2008: The Directors and Writers Thread

[MarkH]

Yesterday's show, which she did, was GREAT. I'll have to watch more.

[Ryan]

If you set your expectations too high you're guaranteed to be disappointed. For me, I take the soaps one day at a time. I refuse to get excited about anything until there's consistent growth and progress on a specific show. Once that happens, I can begin to get excited about things again.

[Khan]

So true, Ryan. Defeatist, but true.

[Ryan]

Lol, I'd rather set low expectations and be surprised when the shows go higher, than set unrealistic realistic expectations and expect them to achieve them.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

I see, for now, as much as I'd love scriptwriters and breakdown writers with better reputations, if the storylines suck, there's no need for me to watch a soap. If the dialogue and structure are average, that's fine, but there has to be something about the storylines that will keep me watching.

I seriously doubt most of these people will last at Y&R for very long. Y&R seems to be like how the other soaps were a few years ago, you know constant hirings and firings. While the other soaps are trying to be cheap and keep all writers they have now, instead of firing them and hiring new writers.

[brimike]

Oh, just that they're more experienced script writers with an appreciation for character and the distinction between voices. So if they're given a more "general" outline to work from, they have lots of room to really add a lot to the episode, as opposed to an inexperienced script writer who won't know what to do with that kind of outline, and ends up writing in flashbacks and awkward "hip" moments like R Sinclair was referring to.

I always hear stories, and interviews with soap writers who have referenced this, about Santa Barbara's glory days, and that the outlines were atrocious, but the script writing team was so strong, they really got to fill in the blanks of the horrible breakdowns with all of those wonderful Capwell dinner conversations, the Mason/Julia cerebral bantering, etc.

[sudz4u]

Yet try as he might, Patrick M. just can't seem to win Brad that coveted Emmy...

[Y&RWorldTurner]

All he does it write dialogue for B&B.

I know he wrote outlines in addition to scripts at SB, GL, and GH.

Since B&B is only a half hour show and doesn't use traditional outlines, all Mulcahey does is write scripts.

B&B will never win an Emmy for writing, but that's another story.

[Sylph]

Because his B&B scripts suck more often than not.

[sudz4u]

But isn't he the most genius scriptwriter ever?

[Sylph]

To some. To me - no. GH-ers beat him every single day.

[Khan]

Because, look at what he has to work with (says the Patrick Mulcahey apologist, lol). Put aside the fact that, for the most part, B&B's cast is one of the weaker ones right now. As unfocused as SANTA BARBARA could be sometimes, the show still possessed amazing, multi-layered characters, like Mason, Julia, Gina, Keith, CC and Sophia, Lionel and Augusta, and so forth. With the exceptions of Stephanie and Pam, B&B's characters are bland and insipid by comparison.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

There's only so much good scripwriting can go when you're dealing with B&B stories and characters.

[sudz4u]

A story I'd love to hear!

[Y&RWorldTurner]

The GH scriptwriters should be head-writing that show. I'll never understand why say Michele Val Jean settles for writing scripts to Guza's shitty stories.

JFP should've given Val Jean and Korte more time before firing them in favour of bringing McTavish to GH.