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It looks like that is Scott Feraco, Jeff #1. It's neat to see Jeff when he was written as a psychotic interloper in the Trisha / Trucker story. I know Trucker and Trisha were a beloved couple, but it seems like Trucker was simply playing a Steve Sowolsky recast. I think it would have been more interesting if they kept Jeff's original characterization (brash, arrogant heir to a media empire who was looking to prove he was more than his legacy) and made Trucker the crazy one.

That was Chaz Saybrooke, Ryan Fenelli's final love interest. He was connected to Emily, the woman who had the affair with Richard Rowan and Jack Fenelli. Emily was either his cousin or his aunt or some relation. Nice preview. It's a shame there is so little of the summer of 1988 available. I know its a Writer's Strike summer, but it would still be neat to see.

Thanks, saynotoursoap. Several years back, another poster had the Christmas Eve episode. I think I enjoyed that one a bit more. Medger's Christmas Eve truce with the Catlin clan was rather poignant and Jenny and Peter seemed genuinely happy despite the looming threat of Vanessa. There was also some T.J. / Annabelle angst which I enjoyed. I waver on "The Catlins." While I don't think it was ever the best that soap had to offer, I do find parts of it enjoyable especially in the era of action and adventure. Some of the family and domestic conflicts are well done, but I do find the segues into adventure a bit dull. Some of the relationship stuff is sweet. While the Babe / Dirk stuff did nothing for me in this episode, I remember enjoying them together in the previous episode. Both were lonely for their own reasons and decided to spend the holiday together. I did like the T.J. / Dirk scene and Dirk's comments about being old maids. While I understood T.J.'s reaction to Dirk / Babe, I thought he was blowing things out of line since Maggie and Dirk had not only split, but Maggie had moved to Washington, D.C. T.J.'s line about Dirk being more of a son than some of his own was also rather depressing. With that said, I enjoyed Michael Forrest dealing with his broken marriage to Pamela Burrell's Annabelle than this shipping nonsense. It's nice to know Stacey Manning is Senator Mahoney's daughter. I suspected as much, but I didn't get confirmaton. I get such a creepy vibe from James Condon, who played Mahoney. Maybe it's because I remember him as the married doctor pal of Seneca's who flirted with Kim on "Ryan's Hope." Incidentally, the first time I saw Pamela Burrell was on "Ryan's Hope" as Seneca's doctor pal who helped him with baby Arley. Anyway, the Mahoneys seem to usurp the Quinn family in a sense by tying Stacey to Cullen, who comes off as b#tchy at times. This was a lovely holiday treat. I do enjoy seeing episodes from this obscure soap.

The episode that aired November 5, 1950 has the label: Meta shoots Ted. http://otrrlibrary.org/index.html

Is it possible Grammer is confusing "One Life to Live" with "Love of Life"?

John Hess' script collection is available at Darmouth. Based on the catalogue information, he was headwriter of the show from March 1967 until July 1968 so he probably wrote the Brittons out and wrote them back in. A columnist from around this time period wrote the following letter which gives you some details about the stories in this period.

I've seen it listed as April 18th as Paul and Amy's return date in other papers. Here's another casting announcement. I believe this was the article Brent was talking about earlier

As always, thanks for sharing your insights. I had heard before that Tudi Wiggins might have left the show had it continued, but I didn't realize Abbi wasn't going to renew her contract. I think that would have been a horrific mistake given Wiggins' appeal despite not really having much story after they removed her from Cal and Rick's story until they paired Meg with Tom. Had the show continued, I have to wonder if there wouldn't have been more exits in order to accomodate the large canvas (plus the additions of Alan and Barbara that you spoke of). I misspoke in my last post about Abbi being behind the cast purge in late 1978. In the interview, CarlD posted with Cathi Abbi a few pages back, Abbi said the cast cuts had been made at the network's insistence prior to her arrival. I just assumed it was part of Abbi's overhaul. Your comments about Abbi do clarify the sort of bizarre journey that was her tenure as executive producer of "Love of Life." Going from Holloway to Marcus has to be one of the greatest extremes in soapdom. Despite the inexperience, I get the impression Abbi cared even if she was making baffling decisions like letting Tudi Wiggins go from the series. If she didn't recognize the importance of story, why fire Jean Holloway? If the network wanted the show to go quietly into the night, I don't imagine they would have pushed her to hire someone else.

