Paul Raven

I know there is a lot of talk about the Daytime Emmys but the nominations/judging has always been so inconsistent and suspect, that I wonder what value they have ever had? It certainly didn't pay off in ratings for a best show winner, or opportunities for actors (you never saw Daytime Emmy winners being sought for primetime or even other shows.) It just seem to be an ego boost for certain producers and some (deserved) recognition for certain actors and writers etc but that's it. Especially when episodes submitted were written just as Emmy material and not always indicative. I would have jury members be required to watch a specified random week of shows to get a better flavor for each, in addition to submitted episodes. That would at give a broader indication of the acting, writing etc than purely Emmy bait.

Moved this post about Daytime Emmys to the general discussion thread

You would think TPTB would recognize that one of SFTs big problems in that era was the constant change in direction and cast changes. As @dc11786 pointed out, there was a reveal about Elan's parentage that was needlessly changed. If there were new writers there should have been a mandate to tweak what was there rather than cast purges. Too many new characters. Of course there were characters available who could have been brought on to strengthen the core. Gary and Danny Walton for example. Laine Adamson returning. An earlier (and better) return for Patti with teen kids. Maybe when the realized Louan wasn't loved, maybe Liza could have been rested for a while. So many possibilities.

Exactly -with Kyle and Billy butting heads over the direction/marketing etc and Jack trying to be peacemaker as his father once did.

Music and direction could elevate the final scene of an episode.

SOD critique of GL from 81, well into Marland's run.

@chrisml Thanks for this and all the other articles you've been posting.

HTSAM followed AW at 3.30 where it failed to hold onto AW's rating. When AW expanded HTSAM was moved to 1.30 up against ATWT. Then a few months later DOOL expanded and took over the 1.30 slot eliminating ATWT from the line-up. So I would say YES. Moving HTSAM to 1.30 was the death knell for an already failing soap.

Palace Guard had a 2 hr premiere Fri Oct 18 1991. It ranked #74 7.4/14 Competitition from 9-11pm ABC Perfect Strangers #47 11.0/20 Baby Talk #58 9.7/17 20/20 #32 13.2/25 NBC Matlock 2hr 8-10 #28 14.0/26 Reasonable Doubts #62 9.0/17 FOX UFO Report:Sightings #74 7.4/13 Palace Guard was last in its timeslot for all 2 hrs. CBS aired 2 more episodes before it was dumped for specials during Nov sweeps.

Jan could be Vanessa's sister -Vanessa married well and moved up, Jan was a single mom that struggled. Or Derek could be Vanessa's brother. Smitty related to Vanessa or Pamela etc Just tying some of those isolated characters together. Hayley needs more to do. She seems to have accepted Bill's request not to return to work. Let's see her isolated at home. What is she doing with herself? Who could she befriend? I still like the idea of Anita checking up on her and them forming a tentative friendship. Bill would be annoyed when he hears about Anita visiting, crosses paths with Anita and she sees she's looking out for that young woman. Bill v Anita would be a good watch. Bill might even decide to use it to his advantage.

You have nothing to apologize for. Placing that link in the Santa Barbara thread was the appropriate place for it.The context made perfect sense.

I think they got off on the wrong foot with Vanessa. She came across to me as a little ditzy, not a focused professional business woman. The whole botoxed blonde persona. With a little tweaking, she would be fine as Nicole's friend. The other thing was we saw Dani confiding in her long before she had a scene with Nicole so that was confusing.

Thank you. It all seems so obvious, but Josh is more interested in media companies that produce nothing. Surely the desired audience would be more interested and relate to cosmetics? And it's more believable that Jabot could operate in the 'real' world than Billy's claims that so far non-existent Abbott Communications would be a leader in the field? That's laughable. We have seen Jabot running for decades so the credibility is there. It's as much of a legacy character as the Abbotts themselves.

