Victor Miller Interview

[Kubla Khan]

So, Daytime Confidential did an interview with Victor Miller (ex-writer of AMC, AW, GL, OLTL, and GH) in March (!) and I completely missed it until now. I don't recall any discussion about it, so even though its months old, I think it's still worth talking about. I encourage anyone who hasn't heard it to go and check it out.

Some comments:

- Although I think Victor "gets" it somewhat (he really talks at great length about the excellence of AMC's 80s glory days, and what made the show work), this interview is a bit disappointing because it essentially dissolves into how wonderful and amazing he thinks Megan McTavish is. Megan is the best headwriter he's ever worked with; she is a true "genius" and "brilliant." (Folks: This man worked under Wisner Washam, Agnes Nixon, Lorraine Broderick, Sam Hall and Peggy O'Shea).

- He starts off by talking about the Jesse/Angie returns and he basically blasts "the scabs and the union writers who turned their backs on their union" for resurrecting Jesse and says his return is an abomination. Which is completely fine (he's certainly entitled to his viewpoint), but it's kind of utterly ridiculous when in the next breath he's praising Megan McTavish for being a genius/brilliant and completely acts like an utter fool (and ultimately, dodges the question) when the unabortion is mentioned.

- He says that there's a lot of resentment in the Industry against Megan because she's "really tough" and does not suffer "fools gladly." She's "fired a lot of people," and he has never disagreed with a firing decision she's made (Funnily enough, Victor, fans have never disagreed with a decision to fire her). He then says later that when people are running out of "evil things" to say about her they start say that her storylines are "too dark," but he maintains that there's always light that comes out of them.

- He says that writing for AW was rough and that the show was dark and took itself too seriously (But yet you love Megan McTavish!!?!? Victor, come on!)

- When he and Megan were writing for GL, they read an article about a woman who was pregnant with twins (two different fathers), they loved it and pitched it to P&G to become the infamous Rick/Ross/Blake baby mess (a true abomination). P&G initially shot the story down but they were persistent and they finally said yes.

- When he was writing OLTL in the early 80s, Robin Strasser came to the writers' office complaining about the scripts. "Dorian would never say this [!@#$%^&*]!" Victor was there and he agreed to re-write her scenes for her, not knowing that was a big no-no that could've gotten him fired.

VERY interesting interview, but as someone who admired Victor's work a lot, this interview really shattered my illusion of him Bottom line: Victor's love affair with Megan is utterly mind-boggling.

[Jonathan]

Oh, he's had a hard*n for her for many many years. No one ever seems to hire him except for McTrashit.

[Soapsuds]

Hopefully he will stay away from daytime after hearing his comments.

[LeClerc]

I remember listening to that interview.

I was stunned when, initially, he didn't even remember that he was writing for AMC during the unabortion story! That's pretty scary. It also suggests that he (and Megan) still have no idea what a travesty that story was because, if they did, he wouldn't have had to search his memory for that story.

[Kubla Khan]

He seems to have a poor memory!

He didn't eremember Victoria Wyndham's name. He didn't even remember the names of the characters in the "Twins with Two Different Fathers Story" that he so loved.

If you take a look at his website autobiography, it's riddled with errors. (No, Megan did not bring you back to AMC after GL. You re-joined when Lorraine Broderick was still there. And Megan wasn't replaced with Richard Culliton -- she was replaced by Agnes Nixon & Jean Passanante. Remember? You wrote under them for two years post-Megan). Weird.

[EricMontreal22]

I think he's uber close with Megan. I don't really get why everyone thinks he's making stuff up... He's an old guy, he's getting used to the web--he PROBABLY didn't think he'd have people picking everything he wrote on it, over for accuracies.

[EastMA2]

Well at least he acknowledges that Robin Strasser is a complainer.

[R Sinclair]

Ew.

[NYC123]

Out of all HW he chosed Megan as the best...............

[LeClerc]

(paraphrasing, it's been a while since I listened to the interview)

Interviewer: What were your thoughts on the controversial re-writing of Erica's abortion?

Miller: I don't know what you're referring to.

Interviewer: The Josh Madden story.

Miller: Was I there for that? Oh.....yeah I think I was.

How can he forget being involved with the biggest plot blunder in the history of the show, which was only 2 years ago. IIRC he even wasn't sure at first if it was Megan who wrote it! Also, when the interviewer referred to it as the re-writing of Erica's abortion, nothing clicked for Miller. I don't think he gets what that story did or why people hated it (or even that they hated it). And if he doesn't get it then BFF Megan doesn't. One of the worst examples of out-of-touch soap writers.

[nicknack]

Maybe he wasn't aware that it was called unaboration by the fans?

[Khan]

Truth be told, not many of us knows what actually transpires in your average soap scribes' room/conference. I'm not an MMT fan by any stretch of the imagination...but let's say, I give VM the proverbial benefit-of-the-doubt. Maybe, in spite of the litany of bad story decisions, as well as personal conflicts with this-or-that colleague, that trail her from show to show, MMT is, in fact, a halfway decent writer (and person). And maybe - just maybe - most of her ideas for AMC, GL, OLTL and GH started off beautifully, but persistent network/sponsor/producer/cast-member interference continually mucked up the execution...

Okay.

Now, pardon me while I go off to bathe, because I feel dirty.

[R Sinclair]

Where is this interview?

[PAsoapfan]

Here you go R Sinclair

http://www.daytimeconfidential.com/tags/interviews?page=1

[SteveFrame]

All this proves to me is what I have had said about Tom Casiello. I love him but of course he is not going to come out and say Hogan was to blame for what happened at Days - he is going to focus blame elsewhere. These writers know who is going to hire them and who is not. They are going to stay on good terms with the Head Writers because it is them that will rehire them - not the producers - since the HW usually hires his staff.

I love Tom Casiello but I don't put 100% stock in what he says. I think he is partially right.

Just like here I think Victor is partially right but he missed the truth by a mile.