dc11786

I've seen Barbara Becker listed in radio books as Jocelyn. I only questioned it because the same text overlook Becker as Sybil. Then again, you could be absolutely right about Becker filling in. I hadn't considered the possibility that she had filled in before taking the role of Sybil. Teichman's another who has been listed in radio books, but I questioned it because he was a writer. It's entirely possible he, too, filled in or even briefly played the role. When "Road of Life" moved from Chicago to New York, the show had to re-cast the entire show. Vinton Hayworth and Maybelle Prindaville played Dr. Jim and Carol Brent when the show started in New York. Both were re-cast within the year with Matt Crowley (who originated the role in Chicago) and Marion Shockley. Shockley was married to one of the show's directors George Zachary. Shockley had initially auditioned for the show in Chicago, but Zachary didn't think she was right. I think Teichman replaced Irna Phillips as writer for "Road of Life." Randy Ogden was played by Ernest Graves. One book I read says Alan Hewitt played the role as well. The same book states Sybil was married to Randy Ogden and to a third husband. Sybil was around until the show ended, but I'm not sure if Barbara Becker was there until the end.

Thanks! Bernard Grant was listed as a late run Frank Dana (March 1958). Sally Barnett was married to Dr. Ralph Thompson. Dick Post played Clifford Foster. I have him listed playing him during the time period I've seen "Dick Foster" listed. I think Foster is a typo. Post was also a recast. Paul Potter was the original actor to play Gordon Fuller. He appeared no later than January 1951. He may or may not have been the only actor in the role. Some things I've seen, but I've questioned. I don't think Barbara Becker played Jocelyn, but Anne Sargent definitely did. Howard Teichman wrote the show in the late 1940s. I've also seen him listed as Dr. Brent, but I'm not sure if that is accurate. Charles Dingle played Conrad on the television version. I don't think he played his son, Hugh. Doug Parkinhurst was in the role at least five years. David Ellis is listed as both Jim Brent and Butch Brent. I don't think he played Jim, but I could be wrong. I do think Jack Lemmon played Butch Brent in the early 1950s. I'll add more later.

This fills in some blanks about names and story details about some of the show's early plots: Movie and Radio Guide (February 21, 1941) The First Families of Radio “Right to Happiness”

Never heard of it. All I could find was the one article you probably stumbled upon about it being about a visually impaired woman. If you ever find that folder, feel free to post information on the radio soaps. I've spent the past weekend looking up some and was surprised what is showing up in the past few months. I was trying to piece together a cast list for "Road of Life" and came across tons of names I haven't seen listed in books for the lead roles. What was most surprising was that Patricia Wheel, who was the lead on "Doctor's Wife" not only originated the role of Jocelyn MacLeod Brent, but Wheel returned to the show in its finals days to resume the role.

Don Ettlinger was the show's first (only?) head writer. What seems to be overlooked is this show seems to be a test run for the ultimately much more successful "Love is a Many Splendored Thing." After Irna Phillips departed "Love Is...," Joe Hardy and Don Etllinger take over in the spring/early summer 1968. Phillips, Ettlinger, and Hardy were all involved with "Flame in the Wind." Also, both series featured two sisters in love with the same man. The Farrell/Reynolds clan seems to be a precursor to the Garrison clan of "Love Is..." with an older man (Jason/Chandler) married to a much younger woman (Leslie/Jean) and a troubled marriage a generation lower (Spence/Nancy and Craig/Roxanne). I do wonder if it was Irna Phillips who suggested the Skerbas become the Driscolls when she turned around and made the Donnelly clan Irish Catholic.

According to an article from "Radio-TV Mirror," Mooch was played by Frank Behrens. Teri Keane was on the radio version of "Road of Life" in the late 1950s as Jocelyn McLeod Brent. She may also have appeared on the television version, but I don't know for sure. I think Gordon Fuller was dead prior to the show premiering on television. I'll look again. In the television version, the main plot was the complicated love affair between Sybil Fuller, Jim Brent, Jocelyn Brent, and Armand Monet. Sybil was attempting to have Jocelyn sent back to Samoa, where she had been living prior to arriving in Merrimac. Jim and Jocelyn plotted to convince Sybil that Jocelyn was in love with Armand Monet. The hope was that Sybil would reveal her role in the scheme if she felt Jocelyn was no longer a threat. Complications to the scheme included Lil Monet, Armand's estranged wife, and Jocelyn's pregnancy. Later, Sybil was involved with Randy Ogden, a financier, but that was when the show was radio only.

