Contessa Donatella

That is so good! Great to see soaps starting to show numbers this side of this dam*ed pandemic!

OMG! No. So young. Just cheated out of a chance for a full life. Breast cancer sucks rotten eggs! RIP May light perpetual shine upon her. I loved her as Allison. From Wikipedia, Personal Life section: Schulenburg married her boyfriend of ten years, actor Zack Robidas on September 15, 2013.[19] She gave birth to their daughter, Coda Jones on December 12, 2019.[20][21][22] In May 2020, Schulenburg revealed that she had been diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer which doctors mistook for a mastitis diagnosis that is common to new mothers.[23][1] She described her cancer as the "most insidious kind, inflammatory breast cancer which doesn’t look like typical breast cancer, more aggressive, affects younger women, and disguises itself as a breastfeeding infection."[24] So, breast cancer is evil.

I was just struck by a thought watching DOOL Tue episode. Tamara Braun's got a shot at being the next Nicolas Coster! Maybe. Adding: No, I got Tamara Braun & Sarah Joy Brown mixed up with each other. No wonder I thought they had so many credits.

Just the headline to cause soap fans to guess: DID! Like Little Lizzie Spaulding coughed once & GL fandom shrieked in one voice: Aplastic anemia! It's all about the code.

Nile Rodgers with Adam Lambert Dirty Dancing to the Muppets The Muppets do Dirty Dancing

Gentleman Jack S2E4 M 5-16-22 "I'm not the other woman; she is." Mariana liked to call Abney, Anne, Miz Walker that insipid heiress & insisted that Ann Lister, aka Freddy, didn't love her. I think we should all start calling them Walker & Lister, that has a nice ring to it. There are too many names & too many of them are Ann/Anne! Yes, I am an old fuddy-duddy so try & sue me for it. "I'm not the other woman; she is." is the name of the episode but it's also a line of dialog, which, yes, Mariana says so intently that you know she believes it! Mariana is feirce & Ann Lister went right down that rabbit hole like a very stupid girl, which she is not. All sorts of things could come of this, none of which are good. So, she arrived after a long journey. Personally I was feeling worse & worse about this as we got closer to arrival. She shouldn't be here without Walker! Okay, Mariana manages to growl at her if she's had any dinner & if she would like any & she hadn't & she would so she got fed something, thank goodness for that much. But, then right off the bat, Mariana started in on her, first accusations, she could not know what she had done to her, you'd think she'd murdered her. But, after she did some attacking she asked how often they (she & Anne) "connected"? Very bold, very nosy, very invasive yet Lister didn't really react to anything! And, that continues. Mariana then asked if that insipid heiress knows of their "connection"? At some point Lister told her that she should know that Walker is read all of her letters, wanting Mariana to take some care with what she says, but that didn't seem to faze her. Mariana worries that the time will come when she will never see Lister again. Mariana can't sleep. Mariana cries. Mariana is stuck with Charles. Can Lister still be a friend to her or is she now a wife? Then, baldly, do you still love me? I want to strangle Lister but I think she said that of course she still did. (Was I hearing things?) So, then, and I know Lister should not be encouraging her, but for the first time she tried to kiss Lister. All of the time they keep their heads so close together they are practically breathing each other in & out. Almost reluctantly she pulls back & says she can't do that to Adney & Mariana questions what that is, oh, the name she calls her, etc. She says further that she took an oath & she aims to keep it. And, time goes by. She tells Mariana that there need be no interruption in their friendship. I was floored. "We are who we are." Well, she is just playing right into Mariana's hands. Or some body part. Mariana said she hoped that Lister had not forgotten the nights they had had together. Then she went on, unbelievably to me, to name nights! In Scarborough during the thunder storm when we didn't get any sleep all night long. She repeated that a few times. Then, she named a yr, 18-something & they were at her mother's house. Then something about Lister defending her but the marriage to Charles. Lister said there was no choice, that within 10 yrs they'd have been penniless. Mariana said people treated her badly & she was being made to marry Charles. Back home Walker is made aware of a gentleman who is there to see her, a Mr. Ingram. She receives him. She says she's been trying to paint. He asks her what they say about Lister, that she is ... eccentric. She shakes her head and says that, no, not to her, she's not. She had a little smile on her face as she thought about Lister. She added, "She's clever, interesting." Then he said something I didn't get, about her cousin, Mr. Priestly & she replied that she was very happy. Lister told Mariana to read Walker's letter to her. She did & then of course she judged it & found it lacking. Said she wrote as a dutiful schoolgirl. Mariana & Lister talked more about Charles. Well, we've had news, bad news & more bad news but the worst news of all is that Mariana kept at her & finally they made love. The next day as they are about to part, Mariana gives Lister a present for Walker. She shrugged & said that Lister wanted her & Walker to be friends, didn't she? We see her inside a carriage & then in no time she is home. They embrace. She tells Walker she loves her & that she shan't be leaving her again. Finally a good idea!

