Paul Raven

Charlotte Ross recalls her Days stint as Eve Ross' first TV role — right out of high school — was initiation by fire, thrown as she was into a frontburner storyline that involved a lot of eavesdropping ("They called me The Lurker") and threatening the Frankie/Jennifer romance. "It was 40 pages of dialogue a day, but it was a dream come true," she recalls of her debut as Eve, a "bitch you love to hate" kind of character. "I went to work in the dark, I came home in the dark and there was no hiatus, but it taught me a wonderful work ethic." Freaky fact: On "Days", Ross played daughter to Charles Shaughnessy, but four years later they were cast as lovers in a TV-movie. "I had to straddle him on a pool table, and I remember thinking this is the most incorrect thing!"

The Criterion Blu Ray release of The Graduate (1967) starring Dustin Hoffman and Katherine Ross includes screen tests of other contenders for those roles incuding Robert Lipton (Jeff Ward ATWT) and Jennifer Leak (Gwen Y&R/Olive AW)

Rita Lakin's memoir'The Only Girl in the Room' has been published and there is a video on her website where she briefly mentions 'The Doctors'.She says that Orin Tovrov, creator of TD held a cattle call of writers in LA and Rita accepted the job as headwriter,She thought she would oversee a team of writers and have time to enjoy NY culture and her parents were there and could spend time with her grandchildren etc.She then found out she had to churn out a script a day and wasn't getting any assistance.She didn't know at the time that the ratings were going up each week.She says it was a nightmare.She gives the impression that she only spent 5 weeks,but I think she means she only spent 5 weeks in NY before returning to LA and working from there. Hopefully she goes into more detail in the book.She did manage to get Rick Edelstein as co headwriter for her second year and did make a lot of money from that gig. I wonder if she has any interest in seeing her work on the show. Go to ritalakin.com to watch the interview.

What was the story behind Keith Charles being replaced? Was it lack of chemistry with Erika? He looks like Ivan Kipling with that moustache... Viki sporting that Julie Andrews hairdo.Interesting that the heroine of the show was hardly a glamor girl.I wonder if TBTB tried to get Erika to go with a softer look (considering it was the early 80's and all the shows were glamming up)

