watson71

Regarding those finales, Ryan’s Hope and SFT wrapped up nicely.  As did Texas, with the loss of the TV station coinciding with the loss of the show.

AW and GL were a mixed bag, but they were watchable and entertaining.  Edge of Night was the same, didn’t care for the Alice in Wonderland mystery that was highlighted in the last episode.  However, it looked like the mystery was going to involve most of the cast.

The last episode of The Doctors seemed rushed and sloppily put together.

AMC and OLTL did themselves no favor ending with cliffhangers when they thought they would continue right away.  Viewers never got a real goodbye from both shows.  The OLTL portion where Fraternity Row was cancelled and they discussed the loss of a beloved soap was good.

ATWT was the absolute worst. 9 months to wrap up, vets featured as day players,  and not pre-filming a Helen Wagner ending was terrible.  Eileen Fulton was on the show 50+ years and had only a few lines in the last episode - not to mention Lucinda and John making a fool out of her. 

In his Locher Room interview today, Stephen Schnetzer announced that he will be returning to DAYS as Julie’s brother, Steve Olson, for several episodes.  

4 hours ago, Contessa Donatella said:

They found out they were canceled on April 12th, 1999, I believe. 

Their last real work day was May 25th, 1999. I know some people were at the studio for several days after that but nothing like the full cast or crew. A friend says he was the last person at the studio & that day was Memorial Day.

I believe that NBC intentionally waited until the last possible minute to cancel the show.  P&G should have been more savvy knowing the show was on the chopping block. They should have had an outline to wrap up the show and if it was renewed plans for summer and fall 1999.

Goutman blundered the end of ATWT way more than he did AW.  He had 9 months to plan the end of ATWT.  It was cancelled in December and went off the air the following September.  Knowing this, did it ever occur to him to pretape an ending with 90+ year old Helen Wagner?  She died before filming was complete, and they gave her a one day funeral.  The vets were treated like glorified extras in the last episode, and a 54 year old program ended with a cheap plastic globe spinning on Dr. Bob’s desk.  ATWT’s ending was way worse then what happened at AW which had 6 weeks to wrap up.

4 minutes ago, Efulton said:

It is pretty simple Donna. He wanted to end the story and get rid of Jane Eliott.  There could have been many reasons for his thinking.  That one decision does not negate how successful he was at GL.

Not to get off-topic, but Potter was very successful at GL.  He kept the show competitive with GH ratings wise at the height of the Luke and Laura’s popularity.  In addition, Potter’s GL beat GH as the Emmys twice during this time as best drama series.  He cleaned up the mess that AW was in 1983 quickly, and if the ratings rose higher and AW won some Emmys, Potter would have probably stayed at AW longer than the end of 1984.  To his credit, Potter retired and kept his word- he never worked in daytime again.

30 minutes ago, Efulton said:

 Dorothy Ann Purser & Robert Soderberg: November 1982 - February 1984

- Richard Culliton and Gary Tomlin: March 1984 - January 1985

Totally agree about them, but Executive Producer Allen Potter was there as well at this time.  Potter cleaned up the mess that Paul Rauch left rather quickly in 1983.

13 minutes ago, Contessa Donatella said:

I'm going to tell you something that may change your mind about Gary Tomlin! It was him & Sam Radcliffe with their heads together who came up with Carolyn the gorilla! Obviously I'm mock serious, although it's true that they saddled us with that thing.

Yes they did come up with Carolyn the Gorilla in the summer of 1984, but it was this situation that first paired Felicia with Wallingford.  Wallingford was introduced as an informant for Cecile, Cass, and Felicia as they investigated David Thatcher’s murder.  I suspect TPTB thought it was cute to revisit Carolyn during the last week of the show as a salute to Cass and Felicia’s capers with Wallingford.  I didn’t mind it, but the time they wasted in the last episode could have gone to Rachel having some flashbacks of past characters in the final scene of the series.

Ron Harper who played Taylor Holloway has passed away.  His character was featured on AW in 1980.

https://deadline.com/2024/03/ron-harper-dies-journeyman-actor-generations-another-world-loving-1235867791/

5 hours ago, TVFAN1144 said:

I don’t remember the character of Mary standing out. Kind of lackluster.  Other matriarchs had a stronger presence like domineering Nancy Hughes and Bert Bauer and even Alice Horton

In real life Dwyer lived until 2012.  If she was in good health, and Lemay hadn’t killed the character of Mary- the character could have remained on the AW canvas for its entire run.

3 hours ago, Mona Kane Croft said:

For any of us old enough to remember -- name 3 or 4 pre-1979 Another World characters you think should have returned to the show anytime after 1985.  Not at the same time, but in separate storylines.

