Loving/The City Discussion Thread

[chrisml]

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[DRW50]

Thanks. 

Tyler definitely got some good material out of her exit, even if the stuff with Dinah Lee and Curtis was annoying due to how Curtis was treated.

You could argue that Beck's departure was the departure that most affected and reshaped a soap. If not the most, then she's high up on the list. 

[Soaplovers]

I would agree with that.

I have a feeling that had Beck not opted to leave the soap.. she and Trucker would have settled down as a newly married couple with her having a problem with Curtis dating Dinah Lee.. the woman that Trucker cheated on her with.

So Trucker/Trisha would have been married and having conflict because of Dinah Lee still having a place in the Alden family due to her dating Curtis.  Once Trisha was gone.. and Curtis was written out, the show focused on pairing Trucker/Dinah Lee as an end game couple.

I also think once Jessica Collins leaves in mid 1994, that also reshaped the show.. especially when her replacement didn't fare well and was written out within a few months.

[EricMontreal22]

I think this is a great observation.  I do wonder if some of that was down to how Nixon had started writing story and plot outlines.  By this point (maybe even by the mid 70s) many have discussed how she *didn't* write detailed story outlines anymore--the focus more was on a mood or theme and ABC simply allowed that because they trusted her at this stage (in her "memoir" I think even Megan McTavish talks about Nixon's writing in this way in the 90s and she basically seems to admit that it worked for Nixon.  But if Nixon wasn't in charge of the daily execution of these ideas...)

What was with the ABC soaps around that time bringing in Aussie "hunks" from Heartbreak High?  Richard (Corey Paige?) Tanner on AMC (Vince Poletto) OK not from Heartbreak High but didn't Ingo Rademacher start on GH around this same time?

[Franko]

And then to break the trend, Thorsten Kaye (German-British) on OLTL.

[DRW50]

Corey was the first. Then Ingo 5-6 months later. And then Vince was the last gasp. 

[EricMontreal22]

Right--I did think of that, as it was around the same few years.  Accents I guess...