Meg Mundy tribute. Hope Retro keeps airing TD when Meg appears. https://classictvhistory.wordpress.com/2016/01/29/obituary-meg-mundy-1915-2016/ Meg Mundy, an actress with extensive film and theater credits who earned her greatest fame late in her career as a soap opera villainess, died on January 12 in an assisted living facility in the Bronx, according to her only son, Sotos Yannopoulos. Mundy’s death came eight days after her 101st birthday. A multi-talented beauty from a musical family, London-born Mundy was a soloist with the New York Philharmonic and a chorus girl in several Broadway shows in the late thirties. When Mundy was 19, the legendary modeling agent John Robert Powers told her that she was no beauty, “but I bet you photograph well.” Regal, almost icy – “in looks, she suggests a cross between Jeanne Eagels and Jessica Tandy (which isn’t bad looking),” wrote George Jean Nathan – Mundy had the kind of classy air that was perfect for formalwear and fashion magazines. She became one of Manhattan’s most busiest models during the forties – mainly for Vogue, although Look put Mundy and Lisa Fonssagrives, aligned in aPersona-esque pose, on its January 6, 1948 cover. Steichen, Horst, Irving Penn, and Richard Avedon all photographed her. Mundy’s second husband (out of four) was Marc Daniels, who after their divorce would move to Hollywood and direct for I Love Lucy and Star Trek. Daniels taught returning veterans at the American Theatre Wing, which created a useful workshopping opportunity for his wife – the vets needed female actors to play opposite, and Mundy was a regular volunteer. In 1942, when they met, Daniels was an actor taking voice lessons from Mundy’s mother; but his influence as he turned toward teaching and directing (“Marc taught me all I know,” she told Look, in the paternalistic parlance of 1948) helped to revive Mundy’s theatrical aspirations. After a short run in the Garson Kanin-directed How I Wonder (1947), Mundy played the title role in Sartre’s The Respectful Prostitute (1948), which started Off-Broadway and moved uptown to the Cort. Critics didn’t know what to make of the play, but Mundy got great notices: “Meg Mundy gives a performance that ranks with the best acting of the season,” wrote Brooks Atkinson. “Her Lizzie is hard but human – rasping, angry, bewildered, metallic.” Mundy’s stage career peaked with the female lead in Sidney Kingsley’s Detective Story (1949-1950); it ran for a year and a half, but Lee Grant, in a supporting role, stole the show, and the movie version replaced Mundy and her leading man, Ralph Bellamy, with Eleanor Parker and Kirk Douglas. Amidst out-of-town theater jobs and the occasional cabaret engagement (“Miss Mundy is lovely to look at, but she seems rather out of place – sort of like Queen Mary on a roller coaster,” the New York Herald-Tribune wrote of a 1950 performance at the Blue Angel), Mundy was a go-to leading lady in live television. She acted opposite Daniels in the 1948 pilot That’s Our Sherman (as in Hiram Sherman), and he directed her in segments of CBS’s Nash Airflyte Theatre and The Ford Theatre Hour, including a 1950 version of “Little Women” in which Mundy played Jo. The latter was a family affair (Daniels’s brother, Ellis Marcus, adapted the novel) as well as an unlikely A Streetcar Named Desirereunion: Kim Hunter and Karl Malden, respectively, played Meg and Friedrich Bhaer. Daniels recalled later that Beth’s canary wouldn’t sing during rehearsals but hit its cue during the broadcast, and praised Mundy’s “miraculous quick thinking in following an emergency on the air cut” for length. Mundy with Sidney Blackmer in Tales of Tomorrow (“The Dark Angel,” 1951) and Ray Walston (!) in Suspense (“Goodbye New York,” circa 1949) As with any survey of a live television star’s career, there are tantalizing highlights, too many of them lost. In January 1950, she played the Barbara Stanwyck part in Sorry, Wrong Number, telecast by CBS as a one-off color test. (“Miss Mundy’s ‘neurotic’ bed is a vivid green satin job,” reported The Washington Post.) Mundy reunited with Detective Story co-stars Lee Grant for a Playwrights ’56 and Ralph Bellamy for a 1954 U.S. Steel Hour, “Fearful Decision” (which was restaged live a year later, with the same cast). Mundy played Amelia Earhart on Omnibus, and starred in The Alcoa Hour’s 1957 “colorcast” of The Animal Kingdom with Robert Preston. Few of her early television performances were filmed – in 1954, nearing forty, Mundy had a son with her third husband, opera director Dino Yannopoulos, and was reluctant to follow television’s migration to Los Angeles – but Alfred Hitchcock brought her west for “Mr. Blanchard’s Secret,” an odd sort-of send-up of Rear Window that he tossed off for his anthology. In 1961, on the cusp of a long hiatus, Mundy played Dennis Hopper’s domineering mother in a memorable Naked City – conspiring with director Elliot Silverstein to push the Oedipal aspect to outrageous levels, Mundy’s interplay with Hopper was deliciously icky. Mundy and Dayton Lummis in Alfred Hitchcock Presents (“Mr. Blanchard’s Secret,” 1956) By the sixties, Mundy was semi-retired from acting and working as a stylist and a fashion editor for Vogue and later Mademoiselle. (For a time, she also owned a boutique in Connecticut with another daytime star, The Secret Storm’s Lori March.) Then a former agent brought her back for a showy role in a soap opera: that of Mona Aldrich (later Croft) in The Doctors, a mother-in-law from hell who schemed to break up the marriage of her son, Steve (David O’Brien), one of the show’s protagonists. Soap Opera Digest called her “the Katharine Hepburn of daytime.” Mundy played the role for almost a decade, starting around 1973, but The Doctors killed her off (with Bubonic plague) shortly before it reached its finish line in 1982. The Doctors role opened the door for some juicy movie parts – as Ryan O’Neal’s mother inOliver’s Story and Mary Tyler Moore’s mother in Ordinary People, plus Eyes of Laura Mars, The Bell Jar, and Fatal Attraction. Back on Broadway in the eighties, she was Blythe Danner’s mother in The Philadelphia Story and played word games with Jason Robards and Elizabeth Wilson in You Can’t Take It With You. Law and Order beckoned twice, but Mundy’s swan song came in daytime – as late as 2001 (when she was eighty-five), the actress was recurring as a Hungarian matron on All My Children. Mundy with Dennis Hopper in Naked City (“Shoes For Vinnie Winford,” 1961) Posted by Stephen Bowie

