Santa Barbara Discussion Thread

[j swift]

I think Paula Irvine was a charming actress who was well cast as a scrappy young ingenue.  My problem was that Lily never made sense as a character.  Gina's original backstory was that she adopted Brandon because her husband was older and it was assumed that he had fertility issues.  Then, Lily comes along with questionable motives (was she a grifter?, was she a believer?, was she manipulated by others?, it was never clear). She leaves and is never heard from again for years, then de-SORASed and re-retconned into existence.  I guess after Summer and Mac they had exhausted siblings for Gina.  However Paula's Lily spent so little time with Gina that their connection seemed unnecessary. 

 

In my opinion the most underrated character was Sophia.  She drove the original plot and then was sidelined for years.  Her exchange with Mason regarding Pamela during the Capwell dinner party lives rent free in my head as one of the great scenes in SB history.  The only reason that I stayed tuned in the final year was that Sophia was finally given a plot that made sense with her background.

 

Thus, I totally agree that Brick was a missed opportunity.  He was another one whose motives seemed unclear at first, then he was just portrayed as a good guy.  But, I would have loved to see the dynamics between Sophia's kids with CC and her child with Lionel.  The Brick and Warren rivalry was interesting (for the three episodes that they let that be thing).  The issue in bringing back Brick was that they needed to differentiate him from Warren.  Warren was always a junior Lionel, a womanizer with a romantic flair, always up for a get rich quick scheme, but never wanting to work hard in business.  If Brick sided with Minx to try to drum up some Lockridge business interests that might work.  However, good guy Brick was made redundant by good guy Warren.

 

Meanwhile, I have grown obsessed by my own idea to have Eileen Davidson as Victoria Lane, post Eden.  Victoria was not a well drawn out character aside from her drug abuse.  So, a sober Victoria who wanted to establish a relationship with her child with Cruz, win his trust, and establish herself in Santa Barbara is intriguing.  We would have been spared the odd issue of where Cruz sent his kids in the final year.  It could have established a Cruz vs. Mason issue because Victoria was involved with both of them.  I like the idea of Victoria and Sophia bonding over being aging actresses, or even Sophia being jealous of Victoria's ability to maintain a career in Hollywood.  My fanfic fantasies are overwhelmed with the prospects.

 

Edited June 10, 2021 by j swift

[robbwolff]

 

Lynn Clark was amazing as Lily Light. The character had so much potential, yet was scrapped so quickly. I think she on for only four months. I tell you: the Dobsons were the 1980s version of Brad Bell, introducing characters,  quickly losing interest in them, and then dropping them. There was so much potential with the Duvall/Bassett family in 1985, including the divine Grace Zabriskie as Theda. Yet they were all gone within a few months, with the exception of Mary and we all know what happened to her in the summer of 1986. The Dobsons' lack of commitment to any character who wasn't a Capwell drove me away from Santa Barbara and back to Guiding Light.

[Liberty City]

 

I completely agree and have always stated: the Dobsons, while they may have had a vision for their soap, made a lot of mistakes... especially within their first year or two.

[NothinButAttitude]

^

That seems crazy (their mistakes) because the Dobsons appear to have had a successful run at GL and a semi-decent run at ATWT. Maybe it was because they had checks and balances on the P&G shows that they couldn't change out characters like they did on their own creation. 

 

I just always found it weird how their show bombed so quickly due to them under developing so much of the canvas. 

 

Do you all think SB would've been better had it been 30 minutes versus an hour?

Edited June 11, 2021 by NothinButAttitude

[pdm1974]

That's an interesting question as their cast was often the size of a 30 minute soap versus an hour.

[Soaplovers]

I think having a middle class family come on in the final year was a good idea...to contrast with the Capwells.

 

I just don't think the Walkers were properly integrated with the cast despite the parents knowing Cruz and Santana back in high school.

 

I also think Wanda DeJesus was a good actress, but wasn't Santana...maybe she could have played another Andrade daughter?  

[j swift]

I noted earlier this year that it would be reductive to attribute SB's failure to thrive solely on the creatives in charge.

 

First, it debuted against the first week of the 1984 Summer Olympics on ABC which were a huge ratings draw.  The premiere episode is lavish and provocative, but most people were watching track and field in Los Angeles rather than soaps set in Santa Barbara.  We've all experienced that if a soap isn't established as a habit among viewers, then it will never survive, and SB lost the opportunity to be habit forming because so many people were drawn elsewhere.

