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April 15, 2003 Vol. 28, No. 15

WRITE NOW

by Stephanie Sloane

DAYS OF OUR LIVES’ new head writer, Dena Higley, reveals her plans to revitalize Salem

It’s a tricky time DAYS OF OUR LIVES. The 37-year-old sudser is in negotiations with NBC to stay on the air past 2004, as it struggles along with the rest of the daytime line-up to hang on to viewers. It has had three head writers in two years; Executive Producer Ken Corday recently promoted Dena Higley from the writing staff to the top spot. Here, the scribe unveils her Salem blueprint.

Digest: How would you describe your vision of DAYS?

Dena Higley: “Romance. Everybody’’s in love, but not everybody’’s happy. When Bo looks at Hope, that’’s how we all want a man to look at us. Like the sun rises and sets in you. That, to me, is the essence of all soap operas: the look. What you try to do is build as many stories that can include that look as possible. I try to ask myself this every day: If I were going to turn on DAYS, what would I want to see and why after watching this episode would I want to tune in tomorrow?”

Digest: What was your first order of business when you took over in January?

Higley: “The first thing I did was try to tie up some stories and, at the same time, start new ones, which was a little bit tricky because really good story structure in soap opera is, as you’re finishing one story, you’re in the middle of another and the beginning of a third. I didn’t have that when I started. It wasn’t ideal, but you have to rise to the challenge.”

Digest: What’s the most important lesson you’ve learned on the writing side?

Higley: “I think it is to be true to your own vision. I have seen writers know what was the right thing to do and then be talked out of it and have it be a big mistake. I’ve seen other head writers know what the right thing was to do and not back down and actually be threatened. So, I think the biggest mistake is to be given a vision and to be talked out of it.”

Digest: Do you want to add new characters?

Higley: “Not at this point. We want to be more specific in what we have. Our plates are more than full.”

Digest: Do you have a message for fans who are dissatisfied with the show?

Higley: “I don’’t blame you. I hope you stick it out and if you stopped, revisit us and I think we’’ll make it worth your while.”

PREVIEW!

Here’’s what Higley has planned for your favorite characters in the months ahead.

Bo/Hope: “What you’’ll see with Bo and Hope is a revisiting of both of their characters. We’re stepping away from the victimization of Hope and building her more as a viable person in and of herself. Bo will go through a very big life change and is going to revisit his past. It’s not a midlife crisis, it’s a crisis of faith. He gets on the motorcycle, takes off and goes in search of answers. Eventually, Hope will join him and they will take on the world together. I don’t want to see them break up. I don’t think anyone in the universe wants to see them break up.”

John/Marlena: “John and Marlena are going to be finishing up this whole storyline with her being the mother of the twins, and there’s a big twist coming up that will take them –– and I think everybody –– by surprise. I’’m really couching what I’m saying because I’m afraid of giving away too much. But it’s not what you think. Of course, the whole thing escalates between Tony and John to the point where it looks like one of them would actually kill the other. Then, this twist will come out and that will answer everybody’s questions and move them off into something else.”

Shawn/Belle: “I am rebuilding them as a relatable couple. When they disagree, I don’t want it to come from stupid misunderstandings. One of the things we’re going to do with all these kids –– that’s what we call them –– is make them viable 23-, 24-year-olds by the end of summer so that they’re our young adults. You can tell more interesting story that way. Belle and Shawn are also going to be involved in a triangle this summer, but you will still want them to get together.”

Brady/Chloe: “Well, I have to do something [about Chloe leaving]. I am so concerned about the Chloe contingency and the fan base that she has. I want to be careful to honor their feelings. So, after Nadia [bjorlin, Chloe] departs, we’re going to be moving toward a Brady and Nicole story in the summer. [Their portrayers are] married in real life, so it should be interesting. It will be very different in texture. It’’ll be our hot, sweaty, summer story. To me, Nicole and Victor have no business being married, so it’’s a story about salvation and redemption.”

Abe/Sami/Brandon/Lexie: “I really feel strongly that we need to finish up the whole Abe/Lexie/Sami/Brandon square. That will sort of culminate with the birth of the baby, which will happen around May sweeps. The fact that Sami switched the paternity tests and the fact that there is a special connection between Brandon and Abe will come.”

Jack/Jennifer: “They will get married. As far as their talk show, some of the guests will be from Salem, some of them will be from the real world and we’re sort of going to blur the line between fact and fantasy, play with reality and break down the fourth wall a little bit. Because I’ve been in the business for so long, I want to try new things.”