Janet Matthews- Jim and William’s sister and Liz’s sister-in-law.  You could have built an entire branch of the Matthews family around this character and had her move back to Bay City.  She could have married Vince McKinnon, etc. and been the matriarch of the McKinnon family rather than Mary.

Gerald and Pammy Davis- they could have been grifters looking to get their hands on the Cory fortune instead of Ken Jordan and Paulina Cantrell. And Ada was still alive at that time to be included in the storyline.

Peggy Nolan and Linda Metcalf- either could have been a cousin of Quinn Harding or Lily Mason, a love interest for Grant Todd, or been a relative of the Lawrence or Edwards families.

Mike or Hope Bauer- Guiding Light clearly wasn’t interested in using them.  AW could have brought them back in some capacity.

Linda Dano just uploaded a podcast yesterday with Jill Larson who played Opal on All My Children.  

You can listen to the podcast for free on Spotify.

10 hours ago, Xanthe said:

On Spotify the latest episode is Feb 7 (Sean Ringgold).

That’s correct- they are posted on Spotify now.  She also updates her instagram account when a new podcast is uploaded.

Victoria Wyndham and Carmen Duncan were excellent in the scene where Rachel told Iris that Mac had died on AW.  This was raw emotion playing out in this scene as the actresses were also playing out the death of Douglass Watson in real life.  Both of these ladies deserve an Emmy award.  Also, think of how this scene would have played out if Beverlee McKinsey was still playing Iris. 

24 minutes ago, Donna L. Bridges said:

I think many fans, including me, in retrospect blame the 90 minute debacle! It was enough that he fought against it  tooth & nail & quit over it. 

I think many fans view the 90 minute episodes as a big mistake.  After August, 1980, the following happened: AW would never be NBC’s top rated soap ever again; Beverlee McKinsey left AW and would never return; for the first time in 16 years, AW would not air in the 3 PM time block, with NBC moving it to 2 PM on the East Coast.

NBC should have left AW in the 3 PM block where it was since it premiered.  It was in better shape to do battle with GH and GL.  Also, by the mid80s, both GH and GL were not as strong as they once were.  Texas and Santa Barbara would have done better at 2 PM sandwiched between DAYS and AW.

18 hours ago, Sapounopera said:

Which regime do you think could have "saved" Another World if they had stayed longer with the show?

Once Rauch left in early 1983, Allen Potter and writers Dorothy Ann Purser and Robert Soderberg cleaned up the mess Rauch left pretty quickly.  Potter continued with Gary Tomlin and Richard Culliton as writers in 1984 and the show was good.  Had Potter not retired at the end of 1984, we would not have had all the nonsense with EP Stephen Schenkel in 1985 - Rachel’s amnesia, Larry and the Miami Vice storyline, La Soliel, the Egyptian treasure, the urn with the poison dust, etc.

1 hour ago, Melroser said:

I loved that storyline because it added such mystery! I was 14 in '87 and couldn't wait to watch every day too. The fact that they purposely led the audience to believe the stalker was someone different at different time helped. Chris Chapin. Chad Rollo. I distinctly remember them making it look like Peter was the stalker then suddenly went a different direction. Poor Philece Sampler (whom I loved) got attacked how many times?

There were a few specific scenes that gave away Dr. Alan Glaser was the Sin Stalker. There were a few times in his psychiatric sessions with Donna that he would be rubbing his neck as she spoke to him.  
 

Remember the early May, 1987, episodes around AWs 23rd anniversary, where all of Bay City was at the Cory mansion celebrating Mac’s birthday in a thunderstorm. TPTB even got Ada in on the action trying to rescue Nancy as the Sin Stalker tried to kill her in an upstairs bedroom.

18 minutes ago, Xanthe said:

Of course even though Adam attended Mac's funeral no one ever suggested asking his father and Mac's  brother Alfred for details of Mac's early life that I recall.

Alfred and his wife, Vivian, appeared briefly at the start of 1987, as Neal and Adam’s parents. Alfred was portrayed by Forrest Compton who was Mike Karr on Edge of Night.  At the same time, Ann Flood, was on AW as a Cory publishing employee, Rose Livingstone, who was flirting with Mac.  She played Mike Karr’s wife, Nancy, on Edge of Night. Were TPTB testing the waters to see the audience’s reaction to the characters to see if any Edge of Night fans would notice?  By February, these characters were dropped and the Sin Stalker story was dominating AW.

19 hours ago, Donna L. Bridges said:

Also many people believe she cherry-picked a Pete Lemay outline. FWIW. 

I do wish that Lemay’s bible/outline from this time would show up online.  Clearly his bible did not have Mac Cory dying.  I’m curious how he planned to reunite Mac and Iris.

