Ryan's Hope Discussion Thread

[DRW50]

Huh. I had forgotten a lot of the buildup to his exit. Or I just ignored it.

I wonder how much involvement Claire Labine had in any of that. His actual death was in the writers strike, and she seemed shocked and annoyed by it when she was interviewed years later. I hated the story (MAMA HELP ME) but I was glad to see him go. Nothing against Michael Corbett, just hated the character and what he represented, in terms of women. The only thing I liked about him was when he danced with Delia.

[DRW50]

April 1977 TV Day Stars

[DRW50]

I've been meaning to do this for ages but have never felt like it or got around to it. This is some of the SOD recaps of 1982 RH. 1982 is the only year that has, aside from one St. Patrick's Day episode, been almost totally unavailable (none on Soapnet and none on Youtube).

There are already synopses of 1982 posted here, but these are a little more detailed.

I'm going to try to post these in order. This is just what I have now. If I ever get any others from 1982 I will add them. And the Digest recaps are, I believe, about 2 weeks behind the episodes airing at the time of this date.

Sorry for cluttering up the board, and for the poor quality of the scans.

March 16 and March 30, 1982.

[DRW50]

April 27 and May 11.

[DRW50]

May 25 and June 8.

[DRW50]

June 22 and July 6.

[DRW50]

July 20 and August 3.

Edited July 4, 2011 by CarlD2

[DRW50]

[KMan101]

Thanks, Carl.

I always loved Ryan's Hope reruns.

Having never seen 1982, what did folks think of Patrick James Clarke as Pat?

[DRW50]

Thanks for reading. I have some more, I was just taking a break for a few hours.

I don't know what people thought of him. He seemed like a random hunk type to me, in the one episode I saw of 1982. It was obvious the show had no idea what to do with Pat, which, frankly, they never did, even in the 70's. That's one of the reasons I think it was untrue that recasting Pat ruined the character. There really was no character to ruin.

[DRW50]

August 31.

[DRW50]

I'm not totally sure of the dates here but I think it's late September through early November.

December 21, 1982.

[DRW50]

This is from early 1983 but covers some stuff not seen anywhere. February 15, 1983.

This is all I have at the moment, but I'm sure someone else has more.

[KMan101]

Thanks Carl

And yeah, I agree, they never knew what to do with Pat. I always liked Malcolm Groome the best. You're right in that Patrick James Clark was just another 'hunk' ... I don't believe he lasted long? Didn't Groome return in 1983?

[DeliaIrisFan]

Thanks for this. I definitely have never seen anything this detailed on the 1982 stories.

A lot of it sounds interesting, if a bit off for Ryan's Hope. I don't know what to make of Mary Ryan Munisteri as a writer - in some ways, it's a shame that she seemingly was never really groomed to take over by Labine and Mayer, but rather stepped into that role without warning when they were pushed out by the network. Agnes Nixon stayed on in some capacity at both of her shows - at least for a while, in OLTL's case - while her sub-writers assumed progressively more responsibility. Munisteri did bring some new ideas, some of which sound like they could have added something to the show, and it seems like she did a better job of integrating the new elements with the existing characters than the mid-80s writers did (I guess she couldn't have done much worse). But with no one more experienced on hand to smooth over the rough edges, it must have seemed kind of jarring.

I would so love to be able to see the scene of Delia arguing that faking a suicide attempt is proof of being unfit for motherhood! The irony may well have been intentional on Munisteri's part, as she was with the show from the beginning, but unless some nuance got lost in the recap, it seems like the fact that Pat was Kim's intended mark just as he had been Delia's when she herself pulled that trick never registered for Delia. I think it would have - not in a purely selfless or entirely rational way, and in fact maybe just to reaffirm her dislike of Kim as a way of justifying what she already was planning to do. But I guess the new writers were trying so hard to shoehorn Delia into some sort of Alexis Carrington-esque role that they overlooked her roots.

I didn't realize Maureen Garrett's EJ stayed on for so long after her and Roger's aborted wedding. It sounds like she might as well have left then, if her material was as uninteresting on the air as the recap made it sound. It's too bad the character didn't work out, for a lot of reasons - none of which had to do with MG, who is one of the best actresses daytime has ever had. She came on as an ill-conceived character when the show already was on shaky ground, and then all of the backstage turmoil happened. She could have fit in really well with this company, I think, with a character that was actually integral.

I'm glad Maeve and Johnny had something to do during this lost era when I've so often heard that the show was overrun by newcomers with few if any ties to the core family, but the dancing story sounds kind of isolated and inconsequential. I also had no idea Siobhan and Johnny clashed so badly over Joe. But even when Johnny was at his harshest here, it sounds like he still didn't bring up Mary's murder as a reason for hating Joe. The show really swept that under the rug at this time, trying to reinvent Joe and Siobhan as RH's answer to Luke and Laura. Anyway, I'm not sure the friction with Johnny rings true, though. Originally, of course, Siobhan had always been closer to Johnny while Maeve took exception to just about everything Siobhan did. It would have been more interesting if Maeve was the one who couldn't bear the thought of Siobhan reconciling with Joe when it was their relationship that got her beloved Mary killed, and Maeve went off to her dancing as an escape from her continued grief over Mary's death and her repressed anger at Siobhan for her involvement.

The Mitch character and Karen Morris Gowdy's Faith seem like they would have been the weirdest couple ever. It could have been a fiery, opposites-attract dynamic, except I can't picture her sparring with anyone.

I didn't realize that Seneca's mother appeared in the '80s. I wonder who played her? Probably not Gale Sondergaard. IMDB was no help, but they do have a record of another actress playing her after GS in the late '70s, which I do vaguely remember. I had no idea that Jill and Seneca ever were romantically involved again after their divorce either - I guess that explains why

I think originally, the point was that Pat was someone who didn't quite know who he was, himself - he had always been the middle child, always in Frank's shadow but going with the flow and not actively challenging his family like Siobhan and Mary did, in part because of sexist double-standards but also in part because he was lost in the shuffle of a large family. I thought that was a believable dynamic and MG played it well. Then when Pat saw what a hypocrite his brother was and felt like he was the only one in the family who wasn't going to go along with whatever Frank wanted to do, he turned to self-destructive things to cope - first Delia when she was at her most toxic and then, when he got in over his head with her, to drugs. I do think the recasting hurt the character, or rather the fact that the character never fully moved beyond that downward spiral while Malcolm Groome was still in the role. Ilene Kristen and Kate Mulgrew also left around the same time, when that first cycle of contracts came up, and they too were recast - with different levels of success - but Mary and Delia both got a sort of closure with the original actresses in the roles. Whatever happened after the recasts (not much better than what happened to Pat as far as the Mary recasts, and mixed results with the Delia recasts) the original arcs could kind of stand on their own. Whatever growth the writers may have planned for Pat, the recasts weren't up for playing it, and then I think the show didn't know what to do with him.