Some comments on the Marland interview. His comments in bold. He seemed to go full bore pushing Kelly, Nola and the 'young' group. Not a mention of other characters apart from his beloved Carrie.That sort of fitted in what happened onscreen as one by one most of the Dobson characters either left (Holly, Rita, Lucille, Elizabeth) or were sidelined. Fair enough I suppose as he admitted a preference for his own characters and maybe the mandate was to push the youth aspect. “Now wait a minute. When you started watching Guiding Light, how old were you? How old was Ed Bauer? How old was Mike? They were the same age as the people you are now complaining about. I think one difference is that Mike and Ed were part of the core family whereas Kelly and Morgan were not really connected (retcon of Kelly being Ed's godson notwithstanding) Now had Kelly been Billy Fletcher and Peggy brought back for appearances older viewers might have been more interested/invested. I don't think the divorce rates on soaps are out of sync with society today. Every character on GL (bar Bert) had been divorced-some more than once, so not representative of society in general unless the divorce rate was 100% Perhaps that I didn't fight harder with the network's decision to drop some of the older characters. If that decision hadn't been handed down to me, I would have worked harder to find them something to do. The trouble was Adam, Barbara and Steve had no links to the current canvas. All their children were gone. And those vets would have been expensive. Maybe if they had been offered and accepted recurring, they could have stayed. Yes I do, in fact. I created the first black characters on GH. I'm going to bring a minority family onto Guiding Light some time soon. I'm working on a storyline now. Doug did not introduce the first black characters on GH. That was back in the 60's. I guess he may have meant in recent times. He'd been at GL for two and a half years and no black characters. There had been plenty of time to get something happening.Once he left Clay Tynan and his mother were brought on. I've approved every new character who has come onto the show, even if other people didn't want him in the role. I think the reverse occurred when Kristen Vigard was fired. They went with a pretty California blonde. I can't imagine he was in favor of Jennifer Cooke, same when Carrie Mowery was cast as Jackie. Allen Potter even admitted Cooke was lacking but she had the right look. As far as Elizabeth Taylor is concerned, I think that to bring her on as anybody but Elizabeth Taylor is wrong. (Miss Taylor had appeared as Helena Cassadine on GH) People believe soap actors are real not actors. Suddenly there's Elizabeth Taylor on the show playing someone else. I really think it explodes the 5 day a week reality and the believability of the show. Mmmm I wonder if ET had wanted to appear on GL he would say that. Her appearance as Helena was part of a big event and it was a limited thing. I think most people were interested to see her as a soap character. As for believing soap actors are real, then having Geraldine Court for example turn up wouldn't viewers be like "Why is Ann from The Doctors here ?or Tracy Quartermaine? That argument doesn't hold.

You should check out the Soap Hoppers thread and/or the Cast lists and Character Guide thread. The most comprehensive ATWT cast list and actor soap roles on the internet. Way better than IMDB etc.

As i understand it, Jane signed a 1 year contract. I imagine she negotiated a good salary as she had made a big impression on GH and would be considered a 'get' especially with the thinking that seemed to believe she might lure GH viewers. The deal was that if all parties were happy, she would sign on for another year. At the end of that first year Doug and Jane were happy to continue. Carrie would receive treatment and integrate her alters. I guess the conclusion would be bittersweet as Carrie would decide to leave Ross after causing him so much heartache etc But Allen Potter (and possibly CBS and or P&G)felt that the Carrie story had not boosted the ratings and I'm sure continuing would have meant a pay rise for Jane (as is the norm). So Potter exercised his option not to negotiate a new contract. Doug was pissed and this may have been the culmination of other disagreements with Potter so he quit also. He had already been through this with Gloria Monty.

I understand about the sets, which is why having a number of characters at Jabot would mean that the sets could be up all week, used by various characters. And it would make sense instead of co workers meeting at a restaurant.

Why not have Jack, Billy and Kyle work at Jabot -the family business? A couple of office sets are that's needed. And assorted other characters eg Sally,Mariah could work there and interact, thus setting up business/family rivalries. And instead of nonsensical/vague business stories, they could deal with issues related to that business. Trying to stay relevant in a fast changing marketplace. Deciding what direction to go in. Maybe having to scale back and get rid of Marchetti and any other offshoots. Using influencers to push product and dealing with fallout when one of them does/says something controversial. Kyle may have pushed to get this person on board and now Billy uses that against him. Drop all the media companies and the restaurant workplaces. I don't watch enough to know who works where. I assume Nate, Devon, Audra and Lily all work together. Is that a media company? Victor, Nikki, Victoria, Adam, Claire all work at Newman I assume. Chelsea, Mariah and Sally work where? Daniel? Tessa?

