shows up early in 1986 in some of the Random Episodes material probably around the time of Stacey and Jack's wedding I'm glad that Joe Stuart recognized how awful the character was. It doesn't seem to stop the show from trying several variants for the next few years until he departs.

Brian Walsh was sleeping with Ann Boyd Jones, who was married. So I don't think he was seen as a hero, though he may have been more of a gray character. In Christmas, 1971, Lesley Woods, Pamela Murphy, and Peter Ratray read in the paper about the Young People of Watts, a youth group that helped people in their community with trash cleanup, fixing machinery, and odd jobs. The article stated that the group lacked the necessary tools to make that work. The cast of Bright Promise decided to take the money they would typically use to buy Christmas presents for each other and donate the money to the group. They raised $600. The members of the group were also invited to the set. This would be from that visit.

The Italian episodes have resumed in April, 1984. Callan White has just arrived as Ann, fresh from Washington, D.C., in Corinth for a visit while Roger is off on his senatorial mission to Africa (I think later they are more specific and state Nairobi). Ann's return coincides with Mike and Shana getting closer, with Ann interrupting a romantic moment between Shana and Mike with a phone call to let Mike know she's in town. The set up here is delightfully messy. The next morning, Mike, Shana, Ann, Lorna, Curtis, and Cabot all end up in Shana's office at Burnell's each keeping a secret from the other about past and present connections. The energy doesn't come from the dialogue per se, but rather than dramatic irony. We know that Ann and Mike share a past, we know Curtis suspects Shana and Cabot are lovers, we know Cabot and Shana are hiding Shana's, we know Shana is in cahoots with Dane, and that Lorna is hiding her pregnancy and abortion. It's a lot about people staring at each other and wondering who will deduce the other's secret first. Earlier, there is a nice little scene (a bit heavy handed) with Cabot and Ann late at night on the couch in the front living room discussing Cabot's health condition. Cabot downplays the family's concern and Ann suggest its time that Cabot start to release the reins to the younger generation, while Curtis listens from the upstairs landing. Cabot states Jack is still in school, Curtis has improved, but isn't consistent, and Tony is now in the manager training program. There is a lot of build for a Tony / Curtis rivalry. Curtis is very much interested in Stacey Donovan, who he visits while she is working at PJ's. Stacey is upset because Curtis skipped her swim meet, which he did because he went to New York with Lorna so she could have her abortion. Curtis' role in this drama should secure the end of any hope of Curtis / Stacey given the pregnancy is what brought Tony / Stacey to an end. The Curtis material is the only stuff really left playing out from the Bible, with the exception of the broad idea that Lorna would marry Jack's friend (Tony, onscreen, but Tony Todd's Lyle Turner, in the Bible). At PJ's, Duke Rochelle and Chuck Ellis, the preppy campus drug dealers, are still reeling from their party being busted. Chuck sets himself up as a sorta prototype for the slick entitled rapist types that dominate the 1980s on Loving (followed by Hunt Belden, Alan Howard, and, to a lesser extent, Nick Diantos). He seems to be scheming to date innocent Stacey in order to get back at Mike for busting the party. Rose Donovan is around to provide a talk to for Jim, who is having memories about his time in Rome with Shana. Patrick Donovan seems no where in sight in these episodes so far. It's clear that they didn't kill off Patrick because they were shifting the heart condition to Cabot so Patrick just appears to be around, but not seen. Or maybe Rose left him in Florida. It's interesting listening to Jim talk about his desire to work with troubled kids in the Rome flashbacks. This is a very important element of his character that I didn't realize was established that early on. He takes Steve under his wing, becomes involved with Kelly and Rob, and later Dave Hindman's literacy struggle. You could even link it to the store with Lily and Mei-Ling (was that the name of Mia Korf's character) and her young son. There's a lot of material around Doug and Edy Lester. I will say that Edy has a bit more energy than Merrill Vochek and Lesley Vogel and Bryan Cranston have a decent rappaport, but given how interconnected the show is, this story is playing a bit in a