Contessa Donatella

I can't explain not recalling all of these babies. D'oh, sorry. And, I don't remember who got a dig in about it but I really liked the big bulky white terry robes hiding that 3 lead actresses were all pregnant at the same time. ATWT Sheffer

So, possibly you thought about today being the Endiversary of my forever favorite show, ANOTHER WORLD. 35 Years in Bay City came to a halt today, 26 years ago. Baby Jasmine is now 26. I know that people make great cases for CAPITOL's finale being the worst since they refused to tie up any strings, or threads, or stories, because they were that angry about being canceled & they had Deborah Farentino's character (spelling? Name right?) facing a firing squad, then we just heard the commands & the shots rang out & then fade to black. And, some of course, point to Santa Barbara, which its device of having all the couples dance by the camera was clever, then Paul Rauch showed total contempt by being in a spotlight on a bare sound stage & grinding his cigar out on the wood floor & then walking away out of the spot. But, to me, AW's is the worst because of what is in it - the whole Carolyn the gorilla schtick & because of what's not in it - a video montage or retrospective of the show through the years. However, there are parts of it I really really like, so I did an Edit, deleting what I don't like & highlighting what I do. Maybe you'll like it, too. https://www.instagram.com/p/DJxW5DLJLId/ Another World is my forever favorite soap opera. But it's finale is almost universally hated by its fans. What this is, is an edit where I've deleted everything I didn't like!!!

Chelsea was a notch in Phillip's whatever? And, of course, I left off Ed, LOL.

Now, the problem here is the huge number of people who were employed by a half dozen or so soaps in NYC & most of them are not employed by any soap, anywhere, WHY? You ask why, very simple, although horribly sad, because there were not even close to enough jobs for those now without them. Facts matter. Not a dam*ed thing to do with Ellen Wheeler but all to do with the decimation of the NY soap scene. And, to SheenaEtc you missed the point entirely. It was thanks to her that we had our beloved soap on the air for 4 more years. And, FTR, Venicetheseries didn't launch till the winter after. 9-18-2009 till 12-4-2009. I've said it before & I'm sure I will say it again. No soap should ever try to maintain 3 locales. Springfield, fine, Company, 5th Street The Santos clan, one might argue are people not a place. But, the tier their organization represents must be tended & attention must be paid. San Cristoblah, the island principality, GMAB!!!

OH NO! This is terrible. Beautiful, blue-eyed, very, RN, who always knew who I was & also who he'd met me with. Him? A facade? A fake? Now looking down I see the word CREEP & also mention is made of trouble with Olivia, which has been an ongoing concern of mine. I guess we are getting somewhere. Don't forget Harley!!! Phillip pretty much had the rep. I mean any man who can be paired with so many different women, there's something going on there. Phillip with Beth, Phillip with Harley, Phillip with whothephuck cares, they were all interchangeable, weren't they? Hmm, that is what you said up above here about Josh! So, at GL were the only real good guys, like Dylan or Alan-Michael, don't tell me only Mark Derwin or Bogue later? I know. Is it Rick? No, Ross, is it Ross? Are we having fun yet, hell yeah.

This is great stuff!!! Thanks. I have never gone too deep in this couple, because, well, frankly because I did not care.

Now you've got me laughing. This is a good thing. Typically when it is anything related to ewww "Always" or ugh "Bud" I cannot get beyond snide. Jeva just has this nauseating effect on me. Funny & amused is much better than snide. I see what you did here. Slay me with the obvious then knock me over with ... things I'd rather not think about. Finally, an explanation for the fact that Josh & Olivia were mad sexually attracted to each other but, they could not make it work between them for more than an evening or special afternoon.

Now, I would like to make a few requests. #1 - Can we talk more about this idea of Reva & Josh & toxicity? This to me is a new idea. #2 - I was under the impression that everyone thought that ATWT & GL were both being homophobic because of basically no consummation between Olivia & Natalia and Luke & Reid, who was even killed rather than consummate, which you have to admit is drastic, to say the least. Death to the non-phuckers! And, Otalia was stuck having eye sex, which as we all know is less than satisfying. I well recall that Crystal Chappell tried to talk to Wheeler about her seeming to think that two women in love had no physical or sexual needs. ????? Is that a part of being a Mormon? In this regard, DRW50 said: Now, I hope someone can explain this to me. It sounds to me like he is saying it wasn't bigoted because, basically they were afraid. But, that does not in any way negate the bigotry. If anything, it supports it. At least IMO. I suspect he means that yes, they were bigoted but he doesn't blame them for it. If that makes any sense. #3 - I no longer can remember what it was about.

