Paul Raven

@Reverend Ruthledge I am enjoying these so much. On paper at least it looks like a tightly written series of plots. Unlike today, where things seem to chop and change. Agnes took over sometime in 58, right? I wonder how that cross country road trip played out onscreen? But things flowed smoothly on. And this was a 15 min show. I guess that's why Meta was backburnered as there was just so much room on the canvas. And as much as she was a core character, Agnes realized that in a sense her story had been told and she got her happy ending with Bruce, Again, unlike today where characters have been through everything and still stay frontburner in ridiculously contrived plots.

I wonder if at some point we are going to go back to Mariah and the mystery man she apparently killed. How and why they connected and what lead her to kill him(if that's what actually happened).

I'm not expecting a documentary but the business stories are so far from reality that they are laughable. It's interesting that Josh's Y&R focus is 1.Business stories -that are in no way believable 2. Using basically empty restaurants daily as settings for business meetings or catchups for characters who don't seem to work 3. Mostly characters who have been on for decades and are playing repeats of stories from years ago. It would be great to see a EP and headwriter who could handle the budget and the cast better and come up with something more interesting.

If a song can be a hit in one country then it should be able to perform as well in another. There are too many examples of that to prove the point. So it all comes down to luck and timing. Tommy Leonetti was a big name in Australian TV at the time and Kimberly would have been known from Peyton Place. So the ingredients were there to get the song to the public whereas in the states he was pretty much unknown. As for a Kylie remake I don't think it suits her current style.

It's cheap looking b/c it is cheap and quite honestly most of the poses are not flattering to the actors.

Nice to see Christine in lawyer mode. They TALKED about Mariah's hearing and some nonsense as to why she's free but like most of the awful stories they are made worse b/c we don't see things. OUAT we wouls see the hearing, the judge's ruling etc and it would be more involving and believable. This new park cafe set is actually outside? It doesn't look bad except a few extras eg waitstaff would have helped. Now Society was featured(surprise!) with the Nate/Devon convo at the bar. That was tight shot and we saw a couple of extras in the background. To me the could have done w/o them as the camera held on Nate/Devon. Whereas the park cafe showed the set in entirety and would have benefitted from having a few extra people in the mix. Don't know how and why these decisions are made. Same at Crimson Lights which is usually customer free. Nick/Sharon & co were sitting front of set and there was one lone extra in a booth. It looked sad. One thing I hate is pretty much the opening scenes tell you what to expect. eg Nate and Devon's conversation continued throughout the episode. There's not enough movement and scene/character changes. PS Josh Griffith must go...

You are obviously a super fan of Ms Beck, so I assume you are aware of her success with her stepdad Tommy Leonetti in Australia with the hit single 'Let's Take A Walk"?

I can understand your reasoning Errol and obviously you want what you see as best for the website. I agree a particular discussion can get lost if something else takes precedence in the thread, so I would be in favor of more specific discussions, eg the set situation on BTG gets talked about from time to time but gets lost in the monthly thread. This would be good in the Cancelled Soaps , if there were individual topics as there are often concurrent discussions taking place eg Guiding Light 1995 jumping back to the Marland years Your explanation above clarifies things. And the general topics eg Best recasts, Proposed Soaps etc would also have a place.

@FlyRightOrchestraGuy Maybe just start a Kimberly Beck love thread in the Love/Hate forum...

But AW at 3pm might not have gone over well with the affiliates leading into local 4pm programming. I think it's demos may have been worse than SB. And AW ratings would have slid with no guarantees SB would do any better at 2pm.

Susan Seaforth Hayes was also mentioned for Stephanie. I always found John McCook a little dull. Things might have been different with another actor as Eric.

@Reverend Ruthledge This is great. I like how past characters are included or remembered. It created a bond with the viewer. Later there was just frustration when relatives were forgotten or ignored. Mike went from birth to 16 in 5 years! Wonder why Irna never had any interest in Joey?

As far as AMC (and maybe the fans) were concerned Cliff didn't exist without Nina-hence the 2 Nina recasts and Taylor's returns. But Nina was the same. Any other involvements just seemed like obstacles to an eventual reunion with Cliff. Cliff never had a family built around him apart from his sister who arrived years later. But then neither did Tom (apart from Sean) but he seemed to be better developed than Cliff and had more longevity. Maybe because he moved on from Erica and even Brooke.

After her 2nd departure that was it for Brenda. There was some talk of a role on OLTL but it may have been just fantasy. I do think she was blackballed (at least from daytime)' What puzzles me is how she has been able to support herself for decades with seemingly no income.

