Mitch

LOL...God I hate Fletcher and Hammer!!! They paired him with every diva on the show and no sparks were found! When they put him with Holly Hammer spent his whole time walking over Garrets lines..sorry...Fletch was right there with Buzzard on my Hate-O-Meter! I would have had Brent/Marion knife that nosey ****er instead of that boring cop guy, or poor dim Nadine. A two-fer...Buzz instead on Nadine (I would love to see Deas scenery chewing death scenes...Marion..."Its not that I hate you..its just that I am helping to stomp out noise pollution.") and Fletch for whatsisface the cop. Remember when they had that dumb.."Tell us what you think!" number at the end of the show... I MAY have had a wee bit too much to drink one night and after watching my "tape" of an episode where Hammer was trying to outdo Deas in scenery chewing... left a drunken rant about Fletch on the line. I can only imagine they must have kept that to replay for months for shits and giggles listening to me slur out my annoyance. (edited to change slut to slur..Freudian slip as the usual activity that happened after drinking back in the day..) As for Mike, yes, I would have fired the actor too, but I would have just recast..there were a ton of guys that age who could have played him. I actually would have brought Mike back when Simon left under McTrash..during the Alan tearing down 5th Street garbage. A could actor who could have contolled Marj during scenes would have been great for a Mike/Alex pairing. I know they were thining of making Jeffery a Bauer (God forbid) and Ashley Ricks kid from a sperm donation until the online furor stopped that. I could see big,clumsy , funny Ashley being Rick's kid and she was all Bauer, always sticking her nose into other people;s lives and giving them advice!

I think Bob and Lyla had a lot of dramatic potential at the time and should have been married ..the impact of Lyla's past would have thrown a loop and then just as they were getting back together Lyla could have learned of Margo's affair with James, causing tension as she tries to keep the secret that Margo is screwing over Bob's step daughter....(okay, I would have gone full Marland and had Bob mentioning his need for honesty while Lyla looks guilty..)but they needed to have a strong Hughes family to make that work with Nancy and Chris there and the close ties with Babs and the family, which the Dobs destroyed so all the potential was gone. Bob and Kim could have still come down the road.

The Vicky storyline had potential..especially when they were gearing up Vanessa to take over the more "Alex" role as being alpha gal in Spaulding. She was pissed at both Vicky and Alan and getting back her business balls, but then they brought Marj back..which left Van to dwindle back to sighing about Matt..the excuse was that they needed "Alex to tell Vickies story" but in usual E & B..they dropped both. San Crud and the mob came along and all the rest was lost (say what you want about Cleva..and I hated it..the rest of the show perked along around it and was not swallowed whole by it...) I would have loved if they had kept Vanessa being large and in charge at Spaulding and thwarting Alan at every turn and fighting with Vickie as Matt grew estranged from Van..(I thought Matt/Beth had potential without it being about age and with Beth desperately chasing another man...) Maeve K in Biz Mode was as closer to BevAlex then screeching Marj would ever be. But I also think there was more to the Vicky story earlier....an interview about the time of Zaz departure had E & B talking about it stalling and obliterating the Barbados Spaulding story AND the return of Ellen Parker....did they plan on having Roger having Mo nursed to health in Barbados??? I never saw any follow up so I dont know if it was BS or if it was something that wasnt supposed to get out.

I had suggested before that Edmund was the real Spaulding heir...I have no idea who you would work the mechanics with that one but we have had clones and paitings as portals to time travel..so. I didn't really like Edmund but I loved DAM and he would be more the age and no..Gus was not a Spaulding it was all a big mistake... I actually think they should have brought a "new" character on for the real Spaudling heir...a blue collar guy but this time, unlike Lujack etc...really, really happy to be super rich and he would be ruthless like Alan. It would be a nice add on angst if Prince Phillip got a real rival that was more then happy to be Alan's son. I can't believe they never went there. Instead of Alex Collins could have been Elizabeth..having found out her kids really survived...(no doubt Brandon was involved with faking his death) hiding it all of these years. Also, they could have establish an internship program with PG and the university..using cheap production labor (hey we all did it) in exchange for experience..including the writing staff.

Actually Peapack is upper crust and beautiful..(Reva's aborted wedding to Kyle was filmed there..) and so many places could have doubled as SF locations.,,the Wildwood Arboretum would be a great stand in for places in the Jessup farm and the grounds of the Spaulding mansion..you would think they would love to have the blurb "Filmed at..." in the credits. P & G was just too cheap and unimaginative to do things like that so we were stuck with the junk in Harley's back yard.