Personally I have a strong preference for a time in the past, sadly, when each individual soap tended to have its own unique identity. I feel like BTG has a pretty clear, more unique than not, one, which I attribute to its newness as well as come careful decisions being made. But, generally, all our old warhorses seem to me to have lost that unique identity aspect. Sure, DAYS is supposed to be the diversity soap but they've done such a pi$$poor job of it, I don't think they deserve it. Y&R is supposed to be the soap about the business world & if that's its identity then IMO it has doomed them to the soap cardinal sin, being boring. Is GH the hospital soap or is it the mob soap? And, what is B&B, the Slut of the soaps? And, about blaming P&G, as long as we also blame NBC, I'm good.

See, I loved Tom immediately. And, Jon, Jonathan was a delicious role. And, then, Jami!! Capitol. Refused to tie up any stories. Firing Squad, Fade to Black.

What is this about everyone needing to have a baby? Respectfully, are we watching the same show. Danny & Michelle had Robbie. Natalia gave birth to Francesca. Harley had long had adorable Zach. Olivia had Emma. So, to you, this equates to Babyitis? Often I call it out on a show, but I never once thought of it in regards to GL & it certainly did not pick up with EW. I thought you were going to mention with her being a Mormon the lack of a physical relationship for Otalia, not consummating was glaring.

The gorilla harkens back to the comedic highjinks of Cass, Felicia & Wally. Wait, stop, go back, tell it in a better order. Last year I asked Carolyn Culliton how she felt about being memorialized forever as a gorilla named Carolyn, with a mate named Richard & a handler named Sam, or at time the full name Samuel D. Ratcliff. She told me she effing hates it. She went on, to say that she loved Sam & Gary was godparent to one of their three, so, she can't really object & instead has to go along. What I learned, and she confirmed, was that in the 80s, Sam & Gary, writers at AW, put their heads together & came up with what I've just laid out. Goutman meant this as an homage to that time on the show. What makes it even worse is that repeatedly he said We are not going to reach for nostalgia, NO, we have current stories to tell & we are going to tell them. Now, that is a reasonable sentiment to apply, BUT then for the 2 day finale what did he actually do? He pulled a gorilla & all of her trappings , from the 80s, and, so now I call it the most hated finale in all of soapdom, which if you know anything at all about some real stinkers, you know that is saying a lot. Now, he did get permission to bring Beverlee McKinsey back for the finale. But, for health reasons, her doctors worried about rejection after she'd recently had a kidney transplant & ultimately decided it was not safe for her to fly across country. Can you imagine Rachel calling to the servants that she is getting the door & she opens the door & there is Iris! And, Iris pushed in, past Rachel, and is in the middle of a sentence about some ridiculous man sitting in the seat next to her all the way from Houston?!!! Why he then did not turn around & ask Carmen Duncan, will remain a mystery. P&G denied his request for 2 months to do this, instead of one. P&G denied his request for what he needed for a photo retrospective of the whole show. Also I know this doesn't belong here, sorry, but in my defense, I didn't start it. 😇🙃😉 Edit to Add: Gary is Tomlin. So, possibly you thought about today being the Endiversary of my forever favorite show, ANOTHER WORLD. 35 Years in Bay City came to a halt today, 26 years ago. Baby Jasmine is now 26. And, with this, I promise to stop talking about this show here. https://www.instagram.com/p/DJxW5DLJLId/ Another World is my forever favorite soap opera. But it's finale is almost universally hated by its fans. What this is, is an edit where I've deleted everything I didn't like!!! Maybe you'll like it, too.

I would still be royally pi$$ed at Goutman's treatment of her. And, there is some resonance here. The year before MB had voluntarily taken a substantial cut because she knew that dire straits were coming. Joe Willmore, right.