Jean Holloway started writing in late 1978. Cathi Abbi was hired as producer in the fall of 1978 and Holloway came on around November / December. Abbi is credited for overhauling the production, but she also gutted the cast. In November 1978, a large number of characters were dropped from the cast, but, to be fair, a number of these characters were minor characters who were given expanded roles by Gillian Houghton. Holloway streamlined the storytelling to the Ben / Betsy / Elliot story and the Bambi / Tony / Ray / Arlene story. The Bambi story was convoluted and filled with bizarre characters and strange twists and turns. Holloway also introduced Ray's relatives, the Gaspero family who were cliched Italians with names like Guido. Marcus cleaned up in like two to three weeks. She came on in early May 1979 and wrapped up the Bambi storyline the same week she started launching the focus on the college. To be fair, Abbi and Holloway laid a lot of the groundwork by introducing Timothy MacCauley in December 1978 and bringing Bruce into the campus set at the same time. Marcus just ran with it and made it work. She brought on Steve Harbach, an ex-con who had known Ben Harper when Ben did time for marrying both Arlene and Betsy. At the same time, Van entertained the offer to teach commercial art at Rosehill University. In the 1950s, I believe Van had done some work in advertising which would have made her job offer not completely out of line, but still a bit of a stretch. Marcus did a good job tying the past to the present. Her creation, Steve Harbach, used his past with Ben to land a spot in the law program with Bruce and boarded in the Sterlings' garage apartment. Steve developed a romantic interest in much older Van and even had fantasies about her. Noble Van was horrified and kept Steve at bay, but it was nice to see Van involved in the story. I think the online audience appreciates that sort of effort, but I'm not sure if the audience of 1979 appreciated that story. To be fair, "Love of Life" underwent a timeslot change in April 1979, right before Hollloway was ousted, so that, too, effected the show's ratings. Amy Russell was another character who seems well liked. In August 1979, Marcus brought on Amy, a law student who was vying for Bruce's attention in and out of the classroom. Slowly, her motives were made clear to the audience; she believed she was Bruce's illegitimate daughter conceived prior to his marriage to Van. Around December 1979, Marcus brought her two creations together and Amy seemed to be honing in on Steve in order to get closer to the Sterling family. The two storylines were heading towards a collision and I would love to find out what Marcus would have done with them. At the same time, Marcus continued the Betsy / Ben / Mia / Eliot saga. By the time Marcus arrived, Ben and Betsy had found their way back to one another and Holloway was prolonging the divorce of Betsy and Eliot with some garbage like chaperoned dating between Ben and Betsy. In June, Marcus kicked the story into high gear by having Eliot rape Betsy, who was still his wife at the time. Soon after, Eliot announced his campaign for district attorney and Betsy discovered she had conceived a child via rape. Betsy was tormented and pulled away from Ben causing angst. Eliot used the pregnancy to try and reunite with Betsy in order to provide a proper image for his campaign. Mia hoped with Betsy pulling away from Ben that she would finally have her happiness with Ben. Betsy contemplated aborting the child, but, with Van's intervention, Ben learned the truth about the pregnancy and vowed to stand by Betsy. In November, the story entered it's next phase when Ben and Betsy went away to a cabin by the lake. This was a location shoot clearly meant to be a ratings stunt, but also to move the story forward. A vengeful Mia phoned the cabin and led Betsy to believe