I realize why they did this in the 80s and 90s...all the shows were doing big multi sets and since the "critics' were always kind of dissing the P & G soaps as not being as 'hip" as the ABC soaps..(apparently Geary's fro was very hip for daytime at that time..)they had to do it. But GL's budget problems could have been help along as I said before, by just having less sets built.. but really good sets built on the ones they do. I see a really good Cedars set lobby...I would have Beth and Holly both set up a rape crisis center in Cedars so it makes sense they are walking around, have Olivia leave the Spaulding sphere and be the hospital administrator, Alex take charge of the Spaulding Foundation so she can spar with Liv and flounce around the halls, have Alex take Dinah in as her assistant to keep an eye on her...build a mayor's house set for the Mahlers it make sense that people are coming in and out all the time...keep Company as that would be a community get together, keep the Towers set for blow outs and fancy dinners...keep the old Spaulding living room set for infighting drama, the Bauer kitchen and that Lighthouse hotel thing would be condos and just show the lobby as people come in and out and talk and gossip and fight and engage in bitchy repartee with each other. I think the other thing was that all the P & G soaps should have kept their styles instead of trying to be ABC "hip." ATWT was always the midwestern "family heartfelt show, while GL always seemed more "sophisticated and upcrust."

I wonder why they didn't have Bob and Lyla marry. They were engaged and broke it off due to the revelation of John being Margo's dad but the impact would have been greater with Lyla and he being married. I don't remember them having that much chemistry but they both are such pleasant actors I cant imagine they didnt have an easy chemistry. It made more sense then Bob and the drug lord Miranda.

Is that Lyla...she looks freaking great! I truly think the ATWT vets made a pact with the forces of dark to age better and more naturally then any other soap cast.

EVERYONE had shadows on their faces..Jeff got it the worst...it was like the light over his head went out. For Bunim and the Dobs wanting to make the show "youthfull" it is incredibly slow, dark, and depressing...the scene with Dee and David, which should have been heartfelt came off an slow and ponderous...and then there is no follow up in the scenes at Fashion...(at least have Lisa say, "What's wrong" and when she finds out the Stewarts are divorcing have a bit of a smirk...(an ode to Elle and Lisa's fued.) The scene of Annie and Jeff are supposed to be romantic comedy I think but it just is flat... I do like the Lisa/Ariel scene...its like a Designing Women scene

Why is everyone in shadows? Did P & G not pay the electric bill..Jeff is totally obscured off to the side.

I loved it when Reva first came to town and was full of fire and great comic timing..we hadnt seen that since Nola...and then they had to do the angst and drama stuff...But Reva and her maid were more buddies then Alex and her staff...she was like Mae West and her maids..."Beulah peel me a grape!" I would have loved Reva to stay wild and conniving and give her a Thelma Ritter type maid as she schemes. The scene above with Alex and Reva was weird that it transitions right into them having a chat. Is there a scene missing? I do think that Long wrote Reva and Alex best...like Marland write Nola best...but I think that Curlee was right there writing with Long so she "got" Alex. I think it was Phelps who wanted to turn her into a bitter old bitch all the time...but it was still better then what Conboy and whats her face did to poor Alex and then Wheeler and Kriezman. I just wish they had never written her back in then destroy her the way they did.

I loved Marj...but she was HORRIBLE as Alex...they should have never recast. However, she had a couple of good scenes for her..right when she was replacing Joan Collins and they were still writing for Joan/Alex she was good, (my favorite..when Reva jumps on her for setting up the stalking, Marj rolls her eyes and with a wave of her arm dismisses it.. but soon she was screeching and eating the scenery..so it makes me think that yes, it was the writing that sucked. Also the scene in the Spaulding attic when she confronting FauxAnnie..she had great lines..my faves..which Marj did perfect..."It makes me one to throw up all over your new face!" and the best ...something like "Ya got a nice bark on ya honey... but I have dealt with far worse then you!" Marj was miscast and could have been a great tough ball breaker who climbed out of poverty, married rich, inherited stock in Spaulding and was a continuous thorn in Alan and the Lewises side.