Roman/Kate: “We’’ll bring them together in a really fun way where they’’ll have to make public declarations of love for each other. It’s a mature love story that I think is going to be very charming because the actors are so dynamite.”

Lucas: “Lucas is going to work for Tony, to become his right-hand man. We’re building up Tony more as a crime boss, not related in any story way to Stefano anymore, but being his own man. Of course, Sami will cross between that and her own Brandon/Abe/Lexie story. Already we’’re laying in that there’s unfinished business between Lucas and Sami.”

Rex/Cassie: “We’’ll see Rex developing this edge and turning into what I hope is a really good-looking guy who’s bad. I think that will be fun for our female audience to see. Cassie’s intelligence is geared more toward, ‘‘What can my intelligence get me in life? Can it get me a boyfriend? Can it get me people to love me?’’ She’s very open with what she wants.”

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25348266/

‘Days of Our Lives’ tackles autism

Head writer draws on her own experience in groundbreaking story arc

TODAY

updated 12:15 p.m. ET, Tues., June. 24, 2008

The trials and triumphs of a real-life autistic child are being mirrored in a summer plotline on the much-loved NBC soap opera “Days of Our Lives.” The serial’s head writer, Dena Higley — who raised an autistic child — wrote a dramatic story arc in which DOOL characters Abe and Lexie Carver must confront powerful feelings when their son Theo is diagnosed with the disorder.

“We’re telling the profound and life-altering story of a child with autism from his parents’ point of view,” Higley explained. “Their pain, their struggle — and ultimately, their ability to find life-affirming hope in the midst of learning how to live day to day with this disability.”

Higley and show staff have partnered with the advocacy group Autism Speaks to ensure the storyline contains realism and sensitivity. But Higley needs little coaching. She and husband Mark found out their son Connor suffered from autism — a brain disorder thwarting a person’s ability to communicate, and often marked by extreme behavior — at age 3, the same age at which fictional Theo is diagnosed.

The show aims to not only make a compelling storyline that viewers of the 42-year-old soap will be keen to follow, but also to raise awareness of the common but complex disorder that afflicts one in 150 children in the U.S.

Says NBC’s senior vice president of daytime and drama programming Bruce Evans: “We are hopeful that this storyline will serve as a resource for our viewers, many of whom have already been touched by this critical issue.”

Drawn from life

Higley told TODAY’s Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb the storyline she’s written for Abe and Lexie — played by veteran DOOL cast members James Reynolds and Renee Jones — echoes the struggles she and husband Mark went through in finding their equilibrium through Connor’s challenging condition.

“I pulled out actual dialogue my husband and I had and put it on paper,” Higley said. “You take a position — if you don’t feel your husband is intense enough, you get overly intense. If you’re a husband and you feel like your wife is getting a little too crazy, you dial it down. So nobody’s feeling what they want to feel.

“That’s the story that we’re telling.”

This is far from the first time daytime drama has addressed a real-life social issue. In 1983, “All My Children” broke ground by introducing one of daytime’s first openly gay characters. An interracial couple got married onscreen on “General Hospital” in 1987, and an AIDS patient had a romance storyline on AMC in the late ’80s.

More social issues surfaced on soaps in the ’90s, including drug addiction (Susan Lucci’s character on AMC), alcoholism (“The Young and the Restless”), cancer, homophobia, racism and more. But Higley’s DOOL storyline may be an unprecedented opportunity to present the challenges of autism realistically in daytime drama.

For actress Jones, 49, portraying on camera what is essentially Higley’s real life has been an eye-opening, educational experience — she admitted she “didn’t know anything about autism” going into the story arc. But through talking with Higley and Autism Speaks founders Suzanne and Bob Wright, she found her acting voice.

“I didn’t realize the emotional toll that it takes on a family,” Jones said. “As an actor, to get in there and feel all those feelings — you have the fear, you have the frustration, the overwhelming grief and devastation.”

A welcome opportunity

As for Reynolds, one of Hollywood’s most active volunteers in charitable works, the 62-year-old actor relishes the opportunity to showcase a widespread family dilemma through his acting on “Days.”

“There are a lot of things that mask the symptoms,” Reynolds told Gifford and Kotb. “You can think he’s just a little off or a little slow.” He adds that the important message is that “there are ways of treating this and going through life with it.”

