P&G Slams Douglas Marland

[MichaelGL]

From what I've read, they came up with some very wacky storylines at time, but mostly due to the popularity of GH. (The many adventures of Tom and Margo, i.e. the spinning room and Mr. BIG.) Balancing out all the wacky adventures, they also did their share of some dramatic storylines also like Ariel accusing John of rape. I'm not sure what the ratings were at the time for the show though.

Putting my spin on it, before Marland arrived it was apparent that the show had lost many core viewers no matter how acceptable the writing might have been. At the time the show needed some buzz worthy storylines. Marland did that and drew in both old and new audiences.

[Khan]

Perhaps, if PGP Classic Soaps had unlimited access to his/her company's archives of Marland's work on GL and ATWT, they would know better than to write such unmitigated, and misinformed, trash.

But hey, it's only my opinion!

[kalbir]

I've said this before but without the late Douglas Marland as Head Writer, I doubt very much As the World Turns would've made it past the 1980s.

[EricMontreal22]

From Schemering's second edition Soap Opera Encyclopedia (my fave Soap resource, shame it only goes up to '87)--typos as always are mine

"On December 1, 1975, ATWT expanded to an hour and received top ratings for the next three years. The continuity remained strong, with more actors staying longer in their roles than in any other soap then or since,. The super-constructed stories continued to build slowly to a wallop of a finish for those who were patient. In a cover story on soap operas in 1976, Time magazine ridiculed ATWT for being overly bland, euphemistic and reactionary. (In 1975 Dan had been courting Kim for months and finally confessed his love for her with nary a kiss, although they hands had once touched---on a doorknob.)

P&G was beginning to feel that their show was a dinosaur amid all the free-living, barely clothed human animals having a ball on the ABC soaps and on CBS's Y&R. In the summer of 1978 the Soderbergs started to fall asleep at the helm, repeating a story on alcoholism and reworking other plots. Feeling pressure to "get on with it" the show added a disco set and ran an unpopular storyline about prostitution. The famous long scenes were cut in favour of fast-moving clips. Bedroom antics increased, but as the show moved faster, it lost its focus. The Soderbergs were replaced by another husband and wife team, Ralph Ellis and Eugenie Hunt, who have been writing dialogue for the show. The bottom soon dropped out of the show as long-running characters were written out, parts were recast and a slew of dull characters were introduced. Eileen Fulton's Lisa was saddled with a gothic romance lifted straight out of Jane Eyre, and Don Hastins' Bob was seen hobnobbing about town with a boring ballerina. ATWT no long had any steady grip on the ratings top spots as it had for over the past 20 years.

Early in 1980, with the ratings dive-bombing, Jerome and Bridget Dobson, who had successfully already contemporized sister soap The Guiding Light into Guiding Light and brought that show its first Emmy as Oustanding Daytime Drama, were in for emergency surgery. In addition to imaginative storylines, the Dobsons created a series of strong male characters which the female-dominated serial desperately needed (strong male characters being part of the appeal of ABC's soaps especially), included a willfully sexy scene almost daily, and emphasized the younger characters. The Dobsons zeroed in on Larry Bryggman's John Dixon--by this time television's longest running villain--in a series of dramatic trurns, including a matrominal rape, blindness and faked death. Bryggman's brilliant performance and the Dobsons' brilliant writing resulted in a complete and successful facelift for Oakdale.

But not all was happy on the set. Helen Wagner, who had played Nancy Hughes since 1956, suddenly quitr shortly before the show's 25th anniversary, complaining that the older characters had just about disappeared from the show anyway (She returned a couple of years later for grandson Tom's wedding and retruned fulltime to the show shortly afterwards.) In a rather ill-advised move the Dobsons were replaced, suddenly, KC Collier and Tom King, who had had some success on Another World and its flop sister soap For Richer For Poorer, and managed to turn the Dobsons' carefully constructed storyline into a convulated, spy-laden mess. After a year the DObsons returned to repair the damage and put the show back on course. When they left to go create Santa Barbara John Saffron and Caroline Franz proved worthy successors.

Early in 1984, Saffron was replaced by the team of Tom King and former soap actress Millee Taggart, who concentrated on the romantic problems of teenagers Betsy Stewart and Frannie Hughes. Later that year, headwriters Cynthia Benjamin and Susan Bedsow Horgan refocussed the show, continuing the young love plotlines but also finally giving the older core characters, Bob, Kim and Lisa their first real storyline in years. In Aprin, 1985 Bob and Kim were married after an on-and-off courtship of twelve years. Joinning in the celebration were faves from the show's past, including Nancy Hughes, son Don and in an appearance after 17 years, Rosemary Prinz as Penny. The renovated ATWT was bursting with confidence--once again a thoroughbred amid a field of barking mutts.

The show truly high stepped into the heavens with the innovations of new executive producer Robert Calhoun and headwriter Doug Marland. While Calhoun finally updated the production values. Marland reactivated the show's heritage with contemporary, surprising twists and turns. The return of the magnificent fortyish foursome (with all its heartbreaking resonance)-- Kim, Bob, Lisa and John-- played brilliantly against the Tracy-Hepburnesque banter of thirtyish Tom and Margo, the romantic longins of twentyish Craig and Sierra and the randy confusion of teens, Lily, Dusty, Holden and Meg.

