The Doctors

[Khan]

Boy, did Ann Williams luck out. Bob Welch was one very handsome dude.

[DRW50]

In some shots he reminded me of Michael Ryan (John Randolph, AW) but Ryan was a little wilder-eyed.

They did seem like a beautiful couple.

[DRW50]

[DRW50]

February 3 and May 26, 1981 Digests.

[Paul Raven]

Was that the end of John and Ashley? I'm blanking out on how many of the characters were written out-Brad,Jack,Darcy,Viveca.I think some of these had potential and it was damaging for them all to be dropped when the audience may have been getting interested.

Variety over the years would note cast comings and goings (not everything unfortunately)Some of them were unknown to me.Maybe Carl or others might know more.

1965

March Sindee Richards (Penny Davis)

March Ann Williams out (Maggie)

June Jacqueline Bertell ?

1966

May Harry Packwood (Mike)

August Morgen Stone (Keith)

1968

April

Conrad Roberts (Dr Simon Harris)

September Peter Burnell (Mike)

1969

June Jim Shannon

August Mel Winkler (?)

October Virginia Vestoff (Althea)

Ginger Gerlach (Julie)

1970

March

Frances Sternhagen (?)

Robert Silvio (?)

October

Elizabeth Hubbard returns (Althea)

1971

May Palmer Deane (Hank)

July Nancy Barrett (Kathy)

1972

July Holly Peters (Kathy)

1973

January

Julia Duffy (Penny)

Marie Thomas (

1974

Michael Landrum (Mike)

1977

July

Chuck Weiss becomes exec producer

1978

May

Peggy Cass (Sweeny)

August

Carla Dragoni (MJ)

1979

May

James Storm (Mike)

July

Doris Quinlan becomes exec producer

October

Ben Thomas (Jack)

1981

November

Ashby Adams (Mike)

Amy Ingersoll (MJ)

[DRW50]

9/14/82 Digest

[MichaelGL]

It's a bit sad reading that last scan Carl, knowing how far off the rails TD would go after two of the stories featured in that synopsis, the grave robbery/plague and the Adrienne/aging story, were to take off the ground.

I never knew Phillip Manning and Matt butted heads at Hope Memorial, and it's interesting that TD took focus on Madison Trust, which I believe was a bank run by the Mannings?

Edited December 11, 2011 by MichaelGL

[Paul Raven]

Skimming thru Kathleen turner's book.She briefly mentions TD.She says that the character initially made no sense to her as each script seemed to portray a different character.She says the only way to make sense of it was to have Nola be a drunk.She took the suggestion to the producers and they went with it.

When the producer (Chuck Weiss?) departed Turner saw it as her chance to leave 18 months into a 2 year contract.The producers said no and they would take her to court.Turner responded that it would mean the character would be in limbo while things were resolved and she had made Nola popular.They relented and she got out.

She states that soap acting could be dangerous as you have to go with your first acting choice rather than dig deeper.However,she said it was good training for TV.

[DRW50]

Thanks for sharing that with us. At least she didn't seem to look down on soaps.

[Khan]

Please tell me Doug Marland wasn't still head-writing the show at that point. I'd hate to think he was that inconsistent with a character he had created.

[DRW50]

I think Marland was there when Kathryn Harrold was in the role (not sure how long she lasted - a year?).

[Khan]

Yes, Carl, Kathryn Harrold lasted a year as Nola.

[Paul Raven]

Turner said that she would get scripts which had Nola speaking 'slangy' one day and eloquently the next.

[safe]

Daily TV Serials / March 1977

Jim Prichett

Jada Rowland

[DRW50]

A Christmas gift from saynotoursoap. The last episode of The Doctors.

videos gone

I was a little confused as what they were setting up after Nancy and Jeff married (was he starting to realize he didn't actually know her that well since he spent a lot of time with Felicia pretending to be Nancy?). Overall I think they did a nice job of leaving a few stories open ended while giving most of the characters closure. The scenes with Maggie and Matt were beautiful - it sucks that a show with such vibrant middle-aged characters had to end - the only other soap where the characters were still so strong after years and years would be the Bob/Kim/John/Lisa set on ATWT, IMO.

Edited October 18, 2014 by DRW50