Indeed, Higley’s son Connor has thrived despite the disorder. A football and track team member, Connor recently graduated from high school, earned a black belt in tae kwon do, and is heading off to college in the fall. And he has blended in with a family that includes his 18-year-old biological sister and adopted siblings from Vietnam and Ethiopia.

“We have a mixed bag, and Connor fits right in,” Higley said on TODAY. “He’s a wonderful, brave, fabulous kid. We don’t cut him any slack and we expect the best out of him.”

Jones adds that for viewers of “Days of Our Lives” who have autistic children, the storyline that begins June 24 will be an opportunity “to have what they’re going through validated in some way.”

http://www.fancast.com/blogs/2010/deep-soap/deep-soap-days-headwriter-dena-higley-i-was-given-a-blank-check/

Deep Soap: ‘Days’ Headwriter Dena Higley: ‘I Was Given A Blank Check’

by Sara Bibel

Apr 28th, 2010 | 7:45 AM | Comments 7

Monday, the ‘Days of Our Lives‘ cast and Powers-That-Be gathered for a cocktail party as part of NBC’s summer press day, an event featuring panels about NBC-Universal’s spring and summer programming. That’s right. The network that was ready to get out of the soap biz now considers DOOL important enough to merit a cocktail party with fancy hors d’oeuvres and an open bar. The official occasion was the show’s 45th anniversary. I spoke with headwriter Dena Higley about her inspiration for Hope’s (Kristian Alfonso’s) surprising new storyline, writing Alice Horton’s (Frances Reid) memorial service and DOOL’s writing process.

Why is Salem going to be sizzling this summer?

Because of couples breaking apart, yearning, coming back together, finding each other, big secrets being revealed, supercouples rediscovering passion, and some surprise bombs dropping.

You are the only daytime soap whose total audience is growing. What do you think the secret to your success is?

I think we have to make people want to watch tomorrow. Why do you want to watch tomorrow? Because you love these people and something’s going to happen and I have to make sure that everything’s going to be okay. We try to make sure everybody’s just a little bit annoyed with us at the end of an episode because if they’re a little bit annoyed, a little bit unsatisfied, then they’ll watch tomorrow. But eventually we want to fill them with satisfaction. And then they start it up again.

As a viewer, I had one of those,”Wait, what the heck?” moments when Hope’s new storyline about her double life started last week. What is going on with her?

All my favorite storylines come out of just waking up in the middle of the night and going, “I know what I want to do.” It’s not doing research or trying to read books or watch movies. It’s just I woke up and I knew I wanted to tell that Hope storyline and it just fell into place. I picked up the phone, called [Co-Executive Producer] Gary Tomlin, and said, “This is what I want to do.” He’s like,”That’s the craziest idea you’ve ever had, and I love it.” So it came out of the blue. It just hit me that we would have so much fun with Hope because it’s coming out of the kidnapping and the drama with Bo. I think that’s all very relatable to women. You have trouble with your husband and you get angry and what do you do with that anger? What if all of your anger in your life took on a life of its own? What would that look like? I wanted it to be kind of a fun “woo woo” story and at the same time I wanted it to be a relatable woman’s story. I think we’re all going to be cheering because we all can relate, I think. I’ve been angry at a few men in my time.

Do the pills that Hope is taking have anything to do with her double life?

Yes, absolutely. That’s where we’re going. Right before I went to bed I watched something on TV that was talking about that kind of medicinal thing.

Are Hope and Dr. Baker going to become more than alternate life friends?

Not the Hope that loves Bo, but the Hope that’s angry at Bo finds a friend in Dr. Baker (John Callahan) .

What was it like writing Alice Horton’s memorial service?

Tears. Tears. It was so cathartic. I’ve been on the show since 1985. I remember MacDonald Carey (Tom). I remember with sweet fondness Frances. I was given a blank check and [asked],”Dena, who do you want to bring back?” I started making lists and they started making phone calls. People were so generous and gracious to want to come back and pay tribute to her. We wrote the scenes. We cried. It’s like doing a funeral for your most beloved family member. If you could do it perfectly, what would it look like? We’re not one hundred percent,but I think we came pretty close.

What is Days of Our Lives overall writing process?

I write a long story. I send that to my producer and then we talk about it and then I send it to my co-head writer Chris [Whitesell]. We meet with the network and the producers. We agree on where they’re going to go and then once a week we sit down and we break that weekly story into bits and pieces. We have a great staff. They’re awesome.