Overseeing all the intrigue from her drawing room and hot tub was rich-bitch Lucinda Walsh, a nasty cross between Lady Windermere and Lucretia Borgia. (we've never seen a gay so hungry for affection; you didn't know if he wanted to make love to James Stenbeck or merely eat him up.) Liuke Lucinda, you never knew exactly where ATWT was heading except straight to the top

"

[Y&RWorldTurner]

^Thanks for posting that, Eric! I wish the Dobsons were still writing for soaps today, GL or ATWT could sure as hell use them.

[stenbeck212]

Even though I found this at Wikipedia, it rings true, and certainly highlights conventions Marland avoided in his work:

Marland usually had a more subtle and lifelike way of writing scenes than this, even for big revelations. One of his strengths was condensing a conversation to one or 2 acts so that the characters didn't spend an entire episode in one place with filler dialogue. He didn't have time for that, especially since he juggled more characters than most would dare to in just one script.

[c0rinne]

Marland's rules:

[Paul Raven]

I'd love to see the P&G board critique Jean and David and see how many of the rules they adhere to!

1.Watch the show - Kreizman admitted in an interview he does not watch every show.

2. Learn the history of the show -

Jean,Bob has a daughter named Frannie,Tom has a daughter named Lien,Kim has a son named Andy,Lisa has a son named Scott.Nancy is the Hughes' mother/grandmother not Katie's.

3. Read the fan mail - that would now include internet postings.

Dave,Josh&Cassie were not well received

4. Be objective- when there is such a lack of balance,obviously that is not happening.

5. Talk to actors - can't believe that is happening. They'd probably be too scared of losing their job to speak up.

6. Don't change a core character - tell that to the GL cast.

7. Build new characters slowly - Gwen,Cole,Sophie etc

8. Staff changes from within- well,David K worked on the show for years.

9. Don't fire anyone for 6 months - does that include putting vets on recurring?eg Blake.Rick.Alex

10. Good soap opera is good storytelling - umm ...Ok no comment

[MichaelGL]

Interesting. It seems as if Collier and King were the ones responsible for turning ATWT a soap that revolved around spies and mysterious crime lords.

[NaVell J. Lee]

Wow...I must not be around much to have missed a thread like this!

They have the balls to criticize Marland and he received, what...oh I dunno, acclaim from many fans who enjoyed actual, dare I say it, character driven material than stories created to fit a plot. *GASPS* The humanity of it! To actually create a mystery story where...newbies, as they want to spin it, which actually was heavily involved with the entire Hughes clan, with a hint of fresh faces...mind you, these fresh faces could act their asses off. What do we have now, fresh faces who dominate a story and cannot act worth a damn, and us fans don't care about them. With Marland, he was able to write the characters in ways where we can care about them. Whether it be a villain or a hero/heroine. The Doug Cummings murder is still referred to this day a great murder mystery on ATWT b/c why? Look who it involved. And not only that, but it was not rushed, it played on every aspect on the character's fears and desires for who was involved, and was it used for plot? Was it used to drive the characters more? Hmmm......

PGP can spew hatred on Marland all they want. The fact of the matter is, they are just jealous of the fact that us as fans live up to that expectation of what we look for in a story, and not just ATWT, but for all the shows we watch as a whole. Marland was able to keep that focus in mind, where no one else at this day and age can. So what if we cannot accept a new writer's work. Does that mean to go off and trash a brilliant headwriter? Guess so for them, huh?

[Y&RWorldTurner]

Yeah, I know the Dobson often infused an off-beat sense of humor into their writing (Santa Barbara is a very good example of this), but they knew how to do meaty emotional melodrama well. It was Mary-Ellis Bunim, the EP, who wanted a youth oriented ATWT in the early 80's. The Dobsons actually stabilized ATWT and they're of course responsible for GL's 70's golden era.

P&G was pretty incestuous when it came to the talent pool for both GL and ATWT, weren't they? Marland started off at ATWT in the 70's and then the Dobsons were swapped to ATWT, with Marland going to GL.

[PJA]

That's one thing I had against Marland. The Hughes were much more intersting thatn the Snyders. I've always found them to be bland. He was a great writer but everyone has their flaws.

[EricMontreal22]

They were incestuous with all their soaps it seems--in fact in LaGuardia's Soapo Oper abook from the mid 70s he says this was their practice to keep writing fresh--they'd rotate the teams between their major soaps.

To be fair to ATWT nearly ALL the shows got much hevier into crime in the early 80s (Schemering likewise calls OLTL's brief period with the COrringtons writing as a spy laden mess...)

[RogerNewcomb]

I was the first one to respond to that blog entry. How dare they try to pick apart Marland's work just to somehow justify the crap we're seeing today.

[DeeeDee]

Don't feel too bad. The same thing's happening with Bill Bell too.