Paul Raven

Remember that TGL was only 15 min in length until 1968 so there was only so much room for various characters. By the late 50's, Meta had been through a lot. Agnes had taken over as headwriter and probably wanted to write for new characters who were a blank slate. Even then they wanted younger characters to carry the storyline. So Meta was given her happy ending and moved to the back burner. I don't think we saw Bruce much, the actors were recurring. Meta left in 66? but did return for visits I think until finally in 74 she was written out officially. Was this because Did Ellen Demming chose to retire? Otherwise it would have been nice to see Meta when Bill returned, at various Bauer weddings/funerals etc.

Lori March?

I like those ideas. Steve could become the Papa Bauer type figure advising not only Rick and Ed bit also various doctors and nurses. And if Meta returned , there could be a sweet older romance to offset the shenanigans of the older set. OK today's homework- who could have played Meta in 1985?

You're probably right re Marland. I think there was a problem with those older characters on GL as they were no longer connected to anyone. Barbara's whole family was written out, Steve was just a doctor at the hospital and Adam had lost Roger. So newer viewers wouldn't have had much of a connection to those characters, not knowing their histories. And of course, being vets, they would have been on good money that could be spent elsewhere. It would have been nice if they stayed on recurring so they were seen from time to time, just to keep continuity. Barbara Berger had to wait till 85 to get another gig, but it was a good one-10 years on AW as Bridget. Robert Milli got Lars Bogard on AMC and Stephan Schnabel got a short gig on EON.

Another interesting show in 81/82 was NBC's Chicago Story. It was 90 mins in length and difficult to place on the schedule. Don't know what NBC were thinking. It had played as a 2 hr movie the previous season and done well. The cast and concept was interesting. Dennis Franz, Daniel Hugh Kelly, Maud Adams, Vincent Bagetta, Craig T Nelson. It's original timeslot was 8.30 pm Friday, following the Mickey Rooney sitcom. I guess the idea was that viewers would stick around after Mickey through to 10pm. and steal viewers away from Dukes of Hazard and Dallas. It seemed misguided at best. Then that plan was dropped and Chicago Story became a back up show. It finally aired on Saturday in Wk 22 of the season following One of the Boys (the Mickey Rooney sitcom with Nathan Lane and Dana Carvey) One of the Boys was #63 and Chicago #61. Meanwhile a 2 hr Love Boat was #11. Things only got worse as the show moved to Friday and flamed out. Don't know what NBC was thinking ordering a 90 min series with no suitable timeslot.

Fascinating discussions here. Thank @Reverend Ruthledge for detailing the Helene/Marie relationship. As for Gentry, do you think that it would have been a good idea to bring him on in 82 as Ed? I have always thought Marland was OK with Hulswit but it was production that wanted him replaced because of backstage issues and wanting a more youthful Ed. Hulswit was balding and had gained weight at that point. They dropped Barbara, Steve and Adam which Marland expressed displeasure about, although that may have been just to make himself look good with the fans.

The whole story is the usual Y&R mess, crafted to fill actor guarantees and perceived popularity. For the story to have any kind of real drama and resonance, the scale and budget would have to be much grander. But Josh continues to churn out these stories with limited characters and sets. Even the dreaded business stories might be more watchable if we had offices and extra staff.

But there will still 20 or so episodes that will need to be covered. So there will have to be repeats scattered throughout. Why don't they just order another few weeks worth of new episodes?

Lynn was at one point married to Colby Chester, best known to soap viewers as Michael Crawford on Y&R.

Helene Benedict was the next snobby society matron who disapproved of her daughter Anne getting involved with Paul Fletcher. And like the Grants, Henry was much the much more tolerant father. Agnes always liked that meddling mother type-Pheobe, Enid,although did OLTL have one?

Thanks @DRW50 'There's nothing really wrong with Kathy except for mental and physical exhaustion'. Meta, that's a lot actually. The Roberts need to invest in a 3 seater sofa -it was kinda squashy. Not sure what was going on in the Grant's living room set. Were those curtains and a bamboo blind, or some sort of wall feature? @Reverend Ruthledge Would love to read the 50's stuff. Enjoyed your summaries of TGL in the radio thread.

Well, the Hastings brothers had been in the business since the radio days. I wonder how close Bob and Don were as they were on opposite coasts for decades.