Reading old synopses about the introduction of Melinda Grey in August 77. TPTB obviously wanted a new young character on the show and tied her to Kim,Bob etc by making her Jennifer Hughes' long lost daughter. I wonder why they went to all the trouble of creating Melinda when Jennifer's daughter Barbara already existed? She was in the same age range and had been off the canvas for years after a short time onscreen.So her personality could have been shaped to that of Melinda. Also,that brings up some questions. If Barbara and Melinda were around the same age,what were the circumstances of Melinda's conception? Who was her father? Shortly after giving up Melinda did she marry Chuck Ryan and get pregnant with Barbara? How was it explained that Barbara never visited her mom when she was sick and died? Was this dealt with when Barbara finally arrived in Oakdale in late 78?

The Doctors on Retro is now up to October 1970. The Pollocks began as headwriters this week and Liz Hubbard returned as Althea.

Bill Bell was criticized at the time for having Jack hold the threat of paternity over Ashley at that time.Jack would never have done that to John or Ashley. Glad to see some Sandra Nelson love here. YR fan is right,Sandra's Phyllis was areal threat whereas from Day 1 I found Michelle's Phyllis to be too cartoony to be a real threat.I was waiting for Danny and Cricket to laugh at her and tell her to get lost...

Lauren's story was criticized at the time due to the fact that she didn't reveal what Shawn was up to to her husband (a private detective) whose father was a police officer.

Reading an article in TV Guide listings for January 66,I was surprised to see that the CBS affiliate in Youngstown, Ohio WKBN Ch 27 does not broadcast ATWT (or SFT and TGL)I wonder why they would not show the #1 daytime show? Could viewers pick it up on another channel? WKBN, Channel 27 (Youngstown) (CBS) Morning 07:30a CBS Morning News With Mike Wallace 07:55a News (local) 08:00a Captain Kangaroo 09:00a Romper Room 09:30a Cartoons 09:45a Classroom TV 10:00a I Love Lucy 10:30a The McCoys 11:00a Andy Griffith 11:30a Dick Van Dyke Afternoon 12:00p Love of Life 12:25p CBS News 12:30p News, Weather (local) 12:35p Movie – “Million Dollar Pursuit” 02:00p Password (guests Frank Gifford, Betty White) 02:30p House Party (guest Stan Kenton) 03:00p To Tell the Truth 03:25p CBS News 03:30p The Edge of Night 04:00p The Secret Storm 04:30p Movie – “The Mark of Zorro”

Officially Deborah left of her own accord. She stated they gave her more story and more money, but she decided to leave anyway. Unofficially there were rumours she was fired. She did come back in 86 as a temp, so it is hard to tell which is the truth. That scene you mention is pretty much the only one I have scene of Deborah acting with more malice, all the others show Jill in softer scenes, well except when she tells Phillip off, lol. The many scenes during 83-87 of them taunting each other are classic. Unfortunately it does seem Deborah's Jill had few interactions with Kay. When she came on in 1980, Jill was in the Abbott sphere and it wasn't until 1982 when Jill was about to marry John that Kay got involved in her story again. If they had any interactions prior to that it must have been brief and not story related. Kay however did have scenes with all the Jill's (at least the on contract actresses) Not sure about Melinda Fee. Kay had scenes with Jill in March 1980.That would have been Bond. Stu and Liz were married in March 1980 but Kay was not at the wedding.Maybe it was a family only affair.Pam Peters returned as Peggy for that event. Jill got the job at Jabot in May.Was that still Bond or Deborah? By now Jill and Kay were in completely different stories.Jill and Derek had no interaction, which was kind of strange after all they had been through.