Well, I have used the words scapegoat & sacrificial lamb, clock runner outer, meh, maybe so. Basically that term would be applied to whoever was last, right? Someone had to do it. The one to turn the lights out. But, I do think she gave us at least 4 years that we otherwise would not have had. I know some of you do not have an appreciation of that, but I do. It has crossed my mind a time or two that she kept the show on the air, longer than P&G expected. And we know Ellen had worn different hats I worn them well. People who try to diminish her as JUST A DIRECTOR. have badly missed the point. As many years as a Line Producer & some time as Assoc. Producer ... Now i am the first in line to call out P&G as the cheapskates that they obviously were. But, once again, there is nothing unique in this about Wheeler, it would also have applied to the only other promote from within candidate & he would have been just as much over his head.

Personally, I would look favorably on any situation which resulted in Greg Rikaart being terminated by DAYS!! Bring it on!

And the last from the May 1976 SOD.

This is from the May 1976 SOD, with Suzanne Rogers on the cover. That cover & some other pages can be seen in the Retro thread. SOMERSET was featured. If there is anything that can't be read, holler & I will take another picture, closer and/or type up the unruly passage. This or the one just before here are the end.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DLPha6DRMQi/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link Bebe Neuwirth & a great group of chorus singing "All That Jazz".

At the time, news about this spread like wildfire throughout, well, certain areas of soap fandom, not just GL either. To hear the people who were there, and who saw it firsthand, appalling is not a strong enough word. She made a total fool of herself & yes, many people saw it firsthand. Today, where people are almost ALL tethered to their phones, there would be pictures galore!!! So, since it wasn't that way in 2009, she dodged that bullet! Actually, I would be interested in your pov on Lucci. And, here, at last, we have KZ saying very nice things that are down to one Ellen Wheeler. She maybe didn't mention that they had hundreds of fans there, at the end, clapping & screaming with joy, after CUT was called on every scene. The set-up looked for all the world like it does at Golf Tournaments where this mob of fans are the viewers on site.

I know full well this is a Minority position but I really liked Josh as a pastor. Seemed much better suited to the character, to me anyway. Actually there was a rather nice tribute done, a bit over 4 minutes. It is not clear how it ended up not being used. But, apparently at the last minute, someone pulled it. I wish it would surface now. It occurs to me that if anyone has it, it would be Michael Fairman as it was his creation. Maybe I will reach out to him to see if he still has a copy

Yes, I said before that it was not listed but that I knew it had happened. She would not even be close to the first error to be found on either one of those sources, which is something I also mentioned upfront on that post. Not a surprise, though, we all know that they are rife with errors. But, either way, working again as a Line Producer or working again as a Director, both are honest work, in related fields. It is not at all a big thing one over the other.

Yes when someone made the remarkably stupid & possibly insane decision to put GL in the hands of John Conboy & Ellen Weston, who did not have suitable writing experience. Sure, she went to ATWT & worked as both a director & a producer. If I'd been in her place I can only hope I'd have found that way to get away from ConWest. TYSM! And, no, I do not accept that passage from KZ's book as documentation that EW did not like one of GL's strongest assets, and, frankly, I am somewhat concerned that anyone of us here would reach for that as any kind of objective truth of events at the time. My hope had been something that would shed real light or insight on what EW, who clearly revered the show history, was reaching for, and why.

Can you repeat the new WeLoveSoaps url, please? And, Ellen Parker, class act.

Was that documented?

I tend to agree with everyone about Lucci. I would just point one thing & that is that AMC spent a part of every single year doing an Emmy bait storyline for her. I literally have no idea what you mean about KZ having a right to her "reactions". In many ways both before & during this time, KZ's reactions were all over the place, or they were markedly selfish, also not good for the show. This is the woman who had her loyal fan group who she even bragged that if she was not on the show ONE DAY they called the studio & complained & on & on with that routine. Also I know that the soap press handled her with gloves on. If they had reported what they knew, OMG, we would still be hearing about it. So, I suggest that she does not fit at all with Beverlee or certainly not Zas. I fail to see how anyone smeared her. And, in fact, she was the cause of some of those problems that you mention. She ran her professional life in a certain way & the show & anyone in her way be dam*ed.