5 minutes ago, SoapDope said:

The interlocking ring opening looks like it may have been done using some sort of spirograph. Then they filmed it in some sort of a stop animation sequence or maybe a type of rotoscope animation. That's just my guess. The ABC Movie Of The Week opening was explained on youtube by the son of the guy who created it. He said his father projected the ABC logo graphics on the wall and put a camera on a tracking dolly and rolled the camera at a quick pace toward the front to get the illusion of moving graphics.

After doing some searching on YouTube, the same company that created the NBC Peacock “Brought to You in Living Color” logo was probably the same company that created Another World’s interlocking rings opening.

https://youtu.be/HIxGyrQz_e8?si=esssgLI9XSvn-gVy

7 hours ago, Mona Kane Croft said:

The most amazing thing to me is, the original expanding "circle of rings" opening (the one used throughout most of the 1960s and 70s) was created without the assistance of computer technology.  To me, it it almost impossible to imagine how that opening was put together.  Would that be called "analog" animation?  

I almost wonder if they designed the 60 and 70s opening with a kaleidoscope toy and somehow filmed it to capture the interlocking rings and the title.

13 minutes ago, Xanthe said:

Aw, I have a soft spot for this theme. I'm not crazy about the arrangement which is maybe verging on the bombastic, but I enjoy the melody. I like the earlier theme as well and prefer the logo with the rainbow of rings to the opeming blocks that become profiles. 

Always liked this theme and the one before it. Always liked that they kept the interlocking rings at the beginning of the opening credits as a nod and wink to the past.  Also, for 1981, the credits were technologically advanced- I wonder if the company that created the credits for the Superman movie in 1978 worked on these credits?  They are very similar. 
 

Soaps started using exterior shots to establish a house or job location (hospitals, restaurants, etc.) before dissolving into the scene with the characters on the set. This was done a lot as transitions between scenes.

25 minutes ago, AbcNbc247 said:

I’m still wondering what finally happened that made Paul Rauch and everybody realize that the show was in a bad place at the time.

Pete, Diana and so many others were all sent packing at the end of September. 

I suspect that was the time Rauch realized that his days at AW were over after almost 12 years as EP. Probably the last “big thing” that Rauch did at AW was to introduce the character of Felicia Gallant.  P&G would move Gail Kobe to GL after TEXAS was canceled, and move Allan Potter to AW from GL in early 1983.  Potter did clean up AW quickly given the mess Rauch left him with, and AW was again watchable for most of 1983 through the end of 1984 when Potter retired. 
 

The only real fault during Potter’s time at AW was not using Jacqueline Courtney’s Alice more effectively, given the fact that he was AW’s first producer in 1964.  He was aware of Alice’s history on the show. Rather than give her a big storyline, he made her a supporting character in Sally’s story.  If the show had waited to do the Steve Frame back from the dead story once Courtney came back, it probably would have worked.

39 minutes ago, Efulton said:

Did Christopher Goutman or Leah Laiman ever say if Anne O'Donnell was originally supposed to turn out to be Frankie Frame?  I thought maybe they changed this due to the show's cancellation because what was the point of brining Alice Barrett back for the mess of a storyline we got!!??

This was from an interview he did in 1999 before the show was cancelled:

Is "Frankie" the real Frankie or is she just someone Jordan Stark created, and what is she going to do to Cass and Lila's relationship? (don't do too much damage!!!)

A.M.
Pittsburgh, PA


Chris Goutman: 

Let me answer this and hopefully we'll dramatize it because I think it's something we need to answer. Stark did not create her. This is a character who is her own person. Anne is her own person. Stark found out about her and that's about it. She came of her own free will and she has a history which hopefully the audience will find intriguing with what happened to Frankie. 
 

3 hours ago, Paul Raven said:

All of the focus on Pete and Diana including that location shoot and by the next year they were gone and forgotten.

If you look at the cast lists in those credits, only about 10 characters played by the same actor remain  into mid-1983 (Rachel, Mac, Ada, Liz, Clarice, Larry, Brian, Blaine, Sandy, Cecile, Quinn).  

Characters like Jamie, Julia, Sally were recast with new actors.

Everyone else was gone.

Here are newly posted AW closing credits from early 1982 from 4 episodes, including those from a location sequence featuring Diana Frame in a horse riding competition.

4 hours ago, MichaelGL said:

Looks like ATWT fell quite a bit. Impressive numbers for AMC. Another World also rebounding (I wonder why).

On AW, the Sven storyline was beginning to be front burner.  He would kidnap Rachel.  Iris was in on his schemes to break up Mac and Rachel.