that she and Ben were still involved sending an emotional Betsy into a tizzy. She ran from the cabin and out to the lake. Ben got on the boat with her and they rowed farther from the shore. A fight errupted and drew attention from the people on the shore. Betsy spotted a snake on the boat and panicked. Ben raised the oar to kill the snake and boat flipped over. Betsy ended up in a coma and lost the child she was carrying. Eliot was furious and planned to prosecute Ben for attempted murder. Despite the impracticality of this case, it certainly was heightened drama and led to the show's infamous cliffhanger where Betsy, after awakening and suffering amnesia, realized what had happened and rushed to the courtroom to save her beloved Ben. If you read the above SOD synopsis, Holloway had Meg paired with Scott Carmichael, the hospital adminstrator who wasn't ready to settle. Rosehill Hospital was becoming rather prominent with the introduction of Dr. Liane Wilson, the hospital's ONLY female resident or intern (I forget which), and her romance with Betsy's mild-natured brother Tom Crawford. Andrew Marriott was still around not doing a whole lot. The Scott / Meg pairing comes off as a bit absurd as it is such a B-story when Meg was a A-character. Maybe if more attention was paid to linking Scott to the community, and maybe he was as synopses don't always paint the full picture. Marcus nixed Scott / Meg and used Meg as the catalyst to break up young lovers Tom and Liane. It was a rather effective use of Meg who probably hadn't had a story of much merit in some time. Marcus shipped Scott out of town in June, and, by July, Meg was setting her sights on Tom by offering him money to fund his cardiology project. In turn, Tom was romancing Meg in order to keep the money coming in, while falling for Liane in the process. The Tom / Meg / Liane back and forth played for a few months before climaxing in a late October / early November confrontation between Meg and Tom over Liane. A staircase was invovled and, wouldn't you know, Meg took a tumble. At the hospital, Liane went against the orders of her supervisors and performed the necessary surgery that saved Meg's life, but left her paralyzed. Liane was suspended and Meg planned on mounting a lawsuit unless Tom agreed to marry Meg. Meg's paralysis was psychological in nature, I believe, and she was starting to regain use of her legs towards the final episodes. Stealthy Meg was keeping that information to herself. Marcus wasn't perfect, though. Her teenage summer story was pretty bad. Virginal Catholic girl, Gina Gaspero, Ray's baby sister, was seduced by Wes Osbourne, Mia's kid brother who was working as a lifeguard before going off to Harvard. Wes took Gina's V-card and Gina had a pregnancy scare. Somewhere along the way Gina had an incident with some pot brownies. Later, Ray got involved and threatened to have Wes arrested for statuatory rape. The story wrapped up in mid-September and Wes was shipped out of town for about six weeks (I think Woody Brown was filming the 'Flamingo Road' tv-movie) before returning in November while Gina was gone for good. When Wes returned, he made up with Ray and went to work at the disco Ray ran. Liane's little sister Kelly arrived in January to attend Rosehill University and to pine after Wes and in the final week or two Cheryl Kingsford started working at the disco with Wes and became Kelly's rival for Wes' attention. I think Marcus' story was solid, (by all accounts) Abbi's production was good, but I'm not sure the show would have been able to overcome the timeslot and clearage issues. Once a show is dropped, it's hard to get the stations to bring it back. The only issue I could see storywise was the cast was rather large for a half-hour and there was a lot of story to play. I have to wonder if the show didn't feel disjointed at times because of Marcus' canvas.