The Corringtons were out before the first year had passed. Several characters were dropped: Dawn Marshall who was supposed to be the big interest for Dennis left in Dec 80. Mike Marshall out July 81 Courtney Marshall June 81 Bart Walker Feb 81 Terry Decker March 81 Kevin Cook March 81 Alex Wheeler July 81 Samantha Walker March 81 Clipper Curtis Dec 80 Max Decker was recast Feb 81 A slew of new characters were introduced including Jeb Hampton Oct 80 Ashley Linden March 81 Lurlene Harper July 81 Grant Wheeler June 81 Lacey Wheeler July 81 Ruby Wright July 81

Such lush visuals. And when they went to Peapack everything looked drab and shabby. But it summed up GL at the time -all style and no substance. A bunch of characters with little history on the show, most of whom would be gone and forgotten. They obviously spent a lot on that wedding and I don't think the ratings showed any uptick. Kurt was dead later that year.

B&B was a mismash of various Y&R themes. Stephanie did evoke Vanessa in some ways. The Logans had elements of the Fosters -Storm/Snapper, the absent father, Brooke/Jill. Katie Logan/Traci Abbott -the shy sister with a problem-weight issues/acne Caroline's rape/Chris' rape.

Days of Our Lives had a rocky first year. Ted Corday was not well, dying 6 months into Days first year. Ratings were low. Peggy Phillips was axed as headwriter and Bill Bell was brought in July 67 and revamped the stories, bringing on Bill full time and Laura, first played by Floy Dean.

Well NBC were probably wrong to do it in light of that history. It's not like there weren't a heap of other books that could be dramatized. Pt 1 15.8/25 Beaten by Football ABC and MASH/WKRP/Lou Grant CBS Pt 2 11.1/18 Beaten by Three's Company/Taxi/Hart to Hart ABC and TV Movie High Midnight CBS

Yes, like so many actors who come back as 'twins' the new role didn't take off see Mishael Morgan Hilary/Amanda, Tony Geary Luke/Bill, Lee Paterson Joe/Tom etc

I agree. Someone like her who has been on both sides of the screen could bring a lot to the role of EP. Maybe she found that not acting didn't give her much satisfaction. Besides working on Loving might have been a negative vibe, with cancellation always around the corner.

Joanna Johnson left at the end of her contract and there was talk of a recast but Bill Bell finally decided to kill her off.

And then NBC tried to get in on the act with the Beggarman, Thief miniseries which flopped.

TV Guide June 3 1996 By the next year Jane was back onscreen on Loving. In 2003 she returned to GH. So the BTS career didn't work out for whatever reason. Loving: The new house of Elliot Jane Elliot, one of daytime’s most beloved divas, quit her Emmy-winning role as General Hospital's Tracy Quartermaine in 1993 and promptly disappeared in a whirlwind of rumors: Some said she was being lured to As the World Turns. Others claimed she was a shoo-in to replace the great Beverlee McKinsey as Guiding Light's Alexandra Spaulding. Still others saw her having private discussions at One Life to Live. But last January, Elliot popped up in a part no one expected—as the producer of ABC’s Loving. “After 30 years as an actress, I was beginning to feel that my days onscreen, my income, and the number of [soaps] available to me could only diminish,” says Elliot, who has starred on four of the ten current daytime serials. “Looking at the sunset of my career just wasnt going to do it for me." So, after departing GH due to conflicts over story and management, the single mother of two decided to pound the pavement for production work. Just one contact came through—her former Days of Our Lives boss Al Rabin, who hired her as dialogue coach on his syndicated sudser, Valley of the Dolls. "Al was the only one who took me seriously. [Hollywood] is a boys' club where my sex, my age, and the experience that comes with time are liabilities," says the 48-yearold Elliot. “So I moved East, where you could hear the sound of doors banging against walls as they were flung open for me." The female programming heads at ABC Daytime let Elliot observe all aspects of soap production at One Life to Live, and after she proved that she had the chops, they awarded her the Loving gig. “I’m learning on the job," she admits, "but the cast and crew have been extremely supportive. And that is a miracle. I was fully prepared to have people saying behind my back, ‘Who the hell does she think she is?”

With BTG hitting that milestone soon, I thought it might be interesting to look back at BTG's first year and other soaps past and present to discuss what changes on and offscreen occurred before the first anniversary. BTG had one recast with the role of Ted and it's still not clear why that happened. And Bob Guza departed as co headwriter, but that seemed to be the plan from the start. As far as story is concerned it seems that Shanice taking a more major role was probably not in the cards at the outset and Derek and Ashley being de-emphasized seems to have come into play. Andre and Dani marrying?? Looking into the past a lot of soaps didn't even make it to Year One.- The Best of everything, Hidden Faces etc The most recent example being Lovers and Friends. Rather than revamp on air it was taken off after 4 months and returned 6 months later with a new title For Richer, For Poorer, some cast changes and new stories but it was cancelled after 10 months. Santa Barbara had recasts and revamps almost from the beginning . What do you recall of those first 12 months of various soaps?