 

Then, you have to factor in that NBC historically had a terrible time adding a third hour of soaps to its lineup.  The 1970s are littered with soaps with  interesting premises but failed to attract an audience because NBC could not gain audience support against GH and GL. 

 

Third, soaps overall were down in ratings in 1984.  The Price is Right expanded to an hour and it gave CBS a significant lead in the ratings.  The 1984 Tumblr Soaps of Yesterday, noted that part of Y&R's historic reign at number one was due in part to the lead in of the super successful Price is Right.  Even GH's ratings were down due in part to the popularity of one Miss Reva Shane, as well as the loss of Luke Spencer.

 

The changes in the first year, including recasting Joe, axing the Andradre and Duvall family, and firing many of the original writing staff were in response to a poor start, they did not cause a drop in ratings.

 

Like most things in life you can't blame one thing for a project that is claimed by multiple owners.

Edited June 11, 2021 by j swift

[FrenchBug82]

My first instinct would have been to say that with the benefit of hindsight they probably would have been better off sticking with some of the things they felt were not workings - actors, stories, characters - and work at repairing them, even if it meant the show being rough while this was accomplished - rather than wildly changing directions every six months in a way that made it hard to cultivate loyalty and interest in the audience.

BUT maybe they felt they didn't have the luxury (read: enough support and goodwill for the network) of spending months repairing what they had and instead repeatedly cleaning house abruptly and trying new things was a better way to appease executives and stay on the air?
As J Swift said, while the Dobsons made a lot of bad calls, we do not know ALL the factors that were leading to what was business decisions as much as creative ones.
Overspending at the outset WAS a mistake on their part and that's on them. What follows is probably a muddled mess of complicated motives and interests from the various parties.

[Sapounopera]

 

LG was amazing as Gina. I would have never recast. Linda Gibboney and Ava Lazar were amazing in the beginning of the Brandon story.

(What do we know about Robert Eden?) 

[Liberty City]

I completely agree; replacing Linda Gibboney with Robin Mattson was a mistake. Gibboney embraced the vulnerabilities of Gina.. which became lost in the deceit of Mattson's portrayal.

Plus, Gibboney's work opposite Ava Lazar's Santana was incredible.

 

 

Jane Sibbett said she did not like rehearsing love scenes without a director, and that Richard Eden did, and that's all she would say.

In an interview, she stated: "Richard Eden ... no comment. We didn't get along. I didn't like rehearsing love scenes without a director and he did. Enough said?"

[Soaplovers]

LG's Gina and Eden were a good rivalry.

 

When Robin Mattson took over, whatever strength Santana had was sapped out of her.  When Gina G first took over as Santana..she wasn't so whiny..imho

[FrenchBug82]

That's am impressively classy way to say she was sexually harassed.

 

I mean Gina was my favorite part of SB so it is going to be hard for me to say anything bad about RM. I loved both portrayals... The writing shifted though so that's what I would blame one's preferences on.

[pdm1974]

I remember when  LG was replaced as Gina. I was so upset even at a young are, but RM more than won me over. Gina and Keith were magic!

[Chris 2]

GH may have been down about 10% since the Luke and Laura days, but it was still very healthy in 1984. As was GL.

 

The bigger problem at that time was that viewers were slowly leaving the three network world with the advent of cable. And there wasn’t necessarily the audience available for three soaps airing at the same time anymore. The only way that SB was going to grow was at the expense of its timeslot competitors. And there wasn’t much leftover soap audience for them.

 

I do think there could have been an audience for a soap that aired at 4:00 pm rather than 3:00. But the affiliates weren’t going to give back that hour because it was so lucrative for them with syndicated shows. And to launch a show like SB in syndication wouldn’t have worked because local stations were simply not patient enough to give a soap time to grow without the network’s muscle behind it, and also didn’t want to risk the lead in for their local news shows.

[Liberty City]

 

It really was. And I think Sibbett was trying to not bad-mouth her former co-stars, which she admitted she didn't want to do later on in the interview.

 

 

To me, they both play different Gina DeMotts.

 

 

Santa Barbara was always competed against other networks; had NBC maybe aired it during a time when soaps were not airing it could have faired better. Plus, I'm not sold that NBC was the right network, either.