James Harmon Brown & Barbara Esensten: The Verdict

[dragonflies]

They didn't cause any damage, I can't agree with that. They pretty much damaged every character on the show. Whitewashing their own writing is pretty damaging to the show as well.

I think the ONLY thing they did right was how they've written Erica(not always good) overall

[R Sinclair]

Who's been damaged? Nobody on this show has done anything that can't be taken back or has ultimately changed the character forever (such as McTavish's versions of Ryan "I AM THAT MONSTER" Lavery, Tad torturing Madden, Babe stealing Bianca's baby and kidnapping Little A, Bianca's rape, Eric Kane willingly giving 14 year old Erica to a pedophile movie star, Erica's unabortion...). The only character who suffered any "damage" during B&E's tenure is Greenlee due to CRASH... but wait a minute, she's been, what was it? "Whitewashed" was it? Yeah, she's been "whitewashed" so by definition, she's no longer showing signs of damage, either.

I'm with Jack... they didn't cause any damage. No big decisions were made that altered the course of Pine Valley forever. And I'm ecstatic that there weren't any vampires.

[Greg's GL]

I caught a couple of eppys of AMC when they started out, but wasn't that impressed. IA with others that their first year at GL with Paul Rauch was fantastic. Campy, but still a good show. Obviously, their crowning achievement was the evolution of Annie Dutton to queen bitch of Springfield. Their attempt to bring her back as "Teri DeMarco" was ill-conceived and I always thought Rauch had more to do with that than B&E (don't know why - just my personal opinion).

If I remember correctly, the dialogue was good under them as well until about the last year. Their tenure at GL for me I would give them a B. Mostly for Annie and some of the Reva Clone stuff (GLisNo1 - I actually liked that story too). JMHO.

[LeClerc]

First of all R Sinclair you rock!

Second, I think there's a tendancy to not give B&E credit for anything good that happened, and attribute everything bad that happened to them because then people can convince themselves that things will actually change once they are gone from the credits. Zendall will be written the way Zendall fans want them to be, the Crash story won't be whitewashed anymore etc. Everything bad will be gone because it was all B&E (I will never believe that the re-writing of how Spike lost his hearing was their voluntary idea) and everything good will remain because that was everyone else.

Getting back to the overall point of the thread:

B&E had some great stuff during their runs: the Loving murders; the last few months of "The City", the first year of GL and some of the other stuff they did there like Selena, Lizzie's leukemia, Abigail's cochlear implant...the Daniel Coulson story on OLTL, which they were involved with.

Nothing good to say about Port Charles

At AMC I would highlight the initial emotional fallout from Crash. Heck, I can even see how, on paper in its original form (before the re-write to accomodate Rebecca Budig's return) the story would have seemed like a good idea.

I am extremely grateful to them for bringing Angie and Jesse back. I didn't see Megan McTavish bring them back, I didn't see Lorraine Broderick bring them back, Agnes Nixon didn't do it when she was headwriter, nor did Jean Passanante or Richard Culliton or Rayfield & Cascio. Esensten & Brown did.

Which brings me to another positive thing about them: they aren't scared of black characters. They aren't scared of social issues, they aren't scared of minorities. Over their careers they did stories on racism (Angie's desire to adopt a girl who happened to be white, The City), the transgender experience (Aszure, The City), child molestation (Jocelyn, The City), cochlear implants (GL and AMC), breast cancer (Tess, The City), honour killings (PC), among others.

All their shows have made diversity a priority. And there are not many soap writers that can be said about. And we can say goodbye to diversity and social issues when the Prattster arrives.

They also (under Rauch's leadership) saved GL's life back in '97.

So it hasn't been all bad. I'm sure I've used the word hack to describe them multiples times over the past several months, but that's not really fair. I really do think they have the right overall framework. They just aren't very good storytellers.

[brimike]

FANTASTIC POST, LECLERC! I absolutely agree with you. In the grand scheme of head writers, E&B are somewhere in the middle. They're certainly not the devil incarnate, nor do I consider them "hacks". They've had successful stories (and horrible ones) at all the shows they've worked at. Much of their ten months at AMC were problematic, but four months of that were hijacked by the strike, and even though they were still writing during the strike after going fi-core, the whole thing clearly took its toll on them and their work suffered for it. They had a great start, then really started to go downhill... but the strike totally exacerbated the freefall. They've managed to pull it together in time for May Sweeps, but it just wasn't enough... and then you combine that with Frons' friend Chuck wanting a job, and the need for ABC to find a scapegoat, and the whole thing falls into place.

