Edge of Night (EON) (No spoilers please)

[DRW50]

Posting some articles for Maeve Maguire's upcoming birthday.

2/71 TV Dawn to Dusk.

[DRW50]

Sorry about the bad cropping on some of these.

[quartermainefan]

I loved the Nola story. How refreshing that your leading lady and biggest name is not insisting on a glamorous role reeking of empowerment and status? Try finding someone like that today on soaps.

[DRW50]

I guess it helped that EON always had high turnover. The show's willingness to hire people and move on meant a lot of fascinating roles. Ann Williams was on soaps for years but I think her Edge role, as Margo, which probably only ran a year or a year and a half, was her favorite.

Kim Hunter is so fabulous as Nola. There are so many great scenes, even little moments easily overlooked. Here's one where Paige walks in and is horrified to find Nola off the wagon again.

[quartermainefan]

One scene I remember which I loved when I saw it on aol was Nola was drunk at Elliot's bar I think, and was just giving this lament about how it sucks to get old and become a has been no man wants. And again, today you see Erica portrayed 20 years younger than she is, characters like Alexis on GH are ten years younger than the actress playing her, and characters like Kate Roberts on DOOL never get old, they just get ever more fascinating to the men in their world. Nola got old, and she knew it.

[DRW50]

August 1957 TV Radio Mirrow. I didn't feel like typing up the non-photo pages, but, since the scans aren't exactly great, if there's anything you can't read, I will type that part up.

[DRW50]

This is so gorgeous.

[DRW50]

It seems that, in terms of blatant youthification of P&G, the big moment was firing Mandel Kramer and bringing in Dennis Parker as the new police chief.

What I wonder about is the fan reaction when, around 1976, Calvin, Steve, and Deborah all arrived, and ended up on the force (I don't know if Deborah was a cop when viewers first met her). This was a pretty big shift for Edge, wasn't it? I know they had always had young characters in the middle of the action, but hadn't most of the "law and order" characters usually been older?

[MichaelGL]

I'm really in awe at the production values of Edge back then, very few soaps at the time seemingly had such controlled lighting, very cinematic.

[DRW50]

The show is stunning. Beautiful people, nice sets, good lighting, great writing, great acting (not too sure about the wardrobe though). With better handling the show could have been #1.

I know a lot of people may feel the move to ABC was a death knell but ABC's upturn in the late 70s probably kept EON on as long as it was. And if not for P&G, ABC probably would have continued EON.

Edited August 1, 2011 by CarlD2

[saynotoursoap]

Steve turned up first in the summer of 1976 as a bodyguard hired by Adam to protect Nicole from Claude Revenant's assassins. There had been hints that Steve had been kicked off the police force for rogue behavior. I believe Henry Slesar deliberately kept Steve somewhat mysterious so that the audience would be uneasy as to whether or not he really wanted to help Nicole. I don't usually like his type, but Denny Albee was cute and ingratiating even though he was not given much to do at first. At that point, Bill Marceau was still the chief of police and Luke Chandler the #1 cop on the series.

Deborah Saxon came next in the fall of 1976. Deborah was not a cop initially. She was the spoiled daughter of businessman/crimelord Anthony Saxon. Deborah was introduced as a drunken character in the Ace of Clubs cocktail lounge, which was run by Saxon's flunky Beau Richardson. Danny Micelli, who worked for Beau, threw Deborah out and was then called on the carpet for being mean to the boss' daughter. At first, Deborah was very similar to the Raven character, who at that point was still played by the original actress Juanin Clay. Deborah was written as more headstrong and volatile, while Raven was manipulative and cunning. Deborah's character slowly began to change in the spring and summer of 1977. It later was revealed that she had been raped by Beau Richardson the night he was murdered at the Ace of Clubs. Steve and Deborah had been seeing one another casually, with Deborah taking some delight in her father's dislike for Steve. Deborah was not aware of her father's criminal activities, but Steve thought Saxon may have been involved in the muder of Adam Drake. Steve had rejoined the police force after Nicole's assassination attempts ended, and Steve had been paired with another rookie, Calvin Stoner. Calvin started some tme around mid-1977 to investigate Drake's death. They reported to Marceau and Lt. Chandler.

Eventually, Beau's rape of Deborah came to light, and Steve understood by she had been so reluctant to become intimate with him. Deborah really began to change into a less-spoiled, stronger, more self-sufficient woman after that, and in early 1978, she decided to join the police force. By that fall, Lt. Chandler had been phased out of the story -without explanation, as I recall. Steve, Deborah, and Calvin had been dubbed the Three Muskateers and were very popular with fans. I think the secret to it was that Henry Slesar had introduced all of the characters separately and over time. The audience got to know them first and saw them with the veteran cast, thus they were accepted. It was not like today where a soap would introduce three new actors on the same day at the same time, stick them in the middle of established stories, and expect the audience to like them instantly.

[saynotoursoap]

When Edge first went to ABC, it looked dreadful. The lighting was very harsh and bright, and the sets, leftover from the CBS days, looked old and tattered. Edge's production values really began to improve when Gail Kobe took over as supervising producer, and the lighting especially was moody and appropriate for the settings. After Gail left to take over as EP on Texas, the lighting and sets began to decline to again. By 1983, I thought the series looked perfectly dreadful. That sort of thing does not ordinarily bother me as long as the writing and acting are good, but Edge was also beginning to decline in the writing, too, as ABC began to interfere more with Henry Slesar's work. Edge would have benefited greatly from acquiring the sets of Texas when it was canceled, as the production values on that series were excellent.

Edited August 1, 2011 by saynotoursoap

[DRW50]

That's interesting about Gail Kobe, as I can't say I have been bowled over by the production values on her GL (perhaps the huge hair and gaudy clothes and somewhat vacant sets were more of a soap mandate of that era).

Thanks for telling us more about the background of the characters. I knew Deborah started out as a bit spoiled but didn't know the full background.

I wonder why they didn't have Deborah and Steve leave together. Why do you think Albee didn't work out on OLTL?

Was Chris Egan very popular?

I know what you mean about the show's production values later on. What can you say about this thing? (Now someone will tell me this was a very popular opening)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DxAbOLR8xjc

Do you think there was any real need to recast Jody when Lori Loughlin left? And do you think the show should have gone with their initial idea of making her a vixen?

[DRW50]

Is this the scene?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUDbUPhWTBg

[edgeofnik]

This was the intro that I believe most fans hated because it was so cheesy. (The only good part was Gunther and the feather duster!) Obviously by my avatar it's clear which era I prefer 1980-83, but I'm partial because that was when I was most into it.

No need to recast Jody, but that wasn't the problem. It was the loss of HS as head writer that truly hurt the show. I liked Deborah -- didn't at first, but after watching several months, I liked her (and Steve).

Looking back the loss of Logan, Draper and April were pretty significant. Also, axing Elliott as foil (or secret lover) for Raven really was a dagger. Until I went back and watched those episodes, I didn't realize just how good that combination (of all those characters) was for the show.

The other thing that I loved about Slesar was the way threads of future stories were laid out months in advance, only to be picked up when you least expected. The complexity would never play today. I'm specifically thinking about Jeff Brown/Sky/Val/Jim/Guther/Nora/Spencer/Damien/Carlo/Martine with Raven right smack in the middle. It's fascinating to watch things pop up and then think back - "that's right". I'm remember when Gunther mentioned his wife, etc. There were some big shockers then. I only wish more EON episodes from 77-79 and conclusion of Clown Puppet Murders were available.