I really should let this go but... Yes,this thread pertaining to a primetime show stays in the primetime thread. If you want to discuss Berrengers and/or The Monroes -cancelled soaps- then you can do so in the Primetime Soaps thread in the Cancelled Soaps section (where both of those shows have been mentioned) OR start separate threads for them as has happened with Flamingo Road, Secrets of Midland Heights etc in the Cancelled soaps section. Seems crystal clear to me.

It also means there are fewer options for future romances. And we still have yet to see various family members interacting one on one and exploring their relationships. I would like to see Ted and Bill meet up at the bar for example and catch up. They were brothers in law for years and both outside the Dupree clan. What was their relationship like over the years? Would Ted be more sympathetic to Bill? What about Martin/Dani? etcc. Seeing some of the characters out of their story bubble could be interesting. Maybe tying some other characters together would have been a good idea. Derek could be Vanessa's brother or Ashley Smitty's sister.

Again, why would this be in the primetime soap section? Palace Guard was a primetime series and this is the place for it. I don't believe there is a current thread for Berrengers or The Monroes, so there is an opportunity to begin new threads for them, or continue placing content about them on the Primetime soaps section.

The info on Palace Guard was posted in the Santa Barbara thread already before a separate thread was made. That was an appropriate place as Marcy Walker was on SB when Palace Guard came to be. A new thread was not necessary. Info on The Monroes, Berrengers etc has been posted in the Primetime Soaps thread and again I do not feel a new thread needed to be created.

Impressed with Doug's acting-funny how some actors shine more than others. Speaking of which Derek is still totally cyborg. Even him picking up a coffee cup was stilted. He was back at the hospital b/c a colleague was injured, previously he was injured(nothing came of it) Who will be injured next to have him return to Garland? I know that is Kat's look but her outfits annoy the hell out of me, I'm still not sure what she does-how is she earning $$$ -Only Fans? As for her and Chelsea talking up Samantha as a teen model for 'the purse line' when she looks like a dowdy 30 yr old.. As for a spa set being expensive, we'd only need to see the reception with a small office to the side. No biggie. No sets for Vanessa, Martin and Naomi workplaces is disappointing. Maybe in time.

