LeClerc

This is the part of the interview where LM talks about the post-strike firings/being replaced by strike writers

Lynn Martin is no longer at Y&R. In the interview linked below from a few days ago she says a bunch of writers came back from the strike and were then fired when their contracts came up and replaced with people who wrote during the strike (I don't know if she is referring just to Y&R or other shows as well).

It seemed sketchy to me that Fi-Core James Harmon Brown replaced Brent Boyd shortly after the strike. And Lindsay Harrison probably wrote during the strike. 

Makes me wonder if Janice Ferri Esser really left of her own choice.

Lynn also says that on a show she worked at recently (i.e. Y&R), the writers were given a note to not be funny or clever, and she talks about the elimination of the breakdown writers, the lack of writers of colour..

I know Lynn Martin's scripts are not generally well-regarded, but I was impressed with her in this interview.

https://youtu.be/kiCyBd2YQeA?si=EMwmC47kk49bTiNT

Nikki is supposed to get some unexpected help from some friends as she deals with her drinking. 

I can't think of any friends except Jack, and with JG's "three columns of story" approach to the canvas, I don't see Jack crossing over from the Abbott column to the Newman column. 

So are the friends Neil and Katherine? The name Seth means "appointed" or "placed". 

That would be the kind of simplistic/cutesy resolution to Nikki's ordeal I would expect from Griffith and Beall. 

Could Aunt Jordan be a Nikki doppelganger, who returns to GC with Claire and takes over her life

Am I missing something? Aren't the only Fi-Core writers working on soaps right now Josh Griffith, Michael Minnis (and someone else?) at Bold, and possibly Sheri Anderson at Days?

So everyone else writing these shows -- i.e. the majority, as I assume each show has at least 5 people writing -- are non-WGA members (production staff, network execs, etc) or union members who have not gone Fi-Core and who are writing scripts in the shadows. 

I remember during the 07-08 strike, Michelle Patrick (who was working at AMC at the time of the strike) was quoted in an article as saying she had been contacted by another show to write for them anonymously. She said no, but I'm sure there were other writers contacted who said yes. And same thing this time. 

Amanda Beall and Jeff Beldner no longer listed as writers as of Monday's (US) Y&R.

Beall is still listed as a producer. So I guess she can discuss story with JG, she just can't put pen to paper?

2 hours ago, lucaslesann23 said:

For the July 6th episode of YR, Brent Boyd was not in the credits. Just Jeff Beldner and Marin Gazzaniga

I wonder if Y&R is now at scripts that were completed by the scriptwriters before the strike but had not yet been edited by Boyd.

Or maybe JG took over script editing duties in addition to EP, HW and breakdowns...

I was worried Sara Endsley was gone and kept hoping her name would show up again in the credits.

She was Y&R's best scriptwriter. In fact, I would argue she was its only good scriptwriter (I respect her long run, but I find Janice Ferri Esser's scripts mediocre at best).

Meanwhile, Sally McDonald has not directed an episode in weeks. This has happened before so I'm hoping she'll be back, but at this point I wouldn't be surprised if JG had fired her.

I fear this is just going to be a plot device to have Nick and Sharon sleep together. Sharon and Nick will probably be led to believe that Cameron killed Faith and they have grief sex (the "bunker sex" Amanda Beall referred to in that article back in March). Then they learn Faith's alive, Cameron is killed/goes to jail/pulls a Stitch and vanishes, and then the story will be about what this means for Nick/Sally/Adam -- and Sharon will go back to pouring coffee and giving advice.

15 hours ago, Toups said:

Monday's Y&R US episode has Jeff Beldner in the script editor position and Brent Boyd in the breakdown writer position.  Maybe they just mixed that up, so we'll have to wait until Tuesday's episode to see if it was just a mistake. 

Same thing in the Canadian Monday/US Tuesday episode.

I'm a big Jeff Beldner fan, but did JG fire all the female breakdown writers and keep the one male? 

Fireworks? The Phyllis reveal will play out in the most drama-free way possible, just like everything Griffith has done for the last 4 years.

