Santa Barbara Discussion Thread

[DRW50]

Thanks for letting us know that's actually Nina! I certainly envy you, as Brenda and Nina are two of the reasons I was drawn into Y&R back in the day. Nina was such a unique, classic beauty, she should have been in the days of 40's Hollywood.

I wish I could see more of Angela. The little I've seen of her is saddled with Warren. He comes across to me like a huge ass in those scenes. Did you enjoy her more with Ted and CC? Was she alone at the end?

[juniorz1]

I'm too tired to get started on it Carl so I'll go into more detail later. I really liked her with Warren and the Dobsons were poising her to be a new, different leading lady on SB and it would have worked.

On comes Pam Long and the character/relationship with Warren was destroyed. Long did everything she could to make Angela look like a bitch or a fool, but Arvesen is in a class of her own and certainly kept her dignity.

Her best pairing, however, was with Ted, which is who she SHOULD have ended up with. Those two had chemistry on par with A & Marcy, only it was a more overtly sexual chemistry, like B&B's Thorne & Brooke.

But yes, Angela sadly ended up alone.

[DRW50]

That's a shame. I guess Arvesen may not have been OTT enough for Long. She reminds me a little of Rebecca Hollen, and Long didn't write for her either. You'd think Rauch would have loved her.

[DRW50]

Sorry if this has already been discussed but I read that the show was eventually planning to put JW's Warren with CG's Kelly. Did that ever happen? Or was she fired before that point? Did they ever try him with ED's Kelly?

[Wendy]

CG's Kelly, IIRC, was fired shortly before JW's Warren even aired. Or, maybe just after he debuted. But I know CG was gone just as JW's Warren came on canvas. I also don't remember any true scenes with ED's Kelly with him, either. If anything, ED's Kelly was tested (and failed miserably with) Stephen Nichols' zen therapist Skylar Gates. Nichols didn't last long. Wrong role.

ED's Kelly seemed to be a chemistry void whereas CG's was a chemistry magnet with every male. The only guy ED's Kelly seem to click a little with was her final pairing with Charles Grant's Connor McCabe. But Carrington clicked with whichever guy Kelly loved that day, a blessing and curse since her chemistry with everyone had the writers make Kelly into a fickle flake. (I loved her short flirtation with Peter Love's Ric Castillo just prior to Robert, frankly. But then Kelly/Robert took off...) The Dobsons seriously made a huge mistake firing CG because, to them, she looked "too young for all that Kelly had been through". As I have said elsewhere, I found that very ironic since Carrington Garland was actually two years older than Robin Wright.

And, as I said here and elsewhere before, I kind of liked that ED failed as Kelly after basically insulting CG's version by saying Kelly's IQ would finally go up in her first SOW interview after she was hired.

Then again, there is not much the Dobsons did right during their second stint.

[DRW50]

If SB had gone on I wonder if they would have brought Carrington back.

I have asked this before but I read somewhere that they were thinking of bringing Robert Newman on, although perhaps not to be paired with Kim Zimmer. Do you know anything about that? I know he'd already been on once, as Kirk Cranston, so I assume it would have been a new character.

They never did have any plans for Jodie/Cruz, they just had them as a brief relationship from long ago, right?

[Wendy]

I think A Martinez leaving caught everyone off guard since there was this interview with Pam Long who says she would never had taken the SB job if she knew A Martinez was going to leave. So my guess is, she did want to do something with Cruz and Jodie but, again, that is just my guess.

I have not heard about Robert Newman returning to the show at all. As for Carrington Garland returning, that would have been great, but again, I doubt TIIC would have admitted to that mistake even if SB went on.

BTW, come to think of it, ED's SOW interview did allude to the fact that she was supposed to cross paths with JW's Warren (I never heard of CG's Kelly doing so), but it never seemed to come to be on screen unless I blocked scenes out, which is certainly possible since ED's Kelly (and JW's Warren, IMO!) were not exactly memorable.

[DRW50]

There's a Digest blurb from around the time Wagner was about to start where they mention him crossing paths with Cassie, and CG Kelly, and I think someone else. I'm not sure.

I'm trying to remember if there was an interview where Karen Moncrieff complained about what the show did to her character.

[Matt]

I've always wondered what the new opening/theme song for 'Santa Barbara' was going to be like. It was announced that it was in the works and was happening, but then the cancellation was announced & the new opening never appeared.

[MissLlanviewPA]

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I love these closing credits here. Great scenery, perhaps the longest version of the theme online (aside from that 3-4 minute long CD cut [i'm assuming--it's on the Television Tunes site, along with an 80s TV Themes site]), and I like how some of the background notes are emphasized in a way that I haven't really heard on some of the other versions.

This really is one of my favorite soap themes of all time .

Also, does anyone have any idea when these credits might have aired? Pam Long and Paul Rauch's names are in there, so it was somewhere near the end of the run.