@tonymidnight and all GL and Marland fans. Doug Marland interview from SOD August 16 1982. This was was conducted a few months before he left the show. As I was typing I had some thoughts that I'll share later, but for now I hope you enjoy and we can have some discussion. An interview with Guiding Light head writer Douglas Marland Will Guiding Light ever beat its #1 competition General Hospital? While lunching recently with Emmy award winning headwriter Doug Marland, it quickly became obvious to me that this is a man totally dedicated to making Guiding Light the best soap on the air today. He is a man very proud of his craft and very well versed in this phenomenon called soap opera. During the two and a half years he's been writing Guiding Light, Doug has completely overhauled the show adding many fresh new faces and sprucing up old favorites by creating innovative, provocative stories for them. In the interview that follows Mr Marland takes a look at Guiding Lights past. Present and future. Can a #1 rating be far behind? SOD How did you become a soap opera writer? DM I started out as an actor.I'd been an actor all my life , up until eight years ago. I was on TD and ATWT. I always wrote as a sideline, though. It was a way to ease my frustration when I wasn't working. I guess it was the last two or three years of my acting career that I found myself wanting to spend more and more time writing. SOD What was the first soap you wrote for? DM I worked on AW for a while and then NBC asked me to take over as headwriter for TD. From there I went to GH. It was thrilling to be part of the rebirth of a long forgotten show that even the network thought was a turkey. It was probably the single most exciting experience of my career. SOD Why, Doug after you helped catapult GH to #1 in the ratings ,were you suddenly fired? DM I think I was fired because Gloria Monty (exec producer of GH) and I are two equally strong creative forces and I was just as strong in my convictions as she was in hers. We came to loggerheads. Also,it was very disconcerting to me that the writing was never mentioned as one of the reasons for the success of GH. Once I brought that out into the open, once we reached that point,there was no return. SOD How did you get to your present position as headwriter of GL? DM Well, after GH, I wrote ATWT for a while and then P&G switched me over to GL. When I started watching GL I was fascinated by it. There seemed to be a lot of potential. Of all the shows I've written GL is my favorite. I like the feeling, the chemistry of GL -the family ties and values, the family love. I adore the Bauers. The values the characters hold give me a great jumping off place for things to stem from all kinds of storytelling. The show was very well set up. I inherited the wonderful Alan-Hope romance and had the pleasure of marrying them. And I had the pleasure of killing off Roger Thorpe, who'd been the villian of the piece for eight years. Although I hated to lose the actor who played Roger, it was fun to devise a way to give him a finale equal to his talent. SOD What were the elements of GL that you felt needed to be changed? DM One of the things that bothered me about the show was that there weren't any teenagers. Because I love writing young stories the best, I wanted to bring in some young characters. So that was the birth of Morgan and Kelly, and I changed some of the other young characters like Kate, Hilary and Floyd. And I brought Tim back. It's been wonderfully exciting to see how the audience reacts to these characters who were new two and a half years ago. They're standard characters now. SOD How do you conceive your characters? Are the based on your imagination, from newspapers, or from people you know? DM I think a combination of the three. They're all brought about in different ways. Kelly is a very special character to me. I think we all tend to project something of ourselves into our characters if we're going to create a hero. After I brought Kelly on, Nola came about, That was a lucky day!I wanted a girl who would be from the other side of the tracks. That was the other problem with GL-everybody had achieved. Everybody lived in a nice house and nobody worried about money,I thought “We have the haves, where are the have nots? I remember we were testing for Morgan and suddenly on this tape of Morgan's came this red haired, big brown eyed girl with a throaty voice who had a sound different from everybody else. I sat there fascinated. This girl was no more like the Morgan I envisioned than the man on the moon, but I couldn't take my eyes off her.. I had to get her under contract before anybody else did, because she was wonderful. Since I wanted to bring on a have not family, I put Nola in the boarding house as the daughter of Bea Reardon. So that's how Nola was born. Everything else has come from what Lisa Brown has brought to the role. SOD Do you discuss with the actors the direction you want their characters to take? DM Yes I do, especially with the young actors. What I really do with most of the characters is watch, and the first time I see it's terrific, I call the actor or actress and say, “That's dynamite. You've got it, now just stay with it”. SOD Do you listen to the actors when they suggest storylines and /or changes in the direction of their characters? DM Oh yes,I always listen. But I don't think actors are the best judges of where their storyline should go, because it's all tied into them personally. I always listen if an actor doesn't understand why a character does something or where he's coming from. I'm a firm believer in open communication. The better the communication, the better the show. The old myth about a headwriter being some strange, mysterious person who sends his material and says hello to the cast at the Xmas party is awful. I'm trying to destroy that myth. I go to the studio and socialize with the actors, talk to them. You write better for the actors when you get to know them as people. Sometimes when you get to know them, you find another side of their personality that you never find onscreen. SOD Do you have any favorite characters? DM I'd love to say that I don't, but I do. Kelly is one of my favorite characters. I love what he stands for as a human being. I love the fact that he can be wrong. I love the fact that he can be crazy jealous, which is an insecurity. Kelly can cry and still be a man, and I think that's today's man. Hilary is a woman you can see doing anything side by side with a man. She holds