bubble. There does appear to be some low key foreshadowing with Edy suggesting that she could be a serial killer or something of the sort, which seems to be set up for Jonathan Maitlane, but I could be overreading that. There's also a mysterious phone call to someone about something, that's really the best I can say. It isn't bad, but it feels like C-story from a hour long soap that is being elevated to B-story on a half hour and that's a rough shift. Tonally, the Edy / Doug mateiral is a nice contrast to the heavier material in the other set of stories. I appreciate the show for it's smaller moments. There's a nice exchange between Warren Hodges and Mike Donovan at the hospital. Mike is waiting for a therapy session and Warren has come to visit an ill colleague. Mike assumes Warren is checking up on him as he has been ordered to attend therapy due to his handling of the Duke and Chuck arrest (Chuck's lawyer sent a formal complaint to the police department). Instead, Warren, also a Vietnam vet, is sympathetic and offers to be a sounding board for Mike. It's a surprising twist, even to Mike, as it would be so easy to build a rivalry between them. As a cop and a district attorney, their professional lives intersect and could easily be at odds with each other over how they each handle their work. In addition, Warren is involved with Mike's estranged wife, Noreen. It was nice to see a genuine moment of friendship between two men who easily could be enemies. Another nice small, but more pointed, moment was during the aforementioned Cabot / Ann late night chat where Cabot refers to Ann as his favorite daughter. With Shana in town, this is a cold, but more likely just careless, move on Cabot's part, followed up by Ann downplaying it as Cabot's only daughter. White manages to emulate some of Shannon Eubanks' quiet warmth without completely mastering the air of old money that Eubanks seemed to embody with more ease. I appreciate White's attempt to bridge the gap between her later Ann and Eubanks' intrepretation. During the 1984-1985 period, I do think Callan White emerges as a quiet dramatic force more than likely overshadowed by Christine Tudor's arrival. Hopefully , we get more soon.

I've been told this is the start of the better period of The City. It's still quite rough, in my opinion, and there really is such a hard edge to most of these characters that it's hard to invest in. Molly's last stand was no match for Gwyn confesses. There were a few moments were it seems like some lines, or at least concepts, were reused from that sequence, but the whole thing is very watered down. So Molly Malone was a real person and Sandra Carlson killed her? The other stories were decent to bland. I don't hate Carla Soleito being curious about her father's new woman and how that will impact her, but she seems combative with everyone. Even Sydney, who is deadpan 99.9% of the time, is at least trying to save a man's life, which is an entire storyline happening by one way phone calls, a choice on its own. She hates Ally, I get it it. She is angry with Tony because of Ally. She is fun, but I could see how this character could easily be exhausting. Sydney's exit / Tracy's arrival had some nice moments with their back and forth. For some reason, I thought Malcolm Christopher was killed by the serial killer, but maybe that was another character who's name started with an M (Mike maybe?). Anyway, I don't really care about gold in the building, but Sydney sticking everyone with back taxes was a nice exit for her, but I don't know why they went with Jackson Montgomery as the one to usher her out of town. At least Morgan Fairchild's hair looked good. Having, in recent years, sat through a year and a half of Wendy Riche's morally complex Tracy Q, this, and everything I´ve seen of her after, all comes off as very one-note. Jane Eliott is a phenomenal performer and this show needs a live wire given that so many of the heavier characters on Loving who crossed over have been watered down. I do like that they immediatley throw her at Gino as I thought, for a second, maybe Tracy was the lady Gino had met on the cruise. There is at least energy in those scenes. Nick's liver failure has potential. His goodbye scene with Sydney was one of Fairchild's better moments. Sydney gifting him a photo album of Richard was sweet. Corey Page is decent in his material, but Joni Allen is a bit much. Lorraine being tempted by the bottle was fine, but given two alcoholics are living there and there's a bar downstairs, I'm confused why they would have booze. There were more episodes I didn't watch, and I probably won't.