Deborah Adair was great as Jill.She was abridge between the more naive Jill of Brenda (even when Brenda's Jill was seducing/tricking Stu into marriage,you got a sense of her desperation and had some sympathy for her) and Brenda's later return as uber bitch. It was interesting when Deborah returned for a week or so during one of Brenda's ' illnesses' and had to play Jill's divorce from John,She immediately brought more depth to the character. I think Bill Bell was happy with Deborah and when Brenda came back something about her take on the role had him write the character to suit her performance. As soon as Jess took over Jill began to change again.

Here's a list of Bright Promise performers as listed in Variety by year and month. Some of these dates don't correspond to your list Slick and in some instances this may be because they were recurring players and Variety mentioned them for one of their appearances(not necessarily their first).For some of the actors,Variety says '________,in for additional segments of Bright Promise' so their debut date could be earlier. 1970 Tim Brown Mar Mark Miller Mar Lesley Woods Mar Gail Kobe Apr Bartlett Robinson June Catherine McLeod June Barry Cahill Aug Forrest Compton Aug Ivor Francis Sep 1971 Tony Geary Feb Steve Dunne March Jennifer Leak March Ann Seymour April John Considine May Willard Sage May Gary Clarke May Ben Wright May Tammy Kaplan June Murray Pollock June Liza Garson July Erick Baer July Hunter Von Leer July M Jonathan Steele July Richard Eastman July Melissa Greene July Richard Cherney July Tom McAleer July Byron Morrow July Regina Gleason Aug Don Dubbins Aug Sherry Alberoni Aug Anthony Eisley Aug Ben Hammer Aug Michael Grayson Aug Fran Ryan Sept Cynthia Lynn Sep Kenneth Smedberg Sep Maxine Sams July Edward Ansara Oct Walter Brooke Nov Annette O'Toole Nov Cindy Henderson Nov Val Bisoglio Nov Cindy Henderson Nov John Hawker Dec Robert Viharo December 1972 Cheryl Miller Jan Diana Herbert Jan Peter Church add eps Feb Shirley Blackwell Feb Annette Davis Feb Brigid Brazlen Feb Ben Frank Feb

This is fantastic! Let's hope people keep sharing these rarities. Was impressed with the Walter/Lenore nuptuals.The overhead camera work,the church set and the number of extras ould put most of the current soaps to shame. Also noted in the Nov 64 that Ernest Gregory was already in the cast. I thought the Gregory's were a James Lipton creation,which in essence they were,but he took an Irna Phillips character and built a family around him.

After FRFP she did AMC and Loving.How long was she on Loving as Isabelle? I guess some of this might be online?

Thanks Danfling.Having posts from people who actually watched the shows and remember these minor characters is invaluable.As we see from The Doctors reruns,a great number of characters/actors have been forgotten.

The Marshall/Felicia story was shut down pretty quickly and Marshall recast with a lot less appealing actor. It's a pity that often shows back out of these types of stories.AW had little to lose.The ratings were already low and maybe a well written well acted interracial story might have worked,bringing the show some attention. I think Carmen Duncan was fired.As stated there were already a number of 'older' actresses on the canvas and after 6 years Duncan's salary might have put more of a strain on the shrinking budget than some 18 yr old newbie.

Variety reported in Feb 70 Another World down from a 40 share not too long ago to a 32. Bright Promise pulling a lowly 16 share against Edge of Night 39 share.