her own. Her brain works. She's very much representative of today's woman, who's out in the world doing things and has a life of her own. Yet they still want a home and a family just like the woman who stays home all day. I love the character of Morgan, because she's layered and complex. Nola is one of my favorite characters of all time. Floyd knocks me out. He's dear, gentle,talented. Carrie is an incredible character. I love them all, but I'm partial to the characters I created, because they're mine. SOD What do you think makes an actor stand out from the rest? DM I think it's a combination of the storyline and the actor playing the role. You have to have a multi faceted character with a lot of things boiling inside and then cast an actor who can pull on various sides of that character. You have to fascinate the audience so they never know what to expect-What is – going to do tomorrow? SOD Where do you get your storylines from? DM If you keep your characters alive and consistent, they tend to create their own stories. I guide them, but they do make their own plots. I don't believe in telling a plot – no matter how good it is- if it isn't right for the characters. You have to keep your characters, more or less consistent. If they're going to change, you must build up to that. You can't change them overnight. The audience has to understand the character's motivations. I'm interested in telling stories that work for my people. SOD Do you prefer writing for the lighter characters, like Floyd, or more serious ones, like Kelly? DM I enjoy them both. A writer needs relief from the heavy drama as much as the audience does. It's a wonderful release to switch from a tense, dramatic moment to a lighter one. If there's too much intense drama all the time, the show becomes top heavy. SOD What are you most proud of accomplishing on Guiding Light? DM I guess I am proudest of the young people I have brought on that have been accepted by the audience. They've become an important part of GL, and if I took them out now, the audience would scream. If I'd taken them out a year ago, the audience would have said 'Thank God you got rid of all those kids running around.' SOD Many viewers complain that the soaps have become too youth centered. What are your feelings about that? DM I don't think youth has been overdone but I'm willing to say I might be wrong. The interesting thing is that the kids I brought in two and a half years ago as teenagers are now young adults. In another eight or ten years they will be where Ed and Mike and other older characters are now. If I could reply to all the people who complained about the teenagers I brought on, I would have said, “Now wait a minute. When you started watching Guiding Light, how old were you? How old was Ed Bauer? How old was Mike? They were the same age as the people you are now complaining about. I really want to sat to those people, “Give the new characters a chance. Give the people who are watching the show for the first time the same chance to identify with the young people the way you identified with the young people when you started watching the show.” I like writing the young characters because I think the audience can forgive them of almost anything. It's much easier to forgive a 22 yr old than a 32 yr old., because you feel that by that age you should know better. There's a vulnerability in youth that is appealing and exciting. SOD Another complaint we hear frequently is that there are too many divorces on soaps. Why is that? DM I think that its because you only have a limited number of characters, What you are doing is taking the population of a town and trying to represent with 30 people what goes on in today's society. The divorce statistics are incredibly high and you do need to keep freeing characters for new romantic entanglements. I don't think the divorce rates on soaps are out of sync with society today. SOD Do you think you've made any mistakes with 'Guiding Light'? DM Perhaps that I didn't fight harder with the network's decision to drop some of the older characters. If that decision hadn't been handed down to me, I would have worked harder to find them something to do. SOD How did you feel when Guiding Light won the Emmy for best writing last year? DM I was shocked because I though General Hospital would win. They were a solid #1 and the most publicized soap in the history of daytime television. I had no clue we would win. I just expected to go to the Emmy awards and have a wonderful time. I also felt vindicated because when you have been fired from your job and then win an Emmy...it was a wonderful vote of confidence from my peers. SOD Do you have plans to bring any minorities onto Guiding Light? DM Yes I do, in fact. I created the first black characters on GH. I'm going to bring a minority family onto Guiding Light some time soon. I'm working on a storyline now. SOD Do you always become involved in the casting, or do you usually leave that up to the casting director or the producer? DM I'm very involved in casting. It's important because the writer is the only one who really knows the characters and where he wants them to go. I've approved every new character who has come onto the show, even if other people didn't want him in the role. They never fight me on it. Having been an actor myself, I have an instinct for actors and what they can and cannot do, SOD What about the current trend towards celebrity guests on the soaps? DM I have mixed feelings about it. As far as Elizabeth Taylor is concerned, I think that to bring her on as anybody but Elizabeth Taylor is wrong. (Miss Taylor had appeared as Helena Cassadine on GH) People believe soap actors are real not actors. Suddenly there's Elizabeth Taylor on the show playing someone else. I really think it explodes the 5 day a week reality and the believability of the show. I don't think there's anything wrong with bringing her on as Elizabeth Taylor if there's a place where she would logically fit in. We're going to be bringing a lot of name people to Wired for Sound on GL. We'll have singers coming on as themselves to sing their hits. That's a realistic situation to bring these people into, and there's nothing wrong with that. SOD What is your hope for Guiding Light's future? DM To beat General Hospital in the ratings! That would be wonderful. Seriously, I just want Guiding Light to be a good, healthy show that everyone is proud of. I want it to be a show that everybody enjoys and really cares about.

When did Sharon Osborne join GH?