15 minutes ago, TEdgeofNight said:

Just want to say that I am enjoying Y&R VERY much. Go Josh!!!! Write it and Executive Produce it. Josh knew what he was doing by getting rid of those useless breakdown writers. Josh is doing a great job! 

The breakdown team was still in place when these episodes were written.

I think Sharon and Nick are the two characters who have the "bunker sex" Griffith and Beall were discussing in that LA Times article a while back.

The threat from Sharon's past (be it a cancer return scare, Cameron Kirsten, or something else), brings Sharon and Nick together, they end up sleeping together, and then the story will be about Nick's guilt, Adam possibly discovering what happened and telling Sally, etc. 

I was excited about Sharon getting an actual story, but now I suspect the Sharon aspect will be over pretty quick and this is just a plot device for Nick/Sally/Adam.  

I remember years ago the late Bettina Bradbury shared some stories on FB about how vicious McTavish could be with the writers, including exploding at a scriptwriter when said writer's baby started crying during a teleconference, and screaming about her decision to adopt a baby. Once the meeting was over, all the other writers stayed on the call to make sure the writer was okay. 

She also fired Bradbury -- a veteran AMC scriptwriter -- because she complained that one of the breakdown writer's (Chip Hayes) breakdowns were lacking in detail/half-assed. McTavish accused her of thinking she was better than everyone else, proceeded to only assign her Chip Hayes breakdowns, and then fired her at the end of her next cycle. 

Thanks for all that. 

"The show was being trashed and it was unbearable". Indeed. 

^^ Where did you find that?

AMC's last great writing team. Within months I think everyone in that picture was gone and McTavish was back for her god-awful second stint. And thus began AMC's long decline.

6 hours ago, Elsa said:

I remember reading that AMC's original finale would make everybody cry their eyes out and that it had a "Six Feet Under" vibe. Agnes Nixon had written it herself. Or am I making things up?

I believe it was Jill Larson who said the original finale was Six Feet Under-ish and provided a glimpse into the characters' futures. 

I wonder if the montage at the beginning of the episode where you see the births of various characters, and then those characters having kids of their own etc, was actually at the end of the original finale, and after showing the past and the present it would have moved into the future. 

Esta was let go because either Angela Shapiro or Felicia Behr didn't like her. Not sure which -- the reporting at the time was just that an ABC Daytime exec didn't like her. And TPTB were hoping that killing Gillian would help convince Cameron, who was complaining a lot at the time about his lack of airtime and making noise about leaving, to re-sign. He only extended for six months. 

1 hour ago, Dylan said:

Lynn Martin, susan dansby and her now right?

 

Yup. Assuming she sticks around...which sounds like she is, per VR. 

Victoria Rowell mentions her on Twitter, saying she's a friend a hers and KSJ, and the second black writer in the show's history (she's actually the third).

Doesn't sound like Mark is really involved much beyond letting them attach his name to it. And I'm glad about that. 

I'm guessing this story is something Susan Dansby pitched -- and JG will screw it up. 

He mentions they had his resume on hand and put it back in their desk afterwards, so my guess is the "she" was casting director Judy Blye Wilson and the "he" was assistant casting director Bob Lambert. Not "execs" per se, but that's probably how they seemed to him at the time. 

On 7/28/2020 at 4:11 PM, Jonathan said:

Anyone know how / why Marlene McPherson was chosen as the reboot's initial head writer?  That seemed like a hiring out of left field.  Was she a fan of the show?  Did she have a previous working relationship with Ginger Smith, Jeff Kwatinetz, or Rich Frank?

I've wondered that as well. She had no obvious connection to any of the key players. I believe she and Francesca James were friends so maybe Francesca suggested her (and was thanked with a role). Although apparently McPherson was initially supposed to write the OLTL reboot. 

It's a shame Ginger Smith was never promoted to EP (on ABC). She was AMC's Frank Valentini (in terms of working their way up the production ranks). 

Listening to Lorraine Broderick talk about how the writers' room used to work at AMC, where there was not really any hierarchy and everyone was free to pitch ideas and they would stop to watch that day's episode so they could see what was/wasn't working and maybe see something percolating between actors they hadn't expected...if only the network had just left a writing team of Broderick and people like Hal Corley and Fred Johnson alone, with Smith as EP....