I've purchased a subscription to newspapers.com and found them in various local papers. In Phoenix, Arizona, they carried daily summaries for some of the shows in either a TV Guide style listing or in ad space bought up by the local affiliate. These listings seem to be the same listings that can be found in the TV Guides in 1965. I don't know how long TV Guide carried soap listings, but I've seen information that suggests this happened from at least February until November 1965 for certain shows (mainly ABC and NBC serials). I don't remember off the top of my head which papers have the earlier synopses for "The Doctors." I know a Florida paper (out of Daytona BEach I think) occasionally had dailies listed for "Ben Jerrod," "General Hospital," and "The Doctors" for April, May, and June 1963. I haven't copied those down though. No idea on who played Webster and the wife. I do have some cast information for the anthology days, but not much else in terms of new info. UPDATE: The Times Recorder (Zanesville, Ohio) is where I got the summaries for "The Doctors." I believe they also covered daily episodes of "The Brighter Day" for a good portion of 1957. Regarding Webster and Wife, From the December 13, 1964 Bridgeport Post:

I'd lean towards 1966. I've not seen reference to Nick in the summaries I've found for 1964 or 1965 online. From what I've gathered, Elizabeth Hubbard joined the show the week of August 10, 1964 as the summary reads "A strange pattern behind the machinations of hospital administrator Carl Webster emerges as an attractive woman doctor joins the staff of Hope Hospital in episodes of THE DOCTORS this week on NBC. " If she isn't the attractive woman doctor, Althea still appears no later than September 1964. The summary for the week of September 21st reads: "Dr. Althea Davis tries to solve her problems with courage. Dr. Matt Powers gets copious advice from his friends and Carl Webster continues his unsavory plot against his wife in the episodes of THE DOCTORS this week on NBC at 2:30" The next major reference I have for Althea is May 1965 where Gloria Davis arrives (on the 17th). In one of the psychiatric sessions, Althea mentioned that Gloria was Dave's second wife. Anyone know who played Gloria? Then, Althea befriends new arrival Kate Bartok in the summer of 1965 and by early fall, after Ann Williams has been gone several months and Maggie has married Kurt, Kate begins to tease Althea about her 'admiration' for Dr. Matt Powers. I would suspect they played the Althea/Matt angle for a couple of months leading into Maggie's return in November in the form of Bethel Leslie. Nick was probably introduced afterwards.

I think the Shaw siblings departed in late June or early July 1981. I think its safe to say this promo highlighted what was to come to Nola afterwards. Catherine and Kevin Shaw kidnapped Mona and then Jason Aldrich died saving his mother from the kidnapping. That episode is available for viewing at the Paley Center in New York. It is a strike episode. Nola was kidnapped about the same time (or maybe both she and Mona had been kidnapped) and that was when Kevin raped her and forced her "to marry" him. Again, this was the strike so I don't remember reading much about the fallout of all of this. I think they quickly had Nola play the merry widow, purchase the newspaper, and hire Billy Aldrich to write sensational stories for her new venture. Someone feel free to correct me if this is wrong.

Thanks jam! DR, I also saw shadows. By the sounds of it, Karen Werner hadn't been on the scene very long. Regarding Bethel Leslie's billing, I think Ann Williams had a rather significant following by NBC standards and the show might have valued Maggie as the lead role despite Jim Pritchett's longevity. In looking at the newspapers from the time, there was quite a fuss made in TV columns by viewers about when Maggie would return to the story. If I'm remember correctly, Williams left the show around June 1965 and the show brought on Ellen Burstyn as Kate Bartok to replace Williams as the female lead. In the episode previews for the summer of 1965, there is a lot of talk about Maggie even though she wasn't present in the story. At the same time, Roy Thinnes had departed GH for "The Long, Hot Summer," and Phil was absent, but often mentioned in the episode previews. Anyway, when Leslie arrived in November 1965 as Maggie, there was a fair deal of press considering it was a soap opera.