Dec 70 Love of Life 33 share Guiding Light 33 share 3.00 pm Secret Storm 25 share Another World 32 share General Hospital 32 share 3,30 Edge of Night 33 share

I agree. Liz should have been on as support to Jill and friend to Katherine and always trying to mediate between the two. I proposed at one stage that the John Silva character could have been Greg-go to lawyer and romantic option for Nina etc as played on screen.

Roberta and Melody reunited in 2012

Fantastic!! Early Xmas present - can't wait to see the updates. BTW are u going to do a cast list for Bright Promise?

This may have been posted before... Ken Corday and Tom Langan Executive producer and executive producer/head writer TV Guide Online Q&A April 2000 Have you visited Salem, USA, lately? If you haven't, you're missing out on a slew of new characters, situations and secrets on Days of Our Lives. Tom Langan, a longtime Days producer, took over the additional title of head writer last fall, and he's been spinning his own brand of soap storytelling (teen angst, extensive use of history) ever since. The road has been somewhat rocky (erratic Nielsen ratings!), but Langan and Salem scion Ken Corday are determined to bring the show into the new millennium. Here, in part one of a two-part conversation, the duo voice their concerns about the Nielsen ratings and discuss what viewers can expect in the coming months. It must be gratifying that people are responding so well to your stories. Tom Langan: It's very encouraging. As a writer, if people are responding in a positive way, [then] you feel motivated to continue the hard work, but I was very disappointed [that the ratings went down the week of the plane crash]. I don't understand it. I don't see how the Internet site [Soap City] can get a million hits a week and the ratings are flat or going down. You know the answer: Everyone knows the Nielsen ratings aren't accurate. Ken Corday: Will you print that? Tom, is it frustrating for you, as the prime content provider, that the number of people watching isn't accurately measured? Tom Langan: Terribly frustrating, because you labor over this, creatively speaking, and you challenge yourself and you start to second-guess yourself if the ratings don't reflect what you think is positive, good material. Ken Corday agrees to spend half a million dollars in one week for an airplane crash that I'm writing, he shows great confidence, the audience gets excited, the network starts promoting it and the ratings are flat. But the Nielsen problem is nothing new! In the late '80s, during the supercouple era, Days was not a strong ratings performer. Ken Corday: Correct. What you have to look at is that the Nielsen sample seems to be the antithesis of where we are strongest. We are strongest with women 18 to 34. Many of those women are in a single-parent home or a single-person home without children, and some of them are in institutions such as dormitories, colleges and other places that are never sampled by Nielsen. You will never have any institutional sampling; you'll never have any nontraditional sampling. So perhaps that is part of the reason [we're undercounted]. Tom Langan: It's all very frightening to me that with television being one of the greatest inventions in the last 100 years, they haven't come up with a way in Silicon Valley to monitor audiences. Ken Corday: Or if they have, the civil liberties union isn't letting them implement it! Tom Langan: That's an excuse, because people voluntarily get on [America Online] and they get into these chat rooms and enter contests in which they're more than willing to give up personal information. Just put a chip in the television! Why hasn't anyone done it? Somebody is stopping this from happening. Now you're beginning to sound like a Days storyline! Tom Langan: Absolutely. I know it sounds a bit diabolical. How much of your mind is occupied by this &emdash; because head writing is a full-time job, as is executive producing! Do these thoughts interrupt your creative process? Tom Langan: No, because I'm going to write what I'm going to write. I've always said that if my writing is not going to be pleasing to the show owner or the network then they should get somebody else, because that's what I would do. Fortunately, at this point, people are very pleased with how the show is doing. But, as I said, it angers me to know that these are the ratings, because with all the technology we have I know that there could be a much [more accurate] sample than it is. What are your strengths as a writer? Tom Langan: The fact that I have no children. I devote my full time to this. I don't know what my strengths are. I have no idea. I really don't. Ken Corday: Tom's first strength is that he's lived and breathed Days of Our Lives for close to 10 years. In dog years it would be many, many more! So he knows the show. It's not like someone who's