The Doctors

[robbwolff]

Possibly Linda Grover. There's a July 1978 episode of The Doctors on YouTube. The credit crawl lists Grover along with Elizabeth Levin. Elizabeth was/is married to Michael Levin, who played Jack Fenelli on Ryan's Hope.

[jam6242]

I believe Linda Grover was the writer. At least she was as of this July 1978 article. The anniversary was April 1 so I don't know if the celebration was delayed or there was just a lag time in writing about it.

[Khan]

Didn't Kathleen Turner go to rehab a few years back?

[amybrickwallace]

Thank you, Carl - I look forward to seeing that commercial again. It also gave me a chuckle because Althea was known for making terrible coffee. LOL

[SoapDope]

I remember Kathleen Turner being a guest on Rosie O'Donnell's 90's talks show and they showed a clip of her on the Doctors. Kathleen said the writing was crazy at times. I don't know if that was true or if she was just bashing soap work.

Interestingly Kim Zimmer who took over for Kathleen also appeared in Body Heat with her.

[amybrickwallace]

Yeah. Have you ever read Kim Zimmer's bio? She goes into quite a bit of her TD days in there, and when they worked on Body Heat together, she thanked Kathleen Turner for leaving the role of Nola for her to take over.

[amybrickwallace]

I found a 1972 cast photo, after TD won its first Emmy (EP Allen Potter is holding the Emmy in the photo) and emailed it to Susan Bedsow-Horgan (wife of Patrick Horgan, who played TD's villain du jour of the early 70s, Dr. John Morrison). She wrote back saying:

"Thanks for the photo - those were very happy times for Patrick. And even though everyone thought Dr. Morrison was a villain, he always played him as wounded. Maybe that's why he was so effective. And he never got one piece of hate mail. By the way, standing next to Patrick is Allen Potter who was the EP. I worked for him as EP on Guiding Light when it went to the hour in 1977. Patrick got me the interview for the job. And Patrick sailed his brand new boat through the Cape Cod canal but it crashed. They weren't hurt."

As many of you know, Susie was the EP of OLTL from 1994-1996 (and co-wrote the short-lived Prospect Park revival) and was interviewed in the 2013 book Llanview in the Afternoon by Jeff Giles. She doesn't name the soap, but it has to be TD, given that Joseph Stuart took over the reins of TD after Allen Potter left in 1973. Patrick Horgan was on TD from 1970-74.

Susan Bedsow Horgan: Joe [stuart] was a network guy, and boy, was he not liked. He did something very unethical to my husband, preventing him from taking another job and then firing him right after so he was completely out of work. I had the feeling that he was very tyrannical.

This certainly fits in with some of the stories saynotoursoap has said.

On another note, Carl, have you found the disc yet with Liz Hubbard's Brim commercial?

[jam6242]

Keep a close watch of the extras/bit players in the episodes that aired today at noon. There are two future soap stars appearing, one in each episode (one is quickly recognizable).

[amybrickwallace]

One of the reasons watching the reruns is so fun is because you never know who will show up on any given day. Today we get two for the price of one.

[SoapDope]

I wonder what Kathleen thought when Kim thanked for leaving the role to her ? Was Kathleen fired or did she quit ?

[DRW50]

Monika I'm still looking around - I found the two OLTL episodes I put on disc, but not that one yet.

[amybrickwallace]

Thank you, Carl. Keep me posted!! SoapDope, KZ doesn't make it totally clear, but I've always assumed that KT chose to leave. In today's episodes, two pre-fame future soap icons show up - Susan Lucci in the first (a few months before AMC premiered) and Joseph Mascolo (years before he became DAYS' Stefano).

[Dave_01]

I was browsing Youtube and came across the opening credits for a late-70s TV series I'd never heard of before - Highcliffe Manor. One of the co-stars - shown in this clip - is Gerald Gordon.

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[DRW50]

I'd seen that before but didn't remember seeing him.

It was a big flop.

Looks like someone had an eye for soap actors though.

[DRW50]

How random seeing Susan Lucci on there. I had to suffer through Penny scenes to catch them, so I paid my penance.

How surprising to see a few episodes before it that Mike was wearing blue jeans in his scenes with Nancy. Something that would not have happened on soaps until around that time.