Edited March 5, 2012 by MissLlanviewPA

[Wendy]

I never knew SB was supposed to get a new opening.

I'm kind of glad that never had the chance to happen. The opening was one of the last (pathetic) reminders of what the show used to be before Pam Long and Paul Roach...er, Rauch...annihilated it. Memory association, if you will. And it had that "California" vibe to a T.

[Matt]

It always amazes me that Joe Harnell who wrote the Santa Barbara theme song also did the themes to "The Bionic Woman", "The Incredible Hulk", and the original "V". Harnell also did all the background music for Bionic Woman & Hulk included the famed "Lonely Man" closing theme from Incredible Hulk.

[juniorz1]

Though the Dobsons created the character, Rauch was instrumental in her hiring as well. The funny thing is that she was hired at the same time as John Beck (David Raymond) and Terri Garber (Suzanne Collier). Beck & Garber were the ones being heavily promoted in the soap rags, but Arvesen was the only one who's character worked and she took off. That said, she was written for by Long (the Ted/Angela pairing DID happen under their watch) but she wasn't driving story like she was under the Dobsons.

That said, Nina herself recently told me that, had NBC continued SB, she'd have re-signed her contract when it came up for renewal (which I believe would have been in the summer of '93)

Oh yes. They had BIG plans for Jodie & Cruz, but that would have been just as bad, if not worse, than his pairing with ED's Kelly. I've said it before and I'll say it again- if they were going to pair him with Kelly, the only chance it had of working was with CG (or Robin Wright but that wasn't ever gonna happen) in the role. And the ONLY character that and actress on the canvas that it would have worked with and made sense with was Julia. NLG & A Martinez always had chemistry to spare and if Marcy Walker were ever to return (had SB survived), the ensuing Eden/Cruz/Julia story would have written itself. And it would have tugged at the heartstrings of the audience.

You didn't block it out, though you're right about ED's Kelly and JW's Warren (well, actually, he was fine initially with the Mason rivalry and Angela pairing, but Sydney Penny's BJ realllly dragged him down).

Oh and Carl- you're not imagining things either. It was speculated and hinted in the press that the show was gonna do a Warren/Kelly pairing, but that was before Carrington Garland, Louise Sorel, and Shell Danielson were fired. It wouldn't have worked with Eileen Davidson and without Augusta. Plus, since they had to give ED a principal role to get her, I have a feeling that pairing her with A Martinez was discussed as well.

By the way Wendy, I'm SO with you on that ED interview in SOW- do you have it still? I'd love to read it again. As for her IQ comment, much as I hated her, she didn't originate it. The soap press had a field day with her hiring and both SOD & Michael Logan's TV Guide column made the exact same statements before Davidson even aired.

The thing about Davidson's Kelly was that, not only did she not have any romantic chemistry with her leading men, but she didn't have any chemistry with ANYONE on the show. It was almost like Kelly wasn't even a Capwell anymore because she just didn't fit with Judith McConnell, Jed Allan, or Gordon Thomson. Michael Brainard was fine with all of them (except Davidson of course). Plus, she didn't even click with Nancy Grahn in the few scenes they shared.

The ONLY character and actor she had an ounce of chemistry with was Forry Smith's Reese Walker (the only interesting one in that clan) but the show never went there.

And again, I'm with you that in the end, Carrington Garland (and her fans) got the last laugh. ED was a total flop in the role and she, Rauch, the Dobsons, and the soap press all had egg on their faces after the horrible way they all treated her.

[DRW50]

I wonder if they would have had Reese leave and Cruz would have been with Jodie, father to BJ, and stepfather to the son (blanking on his name). What did you think of him? I've only seen a bit of him (Eric Close), in the BJ story clips. He seems OK.

I've heard people at TWOP say that John Beck also had chemsitry with no one. I wonder if it's just because there was so much upheaval at that point.

I've never "gotten" Terri Garber - she was weak on Dynasty, and I wasn't a huge fan of her ATWT character, although I guess we weren't supposed to. I've never seen her work as Suzanne. I mostly wonder if she had that long curly red hair which Marcy Walker had the wig for - wasn't that Suzanne? Every time I've seen Garber she had short-ish hair.

[Wendy]

No, I don't! But it shows how much that awful IQ line stuck with me, huh?

I believe you when saying that Michael Logan may have talked about Kelly's IQ, but ED was the first I had read of it, and maybe it did not translate well in text, to give ED the benefit of the doubt, but her remark about it to me sounded so...snide! And I don't even exactly recall WHEN in '91 ED was hired, as I would love to look up the old issue on eBay.

To this day, it galls me that the show let CG go for ED. And, you're right, ED clicked with no one. She maybe had a glimmer with Charles Grant's Connor, but certainly nothing to write home about.