@Sapounopera The Winsor shows always seemed to have quieter, old money characters rather than the larger dysfunctional wealthy clans that soaps became known for in the late 1970s to early 1980s. Even on The Secret Storm, where a majority of the characters belonged to the country club set and were very polished, there wasn't any of the obstentatious decadence that we would see in the later decades. Or so we can gather from the fan accounts online. On Search for Tomorrow, the Tourneur / Sentell crew sets themselves apart as super wealthy, but a lot of their colorful behavior seems more grounded in their New Orleans roots than in overindulgence and elitism. Rosehill was a community that evolved. In the late 50s into the 1960s, the Carlsons, Bruce Sterling's in-laws, dominated their town with the paper mill. Vivian Carlson was known as a snobbish society matron with rigid rules on social class. This continued well into the 1970s with Nancy Marchand's Vinnie Phillips' briefly usurping Vivian's role before Labine and Mayer brought Vivian back onto the scene. In addition to the mill, there was Wingfield Prep, the boarding school, which was the home of many sons of great wealth and power. The character descriptions @slick jones has provided us show us how these operated in the community. By the late 1970s, there was a shift with the Tess Kraukeur and Bill Prentiss romance where both young people were more working class, though Bill was the son of one of Bruce's neighbors Charles Lamont. Tess did marry into money, older John Randolph, but I don't think the social order was as important than, but I may be wrong. In the 1970s, you have Kate Swanson, a lounge singer, who was invovled with Dr. Dan Phillips. His mother is the aforementioned Vinnie. Lloyd Phillips, Vinnie's husband and Dan's father, was also a doctor. Vinnie meddled in Dan and Kate's romance with Kate having Dan's baby, but believing Rick Latimer was the father (due to nurse Candy Lowe changing the baby's blood type). I think the Phillips represented the type of money that was typical in Rosehill. And by those rules, the Marriotts were probably the show's wealthy family towards the end of the show's run. Arriving in January, 1977, Dr. Andrew Marriott was on staff at Rosehill Hospital and was married to his much younger second wife, Mia Marriott. Mia was in publishing and had been the object of affection of JIm Marriott, Andrew's son. When Jim confronted Mia, Mia rejected him leading Jim to storm off and get into an accident with the newly paroled Ben Harper. Jim died with both Mia and Ben harboring guilt. Andrew began to see Ben as a surrogate son and Mia and Ben became romantically linked, which coincided with Elizabeth Kemp's contract being up in June, 1977. I believe most of the Jim / Mia story was told as exposition or in flashbacks, but it is a certain level of seedy which seemed to work. Later, another son of Andrew's was introduced, Andy Marriott, Jr. Andy was a Ben Harper type, a wealthy young playboy who got himself in a heap of trouble. His father was tired of his antics and wanted to no longer support him. Andy was flirting with a bunch of the younger ladies, and, of course, had a past in California he was running from. He was involved with a married woman, Cathy Smith, who's husband had died. Andy was suspected of being invovled, but there was a change in production (Cathi Abbi and Jean Holloway arrived) and Andy was quickly shuffled of canvas and sent out of town. ` . The last multigenerational family Love of Life introduced was the Gasperos, Ray Slater's working class Italian relations. There were his parents and his brother Guido and sister Gina. The Gasperos were around at the time of Jean Holloway's run with the Bambi Brewster tale. The parents were written out fairly quickly after Ann Marcus arrived. Under Marcus, Gina was paired with Mia's younger brother Wes Osbourne III, another potential wealthy bad boy in the Ben Harper mold, who she slept with after consuming a pot brownie at a house party and was convinced she was pregnant; she wasn't. The story may have been truncated because Woody Brown (Wes) left the show for several weeks, presumably to film the pilot for Flamingo Road. Ray was the only Gaspero left when the show closed out. If the show had continued into the 1980s, I imagine they might have introduced someone to replace Tudi Wiggins' Meg, who was set to leave the series. That character might have had a family built around them. Though, there was also talk about bringing on recasts of Barbara and Alan so maybe Barbara would have filled that role.

I spent some time in May, 1991 (RE #305-306). The show is very strong in this period. There is a lot of build up to Monty's murder with everyone and their brother announcing they want him dead. I knew a good chunk of this revolved around baby Tommy's paternity. Monty has some very good dialogue getting some digs in on Clay about his financial status (dismissing Clay's claims that he is broke from Cabot disinheriting him) and some mildly flirtatious moments with Gwyn. There is a bit of heat between Robert Leeshock and Christine Tudor Newman. Gwyn sleeping with the "father" of Trisha's baby would have been interesting to see play out. I also didn't realize how in the trenches of AE Monty was. He had been working in the machine shop with Trucker but had been elevated to the executive suites and Gwyn was looking to push him further. In addition, he's looking to extort money from Trisha/Gwyn, Trucker, and Clay. He's just ruthless. In addition, he is looking for sexual favors from Rocky to keep quiet about Clay being the baby's father. It's all delightfully messy. As I recall, it is later revealed that Monty killed himself with a fatal inject of insulin, but D.A. Miller suggested that someone else may have switched the vials but they weren't sure who. I feel like Abril was the