Loving/The City Discussion Thread

[NothinButAttitude]

Were these the last few months of Roya in the role of Ava? From what I've seen of Roya as Ava, she does scream mini-Rachel Davis/Erica Kane. I commend old soap writers as their stories were so strong that they could take the same tropes and reapply them to different shows or characters and still make it work if plotted correctly.  I do think that Lisa came in and defined Ava on her own, but I feel (and correct me if I wrong) she was declawed and somewhat made the heroine instead of the vixen.

The scene with Ava/Cabot was cute too. I know it was probably hard for Cabot to accept Ava as she was already on her third Alden man at that man point (even though Alex wasn't Clay). It was good to see the early beginnings of Alex coming into play. 

What were everyone's thoughts on Lily's return? I wish more 80s episodes of Loving was accessible as I would love to see stuff from that time. But reading up on it, I suspect that Lily really wasn't fleshed out as her original run and just came back to be a saboteur for Jack/Stacey.

Would she have even considered being a model for Amourellle? That seems farfetched for her, but I guess if she intended to be in Jack's orbit, she'd compromise. 

I've said this before, but I hate that the show didn't see the potential in Rick. Having him scheme and be mowed down by Jack & Stacey time after time had to be frustrating to watch in real-time. Plus, he comes off as Curtis 2.0. Did those two ever meet and interact? I wonder how that went if so...

I'd hope they would've bonded over being in the shadow of golden boy Jack. 

 

 

[Kane]

Roya was around until the fall of 88. Off the top of my head, I believe the transition happened around the time when Ava gave birth to Sandy and was involved in a weird kidnapping plot by a Middle Eastern prince.

I'm not sure if Rick interacted with Burke Moses' Curtis, but he had a storyline with Chip Albers' Curtis. When Curtis and Todd were creating TJ's, Rick was the contractor doing the renos and Curtis thought Rick might be up to no good. I remember seeing a scene where Rick got all pissy and jealous about the fact that Curtis had a trust fund, so I think they were more rivals than friends.

[DRW50]

@NothinButAttitude Here's when Curtis meets Rick.

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@dc11786 As always, I enjoy reading your breakdown/commentary of the period. I agree with you about the generic nature of the material (which is often an issue with Loving in the '80s). I wish more of the material Lily had after the affair reveal was available, where she worked at the shelter, to see if that touched on her past. As it is she is just a generic schemer, and Britt Hefler is a competent but not very dynamic actress.

I agree about not being into all the stuff about Jim's past. I don't mind Jim, even if he wasn't the most dynamic of characters, but it's all so convoluted (and too reliant on offcamera backstory) and I don't think Mark Pinter had the charisma for the role he was put in. The most interesting element for me was the torture scenes with the double agent. That guy had a presence. They should have considered putting him into the regular cast.  

I also agree the Ava and Clay material was the standout. Roya is just enthralling to watch. Yes, her Ava was another Erica, but she makes the character compelling in her own right, and Clay/Alex was a more dynamic love interest than Erica tended to get. The added elements of her history with the Alden family help.

Edited August 5, 2024 by DRW50

[NothinButAttitude]

Thank you @DRW50 for those clips with Rick and Curtis. And thank you @Kane for the insight. I hate to hear that they put Curtis & Rick at odds instead of having them ban together against Jack. 

I like Jack, but I find him and Stacey together insufferable from what I've seen of them. I think I enjoyed the clips I've seen of them apart more than I did of them together. 

[Manny]

I dont know if this is just me or what, but I have hard time watching this because I cannot get the video to start streaming.

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But looking at the description and your comments, this should be right around time I was watching!! Which would be lovely to see again. 

I still remember Roya Meganot as Ava very much. And Cabot and "Clay"! 

However reading the description, I must say I have no recollection of Carrie?? Who was she? And Dan also escapes my mind. So weird. 

[DRW50]

Sorry about that. If you click on the MPEG4 button on the right side of the page it can take you to a version that is easier to watch (and you can download it).

Carrie I think was mostly just there for the story about Jim's past. Dan was around for longer. He is eventually killed off while dating Ann, apparently, per the Loving recap site. 