The tail end of Jean Holloway's run. I think Ann Marcus starts in a few installments and does a 180.

Her name was Tally Hindman.

I was watching the arrival of Nancy Lawson. I was shocked by Nancy's backstory involving the ex-husband, the abortion, and her secret prostitute mother. It would have been interesting if Elaine, Nancy's biological mother, arrived in town and became born-again looking to reunite with her wayward daughter. It never dawned on me, but I guess Jeff Cummings' saved by the light was a Friday cliffhanger. Those scenes with little Jennifer telling her father Jesus will save her were surprisingly effective. I just wish it didn't have such a hokey ending.

I didn't realize Ellen Weston had played an earlier role before playing Karen Gregory.

I think it was once said Perry Stephens appeared as Jack Forbes on Egoli. He was once involved with one of the female characters.

I really enjoyed this. It was interesting to read about James Langley and his introduction. It would have been interesting to see what would have happened if the show had made it another year or two. Thanks again for these.

From the synopses I've read, Kristen Larsen (Teri Polo's character) was suppose to be a threat to April / Ned. I think Ned and Kristen might have slept together, which is what I assume Kristen was alluding to when she said, "I haven't seen you since..." This whole storyline is just so weird because the characters aren't connected to the rest of the canvas. Ned works at the shop and is Lottie's brother, but these characters are in their own little world. This is the third episode saynotoursoap has posted from this period (fall 1987). The Alden stuff is stronger, but still I'm not overly engaged in the story. Back to the Curtis clips, Curtis was constantly being de-aged. I believe he spent most of the series in his early to mid 20s until Christopher Marcantel returned. I believe Curtis should have been kept in the Ava / Jack / Stacey / Lily orbit a bit longer. The introduction of Rick undermined Curtis in a lot of ways. In the Billie Jean clip, do we know who Rena Sofer is talking to before the flashback? I was thinking it might have been Jessica Steen, who played Trisha during Noelle Beck's maternity leave, but I feel like that would have been when it was Curtis / Rocky / Rio. I've never seen Peter Crombie listed as Alan so I don't know, but I don't think this storyline lasts much longer. I believe most of this crew is jettisoned by sweeps. I believe Ned goes to Germany around Thanksgiving.

Thanks for posting this, saynotoursoap. Thank you Carl for alerting us to this. I found myself laughing throughout the episode (Ned's flashback / the ridiculous marriage ceremony / Ned & Kristen) when I shouldn't have been laughing. When I read about this period, it sounded awful and it doesn't play out better in an episode. I don't remember what else was featured in the other episode from this period (it may have been a day before) but this Alan / April / Ned / Kristen stuff is really bad. The sets are nice. I also liked the use of music in this episode. I wonder if music rights kept "Loving" from SoapNet. I remember there were a couple songs in the episode featuring Lottie in the storm and Tony the medico turned priest. It was nice to finally see Teri Polo in her "Loving" role. The ads in the other video were neat. I really liked the glimpse of Curtis / Lily .

edgeofnight, I found your speech on the Keith Whitney / Jonah Lockwood story very engaging. I've heard of the story before, but I have a much better grasp of the execution of the story after reading this. Thanks.

I found this linked to the write-up on Mark and Laura at WeLoveSoaps. I thought some here might find it interesting. http://www.emmytvlegends.org/interviews/shows/love-is-a-many-splendored-thing

Thanks, Carl. I really enjoyed reading the articles on Claudia Morgan and Les Damon. The articles on their homes was interesting. Their lives seem so simple for actors. I did chuckle how Claudia had been in all 48 states. I found it interesting they didn't name Claudia's mother even though she was featured in the picture.

There was also a pair on "Love of Life" and "Search for Tomorrow." After Maggie Porter died on LOL, her twin sister came to town and seduced her dead sister's husband. On SFT, the twin sister of Arthur's first wife arrived to cause havoc.

This past weekend, I caught Priscilla Pointer in "A Nightmare on Elm Street-- Part 3." It hadn't dawned on me who Priscilla Pointer was. It would have been interesting to see her in the role of Adrienne. I hadn't realized Pointer was married to Robert Symonds, who played Will Watts on "Where the Heart Is." I find it a little amusing that Pointer played a psychiatrist while Symonds played a psychiatric patient.

I wonder if she was being considered as a Laura recast. I think she would have been a good Laura.

I understand. Things are poorly documented, but I'm pretty sure Walsh and McCarthy wrote the show in late 1994 after Nixon. From rec.arts.tv.soap, this is the SOD Fall 1994 preview

Loving's HW list looks something like this. Doug Marland (Jun. '83- Jun. '85) [he had a two year contract he didn't renew] Agnes Nixon (c. Jun. '85-) Ralph Ellis (no later than October 1987-c. Apr. 1988) [he didn't return from the Writer's Strike] Writers Strike (spring 1988-September 1988) Tom King & Millee Taggert (Sept. 1988-1991) Mary Ryan Munisteri (1991-no earlier than Dec. 1991) [she's credited in the Matt trial episodes] Addie Walsh (1992-Jun. 1992) [left as a result of a conflict with Haidee Granger according Granger's wiki page] No headwriter (summer 1992) [Granger acted as defacto head writer] Millee Taggert & Robert Guza (Sept. 1992-1993) Millee Taggert (1993-fall 1993) [an Oct/Nov 1993 SOD said she was leaving due to illness] Agnes Nixon (late 1993-fall 1994) Addie Walsh & Laurie McCarthy (late 1994-early 1995) James Harmon Brown & Barbara Essensten (early 1995-November 1995)