There is a script on page 32 from February 1968 that seems to take place shortly after Althea loses the baby. Any thoughts on when these episodes might have aired in 1967?

The Brewster story is a hot mess when you read it in Jon-Michael Reed's column. I think someone credits reporter Casey Muldoon. I'm not sure if Leonia Baxter, who was Bambi's mother, correct, appeared in the story. I thought she had been murdered, but maybe she appeared in flashbacks. Also, wasn't Eloise Alberini also Reverend Brewster's second wife or was that another character?

Allan Melvin played a pilot on the show alongside Larry Weber. Weber played Chris Kendall, an early suitor of Helen Emerson. Melvin was probably on around 1954 until maybe early 1955. Weber was replaced by Terry O'Sullivan's Elliott Norris. Two brief articles about a storyline involving Elliott Norris' ward: February 1956 and the new tragedy... April 1956 and from TV-Radio Mirror a bit later. It looks like it covers the tail end of 1956 after Elliott Norris left and when Lawrence Walker was introduced. And the captions from the article.

Well, this was bizarre... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zd3F2pX9q7U

It's definitely possible they made it to 1986 as I wasn't keeping up with it at the end. I just remember they made it pretty far into 1985, at least. There was a message board that was pretty devout about tracking what had aired and keeping important details recorded. I'm pretty sure its still around but I cannot recall the name.

Search for Tomorrow made it to late 1985 because the Women to Watch storyline had begun. I think AOL aired episodes through November 1985.

I miss the days when the one blessing a fan of a cancelled soap had was to know that their show would no longer be damaged by hack writers.

I never was overly fond of Gus or Ricky Paul Goldin. To be fair, I felt they shackled him with a lot of bad stories and I didn't really appreciate how Kriezman basically replaced Michelle and Danny with Gus and Harley as the overexposed golden couple. When Taggert/Culliton began playing with Gus' parentage, I wondered if they were going to revert him back to Miguel Santos, Jr., but I don't remember if they ever really dealt with that. Either way, I didn't really like the story as it had been previously established that he couldn't have been Selena's son. Buzz has even confronted him with the possibility after Selena left, and Gus had said it wasn't possible. They may have been mentioned later, but Drew and Jesse were still in New York in May 2004. That's where Michelle and Danny sent Nico when he left town.

If Jeff is who I think he is, he was a member of the internship program with Darcy, Brad, and Alan as you mentioned. Jeff struggled with learning what he had to. I believe it was Dr. Matt Powers who was rather hard on him, which caused friction with him and Dr. Jack Garner. I think Jack may have been involved with Greta, Matt's daughter, at this point which caused more friction. Jeff dropped out of the program and Jack blamed Matt. I don't think Jeff was around very long maybe January/February 1980 until May/June 1980. This is all from memory of reading those old synopses. I had trouble finding information about "The Doctors" in 1982. Because stations dropped the show, newspapers tended to cut the show from the papers. Carl posted some 1982 summaries I believe that might have more about Nola, Thor, and the baby. I thought Thor was a drifter or something. I really don't know. When did Nola leave the show?

Josephine Nichols was Harriet Jessup.

It looks like Sam MacMurray played a murderer/rapist on "Edge of Night." He probably mixed up the shows.

Sorry, Carl, I forgot to respond to your question. That's Gloria Leroy as the woman at the justice of the peace's place.

I do think JB is F. Murray Abraham. I just cannot remember if it was called Noah's Ark or if that was a separate establishment.

I cannot remember if I posted this or not... Dixie Carter appeared as Linda Elliott in 1977. Her character's husband was Barry Elliott was played by Donald Symington. The Elliotts were friends of Jason Aldrich living on the Riviera who Jason and Nola stayed with during a vacation.

Ocala Star-Banner has his column and their archives are available via Google Newspapers. From said column, Frank Elmore played Dr. Hall in 1979. He was involved in the Brewster plot. James Congdon was Scott Carmichael, Meg's love interest under Jean Holloway. I believe another actor played the role, but Reed lists Congdon departing the role in July around the time Rick Weber left and Leah Ayres (Christy) and Michael Beirne (Clay Walker, Mia's pal and Ben's editor).