WOW! Did that post go crazy or what?!! 🤪🤣 It's as if the text had the hiccups! I get crazy word salad in posts sometimes but I've never had hiccuping paragraphs!

I have one thing to say about yesterday & I have not yet seen today. The actress who plays Stella has now chewed up all of the scenery & is looking for something else to chew up. That is all.

Oh, I doubt that there's been any real effort at preservation. I'm sure they have been responsible for important papers to be placed in libraries & that sort of thing but I would be shocked if they'd done anything but maintain whatever they have, in whatever shape it is in. I think their stuff is too valuable to them to let anyone else in on it but not valuable enough for them to actively caretake.

RIP Donna Summer May 17, 2012 I fell down a YT rabbit hole, first getting lost in SUMMER performances & then ending up in an Ariana DuBose diva-logue! Hot d*mn! This is a picture from Donna Summer, The Musical SUMMER on the Tony Awards

On AW Bay City didn't have a state disclosed until the 1980s. Just as Agnes conceived of towns around a central city, Philadelphia, Irna conceived of the bedroom communities that surrounded Cincinnati, where P&G is headquartered. But they ended up clustered around Chicago.

As a fan of Wendy Riche's & someone who has reached the point where I now call JFP #SoapKiller, I should hope so!

Thank you. I think of Wendy Riche & think in bullet points: Claire Labine, 5 yrs of Emmys, Robin & Stone, NB, Monica's cancer, Mary Mae Ward family, and so on. I don't think of the ones you've listed. Well even a well-wound clock can lose time. You say all this & my brain says, you know, nudge nudge, Miranda, Katherine Bell, Stefan shoots Katherine Bell as a prelude to romance, and so on.