most expendable as she has basically left the canvas after giving the baby to Trucker and Trisha. Her killing Monty to protect her baby would be a way to keep her out of Trucker and Trisha and Tommy's lives. It's crazy to think that this story is almost never mentioned again almost immediately after all the build. The big Trucker and Trisha angst is Trisha learning Trucker gave 25k for baby Tommy already and how awful it is to buy a baby says the woman who wanted to use her family's wealth and influence to secure an abandoned child weeks earlier. This is also the woman who in a month's time is blackmailing her father with his freedom in order to secure custody of the same child. Trisha's moral high ground is quicksand. In just a cute little detail, Gwyn keeps calling herself Gwynnie around baby Tommy which I assume is her equivalent of grandma. A precursor to the glam-ma era. The other major crux storyline is Clay and Carly's engagement party, which I was unaware had even been a thing. The even is held at T.J.'s which is now in the mall. I am not quite sure the evolution of this set. Is this a second T.J.'s location? This does seem to be the same set they use later for Checkers later in the year. And I can't remember if it is called T.J.'s by name, but the old T.J.'s set is used for at least one of the college parties in 1992 (maybe the Casablanca dance, but I think that's wrong). While Clay is dealing with Monty's threats, Paul entertains Carly, which puts Ava in tizzy leading to her tacky announcement that she and Paul are getting married. Certainly not the time, Ava. And kudos to Carly and Clay a month later marrying on Paul and Ava's wedding day. Carly and Ava's rivalry is more fun than I expected. Shana gets a nice snarky response in about Ava's engagements being a weekly event. Carly is of course hurt at Ava for making the announcement and seems hurt that Paul and Ava are moving forward. Carly and Clay have very nice chemistry and when Clay returns, things seem more right in Carly's world. There is some nice video work with Ava in the powder room after talking to herself in the mirror. The show seems more stylized in 1991 than in any other period barring the Loving murders. After the party, Ava goes to see Sister Veronica and learns that Michael has been taken by his adoptive parents (Veronica's cousin and her husband) out of the country. There is a rather decent scene of Ava speaking to God. I imagine this is around the time that Lisa Peluso embraced her faith as I felt this more in the 1994 heaven storyline. Anyway, this story doesn't jive with what we get later in the year so I'll be curious if there's any attempt to merge the two versions of Michael's life after he was adopted. With Sister Veronica, Ava has been claiming she is Carly which is an interesting gambit with all the complexity in the Carly/Ava dynamic. The dialogue seems very good in this period. Kate makes a nice remark about Ava having grown up in the last year having to help Kate deal with her cancer. There is some minor bits and pieces with Stacey and Jack fighting over a family picnic with Stacey struggling living in the manor, which is nice B-level domestic fodder to keep the show moving along. Stoic Soames in a Kiss the Cook apron is comedy gold with the actor's reactions. Stacey is out of her element in the mansion and I sorta love it. Christopher Cass works better than I expected as Jack in this period as he doesn't give Perry Stephens' All American Boy vibe, but gives this sort of this mid level entitlement that works for the adopted scion of the Alden fortune. I know Dane isn't around much longer, but I wonder if the plan was, at one point, have him move into the mansion. At the picnic, Kate mentions to Louie and I think the elder Donovans (Patrick and Rose) about her son John and his wife having marital trouble and her granddaughter coming to stay for the summer. It's nice groundwork. There is another gap in the 1991 material with the last of the last batch being from March 22 and then it picking up in the first week of May. Things have bounced back and forth before so I'm not ruling things out. I know we have quite a bit already from spring 1991. And one of the episodes missing from the Random Episodes (an early March episode) set is available in @DRW50 's videos.

The most interesting element of the article, for me, was the changes made from the breakdowns to the filming. I have some draft outlines for Generations with notes from from Sally Sussman Morina and then the final scripts which can sometimes have massive shifts in the day to day writing. Marcus seems to move some things in order to create more cliffhangers for the final episode in order to cause havoc, which is both petty and deliciously insane. I may be wrong, but I also think they may have moved up the Kim and Tran scenes from the week before to the final week in the episode we don't have from the final week (maybe Wednesday?) as I feel like the summaries covered Kim and Tran leaving for San Francisco so that Tran could be with his dying adopted mother. After all, this was the story that Marcus had been trying to tell since she had wrapped up the end of Love is A Many Splendored Thing nearly 7 years earlier. I think they could have wrapped the show up in a week, but it wouldn't have been satsifying. It would have felt rushed. Meg could have walked leading Tom and Lianne to reunite. The trial could have concluded with Betsy remembering (as she did) and the case being dismissed with Betsy and Ben reuniting. Amy could have revealed she was Bruce's daughter, though Marcus was rumored to be replaying her Don / Donna story from Days of Our Lives with Amy learning she wasn't Bruce's daughter. Ray could have accepted that the baby was his and reunited with Arlene. Maybe Bruce and Van could have received word that Alan and Barbara were planning on returning home.