walked in and is learning it while writing it. He also knows that if it's not broken it doesn't need to be fixed, so he's not constantly dumping characters that are familiar and important to the show. And he also knows for anything to grow and change and get better, you have to water and get new life in the family trees for the Hortons, Bradys and DiMeras. That is a responsibility that the previous head writers over the last five years had not been addressing. But over and above all that, I think Tom realizes that this is a medium about emotional connections more than physical connections, more than intellectual connections. There are deep emotional reasons attached to the things we do, and they connect sometimes over an arc of a year or two. The show is in transition since Tom really started writing the show. To look at the show now, it is not the same show it was last summer. I find it a better show, a more intriguing show and a fresher show to look at. We're not trying to or being asked to follow five or six storylines a day. Tom Langan: Do you watch the show? Of course I do! Tom Langan: I'm just curious, when Ken says to you it's a different show than it was last summer, do you see that? I do. And if I can answer my own question, I feel one of your strengths is the humor. It's not humor that is directly related to the storyline. It's almost throwaway humor. And I don't mean to say throwaway as in throwaway, but in that you have to be quick to catch it. Tom Langan: Do you have any favorite storyline right now or anything you're curious to see more of? Abe and Brandon's history. I want to find out exactly what happened, because Abe and Lexie have been underserved. I mean, they've had stuff to do... Tom Langan: ...But they haven't had a story in a long time. Ken Corday: Well, there's a lot more coming there, but I think that the plan that Tom has laid out goes at least a year down the road before any of the big, big secrets are revealed. Were there specific characters that you wanted to write for when you took over? Tom Langan: The story takes on a life of its own and you sort of just go with those people. I did want to bring Chloe in, however, because I felt that the group of kids needed a loose cannon that was mysterious. That's a good way to describe her. Tom Langan: You don't know which way she's going to go yet. And we won't know that for a while because she has a lot of baggage, emotional and psychological baggage. Ken Corday: And what that's done is enable him to bring Nancy and Craig into center story as opposed to the peripheral kind of mustache-twisting. Tom Langan: What do you think of Belle and Shawn? I don't understand Belle. We don't know a thing about her. We don't know what she wants, whether she's a good girl or a bad girl. Is she a heroine? Because she's written to be something of a heroine, yet the actress plays against that. She plays mischievous. We know she has a heart because she defends Chloe and stands up to Phillip, and we know that she wants Shawn and that she's a good daughter &emdash; but none of that translates. I don't feel any of that. I think it's because the actress (Kirsten Storms) plays against what's being written. Tom Langan: I think it's in the writing, because you want to keep her as something of an unknown &emdash; you don't want to predict what's going to happen if, let's say, Shawn should become interested in Chloe. But do you know in your head what Belle is all about? Tom Langan: Not yet, no. I know more about Chloe than I do about Belle, and like you I've been watching her. It's very interesting to me, as a writer, to watch the show because I'm seeing, word for word, how the actors interpret what I write for them and how they relate to the material; that really can motivate you to write more for a character. It works the other way, too, obviously. A lot of people have asked about Brady. Tom Langan: Yeah, I know. I would love to bring Brady in... the only thing is I have [too] many people. Let's just say that he won't make an entrance as Eric did, years after Sami. Of course, the time might be right soon because Jensen [Ackles, who plays Eric] is leaving the show... so we'll see. As a head writer you're creating story but you're also juggling the number of good guys and bad guys on the canvas, as well as contracts and who's coming and going. How do you manage it all? Do you use a chart or a bulletin board, or is it all in your head? Tom Langan: It has to be in your head. If it's not in your head then you shouldn't be doing it. A lot of times people said, "Oh, my goodness, Mike and Carrie are leaving the show. What are we going to do? It's going to leave a big hole in the show." I said, "Yippee. Let's play Belle, Shawn and Chloe. Let's get more Nancy and Craig." I would love it if Mike and Carrie came back to the show, but it's great from a writing standpoint to