There was discussion of Carolyn Hinsey in this thread & of her book. Full disclosure: I am not a fan of her, as a person or as a soap journalist. But, when her book came out I got it & read it & blogged it. I blog a lot of soap stuff. I included all of the chapter heads & sub-heads because that should help people decide if they want to read it. If you want to read the whole thing, it's not long, PM me. But, I wanted to quote myself, here: “Thank you to Patty McGreevey for letting us turn her bar, Blondies, into a Soap Opera Clubhouse for charity events – raising almost $100,000 over the years.” [ I have only the very fondest memories (and some pictures) of soap events held at Blondies over the years culminating for me in the two June AW Fan Events we held there after the show was over including both Linda Dano Day and the dedication of the AW Fan Bench in Central Park.] ... This book is 250 pages but it seems like there must be more because there is so much information written in such a delightful way that it is dense with data. Carolyn Hinsey as a resource is like she's today's Christopher Schemering or someone else as full of factoids. I disagree with her about when GL was canceled. She said it was in March. But, it was on April 1st, April Fools' Day and that was much written and talked about everywhere. More disagreement comes from me about GL: I blame EP John Conboy and his HW Ellen Weston for hammering in coffin nails. ... I agree with her about P&G and CBS micromanaging GL & ATWT in their final years. It's the only thing I can come up with that happened too much to ATWT EP Chris Goutman to explain the change in him. The same man did not oversee the final years of AW and the final years of ATWT. In a Q&A with DIGEST's own ATWT Editor at the time, Jennifer Lenhart, Goutman said outright that he didn't pay any attention to fan feedback, further stating that he didn't want to get thoughts from the fans and that he knew what was right for the show, not the fans. Maybe that man had been beaten down too many times. I agree with her about how devastating it was for Jill Farren Phelps to kill off Maureen Bauer. I like to say that 'Mo was a Reardon by birth, a Bauer by marriage, Michele's mother, seen by many fans as the inheritor of Bert's matriarchy, a tentpole legacy character and Roger's only friend, … she was lost to the ages. Jill didn't even have the guts to tell Ellen Parker in person. They were both at the studio that day but Jill waited until Parker had gone home and called her with the bad news. Of course, there's no mention of the fact that Jill with Margaret de Priest killed off Frankie Frame in a gruesome murder on AW. There's also no discussion of innovative things that happened on THE CITY and on PORT CHARLES, the little soap that could. But, by and large, what can be found in this book is an astounding attempt to relate everything about soaps – from history to demise. She also does a fine job predicting what could and should be done to save soaps. If you asked me I would add that the soaps should have been shortened back to the half hour format. And, I remain convinced that today's modern soaps could have been mounted on the web. The fact that Prospect Park couldn't do it is more a reflection of what they thought than of raw potential. If you're a soap fan and you buy only 1 book about soaps this year, let it be this book. And, the fact that I wrote that last line is what decided me to do the unusual, and quote myself. Remember, this is about someone I don't even like.

What were Wendy Riche lows? And, were they Claire or Guza?

Oh, she would be. Kinda wish she were. You can't swing a dead cat without hitting some fans talking about her - but with Mike as played by Roark. Although Andrea Barber was in the child role first. Doesn't really take away.

Just looking at a role or roles in daytime & success as criteria I think of Kimberly McCullough & Hayden Panetierre & Brittany Snow & Jonathan Jackson. Hayden was core family on OLTL, then GL, then onto Primetime & maybe with recent news, still going. Brittany was GL & then has pipes to die for & is a lead in the Pitch Perfect movies. JJ was Lucky, does music & was in Nashville, as was Hayden. They say good things, very, about Y&R's Camyrn Grimes who was a child star there & is now back as a popular YA character. I can't say.

Loved Amber Tamlyn. Should've known JFP was involved in her departure. I would love to see her in something, besides being happily married to David Cross & a mama to little ones. I mean I'm happy she has that & he's a freakin' genius but it doesn't put Amber on my screen.

Ohhhh. Thank you. Well, I like her & I think she has a future as an actor but no, not comparable. She's no slouch but Kimberly McCullough is iconic.

But, who the puck is Eden McCoy?

For at least 2 yrs they should clearly call him BabyBo. We'll get sick of it fast that way.

Happy Birthday to Fiona Hutchinson, born May 17, 1960 in Miami. Just happened to see this, wonder why, oh I know, she's on FB. May she find out the details of a project are coming through today. I wonder what Jenna would want.

Well, we spoke up for Tripp just in time to lose him! I suppose it is worth it to be shed of the devil. If I never have to hear the words, "THE DEVIL" Muah ha ha, again it will be too soon. I just had to go ahead & watch today. I'll just be a day behind on GH this week. So, what did I think? Honestly, I am so glad to see this day come that I just feel like having a good stretch & falling asleep calm, where after watching DOOL I am usually tense. Watching especially Ciara, half the time garish & half the time really pretty & soft lit, I am well pleased. Now Ava has no sons. Salem took them both from her.

So it was awful but you're sorry that it was awful? LOL! 🤪 I'm no help. I just watched Friday's. DOOL has a 7 month lag time. I have a day lag time. Maybe tomorrow this time I'll be thinking how awful Monday's show was!

Today a poster elsewhere said that a 2007 or 2008 Digest article indicated that only one soap was making money & that soap was GL. If so, that might mean that the draconian cost-cutting measures were yielding fruit.