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This episode is a great gift! My local NBC affiliate had dropped The Doctors before Nancy Stafford came on and I've always been curious about it.

Amanda Setton (OLTL's Kim) has been let go from her regular role in FOX's The Mindy Project. It's not a big surprise as she was ill-used—barely used, in fact.

I remember Tracy Brooks Swope as a love interest for Jaimie Frame on AW in the early 80s. I had first seen her in episodes of Starsky & Hutch and Baretta, and I was somewhat jazzed that a "prime-time actress" was doing a soap. Unfortunately, her character was a crashing bore and didn't last long. Honestly, she didn't impress me much -- but the show was in such a funk at that point that it may not have been her fault.

Oh, I miss Tom. Anyone know what he's up to these days? I saw him in a really crappy zombie movie a few years after he left ATWT ... maybe 2007 or 2008? Haven't heard a thing about him since.

Cass and Kathleen were so good together. Smart, witty, adventurous and pretty darn hot ... I thought of them as the Nick and Nora of daytime. I did warm up to Cass and Frankie after awhile, though. I really think Stephen Schnetzer is one of the most underrated actors ever to appear on soaps. He could do it all!

I liked Cali Timmins, but I LOVED Judi Evans as Paulina and I thought she had scorching hot chemistry with Tom Eplin. I agree that Paulina's story arc would have been much different if Cali had stayed in the role. She was more vulnerable, but also more calculating. I could easily see her being more of an antagonist than Judi's Paulina.

According to IMDB, Jeff Griggs had a previous career in gay porn, under the name of Tony Sinatra....

Which is why, according to rumor, Kristian Alfonso wanted him out.

Virginia Dwyer (Mary Matthews) passed away on August 20. She was 92! RIP.

I always thought AW did beautiful work with its remotes -- St. Croix, Jackson Hole, Arizona, even the New York courtship scenes with Carl and Rachel.

That's a great scene between Cruz and Eden -- Cruz acknowledging his jealousy and trying to make Eden understand that her feelings for Robert are a real threat to their union; Eden denying it even as she on some level knows it's true, and is unwilling and unable to tear herself away from Robert. That's the kind of adult conversation I haven't seen on soaps in more than 20 years.

And boy, did it remind me of how I loved A Martinez back in the day.

I have to say I loved every incarnation of Felicia, from "pushy, nasty twit" to comic relief to romantic lead to tragic heroine. She rivaled Susan Seaforth Hayes for the way she suffered on screen. She was terrific at everything, turning in great performances even in the preposterous John Hudson romance. I also hated that Sergei storyline at the end -- it was so beneath her.

Thanks for the Felicia-Lorna clips, those actress were really magical together. Too bad Robin Christopher was such a horrible recast.

Jeanne Lange was great! I really liked John Getz and David Ackroyd (the original Gary Ewing), too.

Now that the soaps are so few in number, I supposed we will never see either lady in a role on daytime again.

We may never see either lady in any role again. i think of how many fantastic performers were a part of our daily lives and then just disappeared ... Wyndham and Strasser are two of a handful that I miss the most.

Strasser's Rachel was a selfish little girl, much in the vein of early Erica on AMC (which is no surprise, of course). I loved her in the role, just as I loved her as Dorian. But her Christina Karras on AMC was terrible, no matter how long it lasted. Anyone who saw her as Rachel or Dorian would be astonished that Strasser could play a character that was so flat-out boring. Most of the fault for that has to be laid at the feet of the writers, but Strasser did nothing to give the role any spark. That's not to say that she couldn't have played Rachel's transformation -- but really, the point is moot since it was she that wanted to leave AW, not the show's decision to get rid of her.

Wyndham's Rachel was a force of nature. She was truly scary in those early years. She did not often show the vulnerability that Strasser did, at least not until Rachel met Mac, but she was every bit as memorable. I don't know what Strasser would have done with Rachel's maturation, but I know that Wyndham's Rachel is the only reason I kept watching AW through so very many lean years ... just as Strasser's Dorian kept me watching OLTL. Both women made some unfortunate choices in the later years, as Carl alluded to, but they'd built up such goodwill over the years that I still loved them.

Wow, that promo's almost as bad as today's are.

Carmen Lo Porto (ex-Jack) appeared on this week's episode of Nurse Jackie. He looked much taller and more mature.

Ron Raines was just nominated for a Tony Award -- Best Actor in a Musical for his role in Follies. I never liked his take on Alan Spaulding, but I know he's got musical chops. Congratulations to him -- and to OLTL's Judith Light, who was nominated for Best Featured Actress in a Play.

I hope he enjoyed the hell out his life -- I certainly enjoyed his Barnabas.

Poyner was only marginally less wooden than Bruno. I missed a lot of mid-80s AW, so some of this YouTube material is brand-new to me. Thanks!

Rachel often did not even seem like a human being to me - so affected, and empty.

I bow to no one in my love for Rachel and Vicky Wyndham through the years, but you're absolutely right. She got a little of her old spark back when Carl "died" and she was battling Jordan Stark, but that was short-lived. As much as I appreciate that the pairing with Carl kept her pretty prominent in those last years, it was just dreadful for her character. That breathy, faux-Elizabethan accent she adopted made me cringe.

I still love her for all she was from the 70s to the 90s, though.

I was quite young when Mary Matthews "died," but I can remember her death scene. I was never fond of her (or her husband), so I didn't mind her departure -- though in retrospect it certainly didn't do the viability of the Matthews family any favors. I think it would have been better to have killed off Jim (vetsoapfan is correct that Hugh Marlowe was already faltering) and let Mary's grief manifest itself in her trying to exert more control over her children as a (misguided) way to keep them close to her. Though I suppose Dwyer wouldn't have wanted to play that, either.

And then we might not have gotten Irene Dailey's Aunt Liz, who was a wonderful creation -- though often mishandled through the years.

By the way, when it comes upper middle class mothers of that AW era, I much preferred Helen Moore (Lenore's mom) to Mary Matthews.

But such a horrible actor ... at least in his AW days.

Wow, I would have sworn that Kristian Alfonso was on board when the Jake & Jessica story was underway. I don't at all remember Tammy Taylor's Hope having a crush on Jake.

Thanks for the this, Carl -- that was indeed some nice work from SSH in clip 2.

The only one I don't recognize for sure is #8 -- is that Maisie?

There was some pretty exciting stuff happening then. I loved the whole Liz-Neil-Don-Tony-Anna-Marie-Alex roundelay, Eugene and Calliope were a scream, Roman and Marlena and Kim and Shane were great, and Bo and Hope were an attractive couple (though Kristian Alfonso was very, very green). I didn't like the increasing marginalization of the old guard: Doug, Julie, Don, Trish, Maggie and Mickey. I thought most of the Salem Strangler was very well done, including the Mary Anderson murder/Jake unmasking and Marlena's "murder." The Salem Slasher story had some individually thrilling moments but it was, as Paul said, poor conceived. I remember Don Craig ripping off his "mask" to reveal Roman Brady and losing about a foot of height in the process!