Agreed..I thought he seemed like a Hughes...nice, cute but not steroidy like that one guy they got to play him. He had good chem with his family and his relationship with Nancy was sweet. He could have improved. Khan...they coulda cast me...we would have beat "Old Greg Nelson makes a drunken pass at goofy looking Luke" thing by 20 years!

Paul Kover's Chris was so damn cute...why get rid of him? That set that was used for Christmas 2000 (so depressing that Bob and Kim were having Christmas Eve at Mona Lisa with five people..I loved their goofy Christmas Eve at their house which stretched back to Nancy and Chris having it...the soaps became so cold and blah without those things..) was the "Garden Room" at the Mona Lisa...FMB brought it on and it was also boring..I missed that bad tinsle curtain at the Mona Lisa and Lisa's bad painting and how everyone stood around and said..."Where would you like to to to eat tonight" like there was another place to eat in Oakdale. Lisa did run the Wade Bookstore for Nancy and Chris and then it just disppeared. I can't beleive Nancy didn't want to run it so they wouldnt have to shoe horn people showing up at her door for advice.

I thought the rotting junk was in Harley's backyard..her small children had to dodge the construction inside and the rusted junk outside. Wheeler excused the drywall as symbolic of Gus and Harley's relationship...undone. Right. Peapack is actually beutifull, I think we spoke of it here, the remote of Reva hilarious wandering the countryside after her aborted wedding to Kyle as shot by Peapack. Zimmer looked beautiful there and the scenery was even more so. Flash forward 30 years and Zimmer is wandering around a dump and is wearing too tight t-shirts and looks like some slattern tumbling out of her trailer. The main problem was the writing. If they had gone back to pre 80s soap writing..family and relationship problems...people talking in a house, a bar, backyard parties with family...but they still had spies, and assasins, and jewel thieves...If they whittled it down to some really good old sets...Company, Towers, Spaulding exec office, Bauer House...(I would have had Rick open a family practice to make sense of people walking in and out) Hospital, Bloss House (Ross would have been the patriarch of SF and would live in the Mayors house to makes sense again of people walking in and out) and the common big room at the Beacon..and make the hotel room look like a nice warm vintage condo room..and switch out furnishings...it could have maybe worked.

Why Stamford...cheaper...non union? I think that would have been a whole lot better then Peapack and..using closets and offices in CBS for sets..remember the 7-11 set that was built in a storage closet and they made poor Alex go in and say she "LOVED the hotdogs!" Or Josh's church altar which was really Wheeler's desk? They needed more imagination for the whole thing,...there are no exec offices they could use for Spaulding..no large rooms for the Spaulding Board Room..I remember Alan and Alex having a discussion in a closet and then walking into Phillips office which.was a bigger closet. Things that did work included cemetery scenes and some good work outside what could have been a hospital. Other then that..crap.

BWHAHA, but we still got spies, and jewel thieves (that looked like Male Strippers) in this dumpy little town. I remember leading up to Peapack..they would have people out and about for no reason...Alan taking a call while walking across, a park baseball field??? Whatshisface Jeffery taking a call on a park bench while someone across the street had a shaky hand and kept zooming in and out. The problem was, as a long time soap viewer...I was happy as I was sure a psycho was after Jeffie and taping him . But no..the only psycho was Wheeler. I actually was excited by the potential of the the new style but the first few minutes of the change over was a voice over from the now very sharp and brittle Ehler saying..."I am Harley Davidson Cooper and this is MY town!" Uh, not is not! It should have been Rick or at least Reva. I knew then that not only was it the new style but it was all Cooper now and I said..Buh bye! Why did they change the style in winter? It should have been spring or summer not drab late winter. Why didn't they work on the sets more? They could have done what the old live soaps did...which was have semi permanent sets like them all boxed up in a row with a camera down the middle they would just move on a track to the next scene. If live soaps in the 60s could do it there is no reason why this had to look so much like crap. And that theme song!!! Long must have freaked Rauch out..."This good looking, but kinda old dame...has a mouth on her!?!?!"

LOL..but remember, there was NO place in Oakdale anyone could gossip and not be overheard! If I wrote a show I would have scene upon scene of people overhearing things for a day or two as on Ode to Marland! During the start of the Babs/Tom/Margo thing when Marland just started writing Barbara argues with Tom about something Lisa wants to do. Barbara defends Lisa , "Well maybe you should listen to her as she IS a business woman and your not!" and it was refreshing to see women stick up for another woman and show being an independent business woman as good. I also like the Babs/Lisa frenemy thing that went on until the end.