They could have done the 'Penny's mother befriends Afton with the intent of stealing the baby, seeing it as the grandchild she never had. Losing your daughter due to an illegal abortion might be enough to tip her over the edge. JR double crossed so many people that there was a huge pool of victims wanting revenge. Imagine if 3 or 4 of them hooked up and devised an elaborate scheme to divest JR of all his assets. And of course because JR has to ultimately win, they could turn against each other.

Looking back at the one and done episodes in the early days, Garrison (Ellie's brother) came to my attention. He was killed off. But later I think it would have been interesting for a son/daughter to appear. Better than Jack/Jamie Ewing? Any other early plots that could have been utilised later on?

There is so much rubbish on Facebook about all the soaps eg 'Peter Bergman's heartbreaking decision to leave Y&R' etc so I'm inclined not to believe it.

Well they didn't explain back from the dead or why Matt now had a different face again so that would not be an issue. Did they approach Rick Hearst? Again, I'll state there was zero reason for Matt to be in this story especially if Hearst was not available. At least then they could have used flashbacks to bolster the story. Otherwise forget it. Roger should have played a new character.

Miss Ellie did have a brother Garrison who came and went in one episode early on.

The ratings are not high. The show is #1 by default. I wish they took more care in recasting Billy than just grabbing JT because he was popular on GH and the previous Billy was a bust. Actually I think Micheal Roark who played Travis and is now Jeremy on Days would have been a better choice. Jason Thompson is too old and dour for Billy who was always more light hearted when Billy Miller played him.

10 years! What did we do to deserve that? The writing and Thompson's take on Billy make the character insufferable. Today we have Tessa announcing she's divorcing Mariah. WTH is that storyline? Camryn is hardly ever on and we still don't know what happened after months. Awful. I know it's budget but the show's treatment of children is terrible. They're never seen apart from Harrison. If we saw Tessa as a mother to a young child, Sharon as a grandmother we might feel the emotion of the 'story' than just having the kids referred to (or not). So much wrong with Y&R.

They are almost a year ahead of what is playing so those two couples will probably get a lot of story in that time. Maybe by then it will feel right to let them go. The reverse of this is when young couples are front burnered and go through so much story in a few years that they are prematurely played out but stay onscreen for more marriages/divorces and affairs .

One thing is that Ashley is the only young white female on the show and I think they are conscious of having that onscreen.

The 1981/82 season was a struggle for NBC. It was the end of the Fred Silverman era that had produced more misses than hits. Apart from Hill St Blues, NBC's only hits Real People, Different Strokes, Facts of Life debuted several seasons before so Silverman hadn't replenished the schedule. Apparently the pilot line-up for Fall 81 was so uninspired that NBC announced Rock Hudson, James Arness, Angie Dickinson in shows they had no title or clear concepts for. There seemed to be a budget freeze as NBC had no big theatrical releases, splashy mini series, TV movies and specials. And only a few back up shows. They also had bad luck with Powers of Matthew Star and Devlin Connection delayed to the following season which left gaps to fill. Those shows bombed any way. Compared to the following season's schedule with Family Ties, Cheers, St Elsewhere, Knight Rider, Remington Steele all debuting. None of them were huge hits but building blocks in NBC's ultimate success.

I dislike characters 'fading away'. If Derek is a goner, and I'm not sure he is, a couple of farewell scenes should be written where he decides to leave town for a better job, or be closer to sick parent etc. It seldom makes sense when character just disappear.

#67 Palms Precinct. This was a failed pilot that NBC programmed Fri @10 against Falcon Crest and Strike Force. It starred Sharon Gless and Steve Ryan as police inspectors in mythical Palms City CA. #52 Mork & Mindy. After a ratings bump early in the season with a marriage and birth viewers tuned out and ABC later tried Police Squad and No Soap, Radio in that timeslot, bumping M&M off the schedule. #47 Fame, Debut episode. Despite good reviews that show never took off, coming distant second to Magnum.

That was a pretty standard week with no special programming of note. As for Dynasty, at that point it was winning it's timeslot but usually finishing somewhere between 20th and 30th-it hadn't broken through yet. One explanation for the lower rating was that it hadn't aired the week before so maybe a bit of momentum was lost? Anyway it continued to slowly grow throughout the season moving into the Top 20 on occasion but it wasn't till the May finale episodes that it exploded, finishing at #2 for the final two episodes. NBC was having trouble on Friday and Saturday nights but what possessed them to program the movie The Late Show Sat @9?It was a repeat of a box office flop that had rated poorly the first time around. Surely they could have found something with a bit more ratings potential? Barbara Mandrell had won it's timeslot and they squandered that. CBS programmed a repeat of Foul Play and ABC Love Boat.