get some fresh people on canvas that we don't know about. We know everything there is to know about Mike and Carrie; they loved each other! In terms of the juggling act, one thing I do try to say to myself as I'm writing each show is, "Gee, do I have any comedy here? Do I have any fun? Are people going to smile when they see these scenes? Are they going to be depressed [for] the whole show?" You have to come up with a balance of adventure, romance, fun and excitement. As a writer, who were your influences? Tom Langan: That's very easy. [Legendary soap writer] Bill Bell. Bill Bell really nurtured me for the 10 years I was on The Young and the Restless. We became very close through the show and had a friendship, mainly, about the show. I loved his writing and I was amazed by his talent. We communicated very well in discussing daytime in general, and he was the first person to say to me many years ago, "Tom, I'd like to train you to be a writer." I remember exactly where it was. It was in Malibu and we were having lunch and he was buying sandwiches to bring back to the house in the Colony. And I was so flustered by it, I just put it in the back of my head, and here I am 10 years later, doing it. But he really believed in me. He believed I could do it, and he was the greatest influence on me. Have you spoken with Bill since you've taken over as writer of the show? Tom Langan: Yes. And I told him that it was very daunting and that I sort of fell into it. I said to Bill, "I really feel that as each week goes by I'm really getting into the rhythm of it." And he said, "Tom, that's the keyword. Look at me: I did it for four years and I never broke stride. You can do it. From the sound of your voice you really sound like you're doing the right thing, you've got the right attitude and the right work ethic." He was very encouraging. That anecdote brings me to something that is a problem in daytime, which is that writers don't train other writers. Are there specific young writers that you want to work with? Tom Langan: Well, it's interesting. This is a very special animal, daytime, and some people take to it like a fish to water, and other people try it and it just doesn't work out. It just doesn't fit them. It's something you have to be working within; you have to be available 24 hours a day. I hate these people who say, "Oh, my God, I work so hard. I'm a head writer on daytime and I have no time to myself." I would love to find people who could take over for me someday but they just don't present themselves. The desire is not there, the talent is not there and it's not something that you can look at someone and say, "Oh, there's a head writer." It takes months of getting to know them. Actually, there is someone whom I met recently, a young lady who I think has great potential. But again, she looks at this as being impossible, which is the same way I looked at it 20 years ago. Ken Corday: Unlike many of the head writers I have worked with, Tom is the kind of head writer that is not an island unto himself. He is a nurturing head writer. He will sit and although I'm not privy to some of these meetings, with his breakdown writers and associate head writers and allow them to bring some of themselves to the script. He will sit with people, whether it's the script continuity person or a new breakdown writer, and take the time to explain that this is the way that these characters interrelate. And there is a good synergy between him and the current writing staff. Better than I have ever seen on this show. Similar to the synergy that existed when Bill Bell was head writer here, and also creating The Young and the Restless and training Pat [Falken] Smith and giving her outlines, yet reading every one of her shows! And that was in the day when you would not just write the show but you would write the scripts as well! The transition between head writers really has to be hands-on. Thank god Tom was hands-on here when we went from Jim [Reilly] to Sally Sussman to Lorraine Broderick. Had he not been here, I think there would have been a lot of glitches. There would have been big gaps and big jumps and big holes in the story that he seemed to plug. After a while, with all his fingers in the dyke, he said, "OK, I'm going to stop being the Dutch boy and I'm going to be the guy who fixes the dyke and builds a new one," very metaphorically speaking. But if something is not working, he is able to work it out. And if something is working he can be told, "This is great," and then he moves on. He doesn't hammer that nail. He's a rare find. What hasn't worked? Tom Langan: I think it's been too short a period of time to know. I think sometimes things do present themselves and you say, "Oh, God, let's get out of this. It isn't working." That hasn't happened yet, so ask me that in a year!

Martin E Brooks, who played Skip Curtis, has died aged 90.