Kimmer looks good in that video..(funny she looked better in that vid then she did on the show at the time.) They dressed her horribly, it was almost an insult. That broad was a kockout when she was younger...and she still was attractive for her age. Yes she aged and gained weight as we all do, but I always liked that Reva looked like a real, attractive person and not a scary Dee Evans..stuck in time yet looking like a waxed doll. Reva always had a sense of style, even though it was flashy and from Rauch on they didn't know how to dress her...(pastel pant suits are so not Reva..) They needed a talented dresser who knew how to work with real women and not just anorexic actresses. I hated the Peapack years when they would put her in a t-shirt and jeans.but as someone said, Kimmer was sick of it and drinking and probably made herself look sloppier in rebellion. Look at the last scene when they had her in makeup and that simple dress and she looked great compared to what they had her in for months. Pam Long's first day back from strike was either writing the day of Maeve's death or her memorial. I thought Maeve was dull as dishwater but I HATED anything tied to Kyle and Sampson Industries...(Besides Ms. Sally, I loved that old broad and could see her and Aunt Meta tossing back some brown drinks in GL Golden Girl style.) And I love that when Long brought Garret back for a Christmas Episode she watched the monitor..."That women is sexy as HELL!" so she wrote Holly back in! Come to think of it, I would love to sit down with Long and a couple of drinks to hear about her time on the show.Didnt she work for Rauch on SB? I am sure that was a match made in hell!

Kimmer seems totally cool in this. I would love to sit down for some beers with her and listen to her uncensored stories!

Yes, Lisa and Babs started Fashions after they both worked for Natalie doing costumes for that movie they filmed in Oakdale which was never mentioned again. James (financed? ) used it to first import jewels he stole from an Egyptian Tomb...(for real..this was a storyline the Dobs started..) then it was drugs...(after other writers took over and the Dobs had to go on with their material.) Simply Barbara was Babs first line and we would so love making fun of that name in college...and the BRO after Lucy bought SB...they even had one scene where a character had to make it explicit to the audience...:"Oh, I get it,,the originals as opposed to Lucinda's knock offs." )

I have a lot of problems with Pam Long..but really, she more then any other writer on GL or any other soap(who wast the creator of the soap) set the tone for the show that lasted long after her tenure was over. Her characters were really the characters who we think of as being the mainstays on the show...(Phillip Rick Beth, Reva, Josh, Alex, and recreations of Roger and Holly) which is amazing. I think her Coopers are over rated as they are warmed over versions of the Reardons...(Frank for Tony, Both Harley and Nadine for Nola..crappy diner vs. homey neighborhood bar) but I have always hated the Coopers. While Pam was great with creating characters I dont think her storylines were that great....I do think that Curlee and Company really added energy, humor and ensemble storylines while keeping the heart, and that their years on the show I think..to me, where what all soaps should be, smart without the annoying pretentiousness of the Dobsons and Labine, current without being the boring public service announcement of Nixon's storylines, fun and sometimes falshes of camp without going over the top like Reilly did himself. Their plots were well constructed and they used history without being as earnestly boring as Marland could be..(I loved that their characters gossiped about each other and sometimes "good" characters didnt get along with other "good characters...) I think all in all they wrote the perfect soap.

Yea, it was probably his hand...and yes, I think Gentry was gone by then...the last I remember was before Abby's trial (but I think he was around after) and the family went out to dinner and Alan walks in with Annie and says, "A table full of Bauers...enough to ruin your appetite," ...ah..old times. Good they brought Long back to write the anniversary episodes...damn..now I remember why I always liked Rick more then Phillip back in the day, hes looking damn good there. I love Van's patriotic but still tastefull red dress, and what the hell was going on with Mo's hair??What did Long have against Bea Reardon? The previous writers wrote her in and then Long wrote her back out...(though I will admit she was annoying..)

Terrible time on GL..made McTavish. E & B and even parts of Wheeler/Kriezman look like gold! Weird recasts on Ed and Phillip, weird extra characters like Simon and that english guy..terrible time on the show.

Yes!!! But for some reason I thought it was all black!!! Nice use of history there and having Henry be exposition man to tell the audience who Amanda was...I especially like his tittering over "love child" when he had one himself!