Santa Barbara Discussion Thread

[Xanthe]

Wasn't Mary McKinnon's "death" also from falling off a boat? 

[Beach Climber]

That sounds dumb but I don’t recall a lot of those homes having kitchen sets. I know the Capwell mansion did but I’m struggling to come up with others that we saw. Normally, we just had the living room and bedroom sets for most of the houses. 

One thing I always see is that the biggest misstep on the show was killing off Mary. Admittedly I don’t feel the same connection that others do to Mary because I started watching SB after she died so I only saw her scenes for the first time during this rewatch I’m doing. Had they kept her, what direction could they have gone with her character?

She was so earnest and good which doesn’t always make for an interesting soap character and I could see Lane getting bored with the happy relationship and family story since he later did with Mason/Julia. 

[Marissa Gallant]

Yep.

[Marissa Gallant]

There would have been another long, loooonnnnggg custody battle. 

There was a lot more to it than Lane got bored. Lane was always upset that they fired Harley and has been vocal about it. But there was also the break up between Lane and Nancy.

[amybrickwallace]

@Marissa Gallant, I found these images of Judith McConnell through the years. Enjoy!!

Please register in order to view this content

[Marissa Gallant]

Aw, she was so under utilized on this show. I'm obsessing over the McKinnons right now to give Lex a chance to catch up with me. 

So, I've been doing one episode a day. 

[Lex S]

That's kind of you! I figured, with your new job, you would have slowed down anyway! 

I'm about where Robin Mattson takes over, so still quite a ways away

Also, GH fans over here - how many times did Robin Mattson return as Heather Webber?

Edited September 8, 2021 by Lex S
Spelling

[Marissa Gallant]

Well, the new job is. Odd. They thought they had a huge backlog which I fixed in 7 business days. So, now it's about a half day of mundane and half trying to stay busy. Everyone there watches tv on their phones. Everyone. 

That said, I'm enjoying the McKinnons on AW. Same story, played much differently. And during down times I write. Which the new supervisor literally tells me to do. It's beyond weird.

Can't answer your GH questions. 

[Marissa Gallant]

Here's the problem with second viewing. I don't know how I would have felt about Mason and Mary if I didn't know about the giant C in their future. It's hard to invest myself in heartbreak. But watching the scenes where Mary tells Mason about the baby, and seeing his pure joy are really hard when you know. He has clearly wanted a child since the beginning of the show, and it ends like that? Total suckage

[amybrickwallace]

I still wonder exactly why Harley Kozak was fired. She was clearly popular and the Mary character still had so much untapped potential. 

All that said, those final scenes were absolutely incredible. It's no wonder people still remember them over 35 years later.

[j swift]

It seems like it has been always been a debate whether or not she quit or she was fired, because she certainly went on to high profile work in films soon after her departure.  I've read people say that she didn't want to come back and that was why the ending was so final.  But, as all fans are well aware, we never know how those decisions are truly made, and whether the actor or the production initiates that discussion.

However, from a structural point of view the character of Mary had been written into a corner.  I vaguely recall that she was pregnant by either by Mason or Mark after her rape.  Given the times, a paternity story for a nun would have been unseemly and that child would have extended Mark's story which rightfully ended after his trial.  The much later comeuppance for Mark was a creative failure and very unpopular in the soap press.

Her family was mostly written out by the time she died and given that they could hardly balance the Capwells and Lockridges, there was little need for a third family..  There were no church characters to create conflict with her religious background.   CC liked her, so there was no conflict to mine with the Capwell family. 

If they had expounded upon her nursing background and made her a medical professional, there may have been some story potential, given how often people fell into comas in Santa Barbara.  Yet, Kelly and Eden cornered the market on women in peril stories, so she was redundant in that regard.

So, the only story would have been Mason constantly sinning and repenting, which would have gotten very old very fast.  And, Mason would not have survived as a source of conflict if he settled down in the second year of the show.

Thus, it seems like there was no where else to go, but off the roof.

Edited September 10, 2021 by j swift

[Beach Climber]

I think it was mainly because they didn’t know what else to do with her character after the initial SLs, which seemed to be a trend with a lot of characters. Lane’s comments about her departure also suggest that part of the reason she was let go was that they didn’t know what to write for her while he was on vacation. He used to take the summers off so they would have needed to come up with a storyline for Mary while he was gone. I don’t think they wrote his absences in very well. 

[Soaplovers]

So I rewatched the Locher room...and Harley said she was let go from the show.  Apparently, she had only signed a one year contract and it was coming up for renewal.  And renewing it would have also come with a raise.  

Apparently New World (I assume owners of SB) were looking to cut costs...and this was decided as her one year contract was coming up for renewal.  And she didn't know she was being let go till right before her death scenes were to be filmed.  And she asked if her departure would be memorable and the EP said 'oh yeah'.

I did hear the show wanted her to come back later and she turned them down...except for that one episode where she came back as an angel?

I think Mary's death shattered Mason...and was part of the reason he and Julia never could make it work..till 1992 (but with a new Mason..and I think GT's Mason and Julia were more romantic and end game vs Lane Davis' Mason..who kind of viewed Julia as beneath him).

[Wendy]

I think @j swift perfectly encapsulated just why Mary had to go. Looking back, maybe they could have made Mary more empowered, but even that was already happening with Eden, Julia, and Gina. As it is a soap, the only real stories for Mary were probably more "damsel in distress" stories, i.e. kidnapping or whatnot. She was already in the midst of "Who's The Daddy?" when she died.

And as sweet as Mary was, I doubt she would have cheated on Mason [unless drugged or something]. IMO, as popular as Mary was and as great as Harley Kozak was, Mary being so honorable really limited her. She was, excuse me for saying it, too sweet/virtuous for her own good, as far as soap characters went. It shortened the character's potential and shelf life.

[Liberty City]

Lane Davies has said, on multiple occasions, that when portraying Mason he always kept the role kind of emotionally unavailable for anyone post-Mary.

Robin Mattson appeared as Heather Webber from 1980–1983, 2004 and finally from 2012–2016.