Here's a profile on Carrie.

https://lovingsoapopera.wordpress.com/2023/09/29/character-profile-carrie-davis/

Edited August 6, 2024 by DRW50

[Manny]

Oh thanks for the tip! I will check out the video when I come home from work

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OMG, how memory is a weird and funny thing. So.. as I said, I have no recollection of Carrie existing in Loving back when I was watching. However I remember a name Dan and a name Honeycutt. I remember that someone with a name Honeycutt kidnaps Ava and ties her up in a chair in some cabin or something. So I thought it was Dan Honeycutt that did it. But no, Dan was there, but it was CARRIE Honeycutt that kidnapped Ava, as a double agent. Did she have like a secret agent code name? I have a feeling like there was a name. 

For some reason, I have a memory that some Mayor was involved (Corinth Mayor?) In her kidnapping. Maybe this is another wrong memory lol

Anyway, wow, okay, that makes sense. And funny fact, Ava kidnapped and tied to a chair is the last scene we got in my country. It was a cliffhanger and that was the last episode we got which is I guess why it got stuck in my head

Edited August 6, 2024 by Manny

[dc11786]

The way I look at Ava is she matured a bit with Lisa Peluso in the role. Not because Peluso was a better actress, but simply the nature of her story changed. Pairing Ava with Alex, who wasn't a man with money, sorta forced her to shift her priorities. I think there was a bit of a realClay/Ava pairing, but the audience wanted Ava/Alex. To keep Ava relevant, she could no longer be the coquettish young woman using her sexual attraction to manipulate men the way she had in the past. 

I'm not the biggest fan of Addie Walsh's 1992 run, but I think putting Ava at Burnell's was a smart move to position her back into a place where she was able to exert some manipulation while also being more than just a young woman who slept her way to the top.

In theory, I think bringing Lily Slater back was a smart move, but I think the execution left a lot to be desired. Personally, I would have done Lily / Curtis as the pairing with Jack using his previous history with Lily to try to get insight into Curtis' plan for AE. Additionally, I would have had Lily forced to deal with her past by arriving in Corinth to sell the family home with Stacey acting as the real estate agent. I think eventually, Stacey's real estate career would take off and she would be drawn into a business relationship with Dane Hammond, which would have escalated the conflict in Jack about where his loyalties lie. As Stacey becomes more independent, Jack would become more drawn to docile Lily, who would be staying at the Alden mansion as Ann's houseguest given that Lily's mother recently died and Ann could use something to do.  Once Curtis and Lily were engaged, then I would have let Lily

I don't think the actors are given a lot of opportunities to shine during this period so I won't jump to much conclusions on Hefler's acting. The material from the strike involving Jim and the homeless shelter is more appealing to me. I know there were people that like the Lily and Jack affair so I am curious how I would feel watching it play out day to day.

I agree. Jack and Stacey tend to be very bland, which is a shame because Lauren Marie Taylor could give Stacey such a sense of spunk and spirit that is often drowned out by banal dialogue and color by numbers storytelling. I think the best I've seen them is when Stacey and Jack are having their affair during Jack's marriage to Ava, but that was more due to Stacey's internal conflict over being this good Catholic girl who was bedding down with a married man. 

I also don't think making Stacey a romance novelist did her any favors. Raised with two older brothers, tomboy Stacey never comes of as the type.

I really wish a grander attempt was made at Stacey and Curtis. I think Christopher Marcantel and Lauren Marie Taylor could have been Gwyn and Clay of their generation if they at least played them for a minute longer before committing to Stacey and Jack. 

[Sapounopera]

I can understand why they wanted to bring Lily back, but she returned as Lauren Fenmore. It was like Amanda Spaulding's return on GL. 

Stacey should have been a reporter. I think her biggest problem was... Jack. He was rather bland and marrying into the Alden family didn't do her any favours storywise. She needed a different type of leading man.

Roya was my Ava. Not only did I like the actress, but her stories as well. The Clay/Alex story didn't belong to the show and it didn't suit the Alden family.  

[NothinButAttitude]

This makes me feel better that I am not the only one who sees how the pairing of Stacey/Jack is stifling at times. Did you hate when Jack was "killed" off, or did you view it as a chance for Stacey to grow as a character? 