I'd love to see E&B go back to editing. I loved the dialogue on both OLTL and DAYS when they were on those teams.

[dragonflies]

LOL this kind of stuff kills me, people bitch and moan at how bad McTavish was, but at least she never wrote something that for 6 months told us that this character did this, then rewrite as if it never happened.

THE SHOW WAS DAMAGED, I'm pretty sure I said that already.......6 months of storyline then undone, tell me how that's NOT damaging? It's basically saying, "oh you wasted all this time watching this storyline cause it never really happened"

[brimike]

True, but I'm not buying for a second that was anything else but ABC's kneejerk reaction to their focus groups hating Greenlee. I don't believe for a second E&B wanted to rewrite the long story that got them hired in the first place.

[Toups]

What storyline was this? (I wasn't watching AMC back then)

[Ryan]

The entire "Crash" storyline. With Greenlee kidnapping Spike (while Kendall was going into labor with Ian), but changing her mind and getting into an accident that left Spike deaf and caused Kendall to have a breakdown and try and frame Greenlee while pretending to be her friend.

It was also the reason why Aiden and Greenlee hooked up. Aiden is the only one who stood by Greenlee during this entire story. When Rebecca came back, they rewrote Greenlee being responsible for Spike's deafness by saying he was already going deaf.

[brimike]

Nicely summed up, Ry!

The rewrite was RIDICULOUS. Had Brian Frons written all over it: "We'll get Rebecca back, launch a great campaign dragging Sabine's name through the mud, and then say Greenlee did nothing wrong! The audience won't care!"

[Toups]

Thanks Ryan. I vaguely remember that stuff.

So how do we know the storyline changed?

[dragonflies]

Toupsy basically it was said for six months that Greenlee was responsible for Spike's deafness, then suddenly in early December it was rewritten that Spike had a pre existing condition that caused his deafness.

Yeah I must have missed that pre existing condition all the time Spike responded to sounds and voices

Basically by doing stuff like they're setting a precedent that says "Don't get invested in anything cause it can be undone anytime the writers feel like it"

Nope don't believe it, it was ALL B&E. Greenlee was their version of Babe. I believe it cause they came out in SOD and said that everyone was mean for picking on poor little Greenlee, and that the victims must be punished..........

OH and this is MY OPINION................

[Ryan]

Because Spike wasn't deaf until the damn car accident, lol. They spent 6 months telling us the car accident was responsible for what happened. They spent 6 months ostracizing Greenlee from everyone, and having Kendall set her up for some payback. Then once Rebecca came back, it was "Oh, Greenlee and the car accident didn't cause this. He was already going deaf. I dunno how I missed that." (Dr. Joe Martin said that or something akin to it).

It was freakin stupid. Since then, it's been them kissing Greenlee's ass. They barely even bring up the fact that she kidnapped Spike now.

[brimike]

I guess technically, we don't know. BUt the whole thing was fishy, and REEKED of "rewrite-halfway-through".

There was all of this good meaty material with Greenlee's guilt, Kendall's rage (and her own guilt), really intense human emotions and clear points of view from all characters involved. (IN THE BEGINNING)

Then the audience started to turn on Greenlee, and suddenly, like the week Rebecca starts airing, they say "It's okay! Spike was already going deaf before the accident! Greenlee's off the hook!" And then it's never really brought up again (Except for once in a blue moon)

Crash was the A-story E&B got hired with, and I completely understand why. In theory, the concept is powerful, intense, involves lots of characters, and for a few weeks, it delivered. But then the change happened, Rebecca came back, and the Sextet suddenly started spinning their wheels. It was obvious E&B didn't know what to do with them, which was weird, since they were driving story for so long. Which (to me, at least) means that the second half of their story got killed, and E&B were completely lost as to what to do with them... so we had to endure endlessly boring scenes of the six of them just exchanging partners, but not really DOING anything.

[Ryan]

Yup....the sextet from hell.