From what I've seen with her with Buck, she did at least have spunk that she didn't possess with Jack. 

On paper, Loving seems to have had all the right ideas, but they didn't always know how to execute them. And it didn't help that regimes didn't last long. While I know that AMC was Agnes' golden child, I do wish that she would've spent more time propping Loving up. 

[dc11786]

I think there was space to tell a Lily's return story that involved the unfinished business with Jack as there story was abruptly ended because of a network mandate. While it isn't unusual for Loving to strip characters of their personality and backstories upon a return, making the conscious choice to make an incest survivor into an seductress is not one I would have made personally. Honestly, I have to wonder if Bill Levinson was leading the team when that story started. Helfer had played Marland´s precursor to Lily on A New Day in Eden so I think she could have handled that backstory.

Stacey being a reporter would have worked better than a novelist. It would have given her more agency on the canvas. I think Jack and Stacey could have worked, but the show really needed to delve deeper into their characterization. Jack was the scion of an affluent East Coast clan with ties to higher education, politics, and the corporate world, but was the biological son of a man who was born on the wrong side of the tracks and managed to raise his status in life. Dane and the Aldens were enemies. That is a fascinating dynamic that should have fueled the show for years, but it didn´t which leads me to suspect that Dane as Jack´s father was a Marland choice, though Dane could also be considered a Nick Davis for the 1980s. With her large Irish Catholic family, with a strong sense of right and wrong, becoming involved with someone who has money and power could have caused her to question her morals. 

Alex masquerading as Clay isn´t a story I would have told, but there are elements that I don´t mind. I find the general outline though sounds like a watered down General Hospital plot. I think Alex´s relationship with the Aldens after the truth comes out is pretty special, but I am not sure it was a necessary story to tell.   

I didn´t watch Loving in real time, but later when I was able to access the material through soap dvd sites so I knew Jack was killed. Most of the consecutive Loving material starts in October, 1991, and, by that point, the best days (worst?) are over. I'd love to see Jack and Dinahlee's "affair" as Lauren Marie Taylor never let Stacey forgive Dinahlee for that. I thought the idea of Jack and Stacey moving into the mansion and then Isabelle Alden returning in the form of the sublime Celeste Holms as some sorta Cabot/Isabelle combo would have been great to see play out. Their final stories as a couple in 1992 were not my favorite (Stacey investigates the Tides and falls for Trucker while Jack gets taken for a ride by John Schneider's Larry Lamont dud diet product Take Off! was underdeveloped. 

Post-Jack, Stacey's life is pretty boring for about a year. The Jeremy / Stacey romance was clearly a shift based on the fact that Trisha was leaving (I believe the plan was Jeremy/Trisha based on how Jeremy's 1991 visit went). I thought Stacey's Victorian marriage of convenience to Clay didn't play to Lauren Marie Taylor's strengths. It was a situation Trisha would have found herself in, not Stacey. Buck and Stacey were fun, but they were more fun when it was Buck and Stacey and Gwyn. I was less interested in Tess. Buck didn't work outside of Stacey for me, so ultimately I could take him or leave him. Phillip Brown was more than decent, but Buck was Trucker's secret half-brother, Curtis' old military buddy, and in cahoots with Tess to snag Trisha's money. It was all just too much. 

I really like what I've read and what I've seen of Marland's Loving, but I do think Nixon needed to write the first two years in order to establish the flavor of the show. Marland's style is too different. The corporate world that Marland had built up in those final months and the number of side stories wouldn't have been sustainable under other writers.  

[slick jones]

 

Thank you @Matt and @DRW50  I watched both tonight. (I did scan the credits on the 1983 episode the other day, though...). Both were very much what I needed-- Olympic overload this week!

 

[DRW50]

Can't remember if I saw this promo before or not. Probably did and just forgot it.

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[Forever8]

An episode of Loving from December 1993 has been uploaded. I don't know whether or not it's been online before. 

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[DRW50]

Thanks. The same episode is up elsewhere with a different date (December 29th). I'm not sure which date is accurate.