On 9/5/2011 at 4:30 PM, rcsnj said:

David Mason Daniels was the original Tyler and lasted 3 years -- from 1982 to 1985. He was then replaced by Dane Witherspoon, the original Joe Perkins from Santa Barbara. Witherspoon lasted from 1985 to 1986. I was never impressed with Daniels. His performance was lackluster and overshadowed by the more powerful performances of Bill Beyers and Nicholas Walker.

In this 1985 article, John Conboy admits that David Mason Daniels was a wonderful human being.  However, Conboy also essentially says that Daniels was a stiff actor.  No offense, but is it safe to say that Daniels and his Tyler character were forced down viewers' throats?  The actor was given three years to catch on, for crying out.  Um, is it too harsh to say that David Mason Daniels was the Roman Reigns of daytime-soap actors back in the '80s?

Edited September 22Sep 22 by FlyRightOrchestraGuy

4 hours ago, slick jones said:

I was 5 years old at the time, so someone  like @vetsoapfan or @depboy that researches GH would probably have a better answer for this question than I would.

Samantha Livingstone  Chandler was only around in the mid-1970s, and always a relatively minor supporting character. Like so many others of that time period, she didn't last very long. She was a young nurse who fell in love with, married, and got pregnant by Bobby Chandler, Lee Baldwin's stepson. Bobby was diagnosed with the terminal (fictional) Melenkoff's Disease, but Steve Hardy saved the day by discovering that Bobby had been misdiagnosed. The young man actually had a different (but still fictional) disease called Farrier's Syndrome (I think), which could be cured in New York City. Subsequently, Lee, his new wife Caroline, Bobby and Samantha all packed up and moved away from Port Charles. The show was in turmoil then, with a revolving door of writers and characters. This was GH's way of cleaning house quickly. Lee Baldwin later returned to the show, announced Caroline and Bobby had both passed away, and ended up marrying Gail Adamson. Samantha had apparently survived (she was not mentioned among the deceased), but we never saw nor heard from her again.

Edited September 22Sep 22 by vetsoapfan

I was always under the impression Beck-Hilton had been fired from Capitol, but my information probably came from one of those columns in which they intimated (rightly or wrongly) that she'd been let go.  (The belief that she was fired MIGHT have come from the mathematics of her leaving after 18 months.  The columnists probably figured she'd signed an initial contract for a longer period of time than that.)

I don't remember her being especially "bad" as Julie.  But that show itself always seemed to be hopelessly spinning its wheels.  From day one, it was more of a "producer's show" (John Conboy) than the clear vision of any specific writer, and the whole show seemed to suffer because of that.  I'm not sure it was a good idea to contract with a producer to launch a new show instead of contracting with a writer; CBS seemed to pursue a writer in 1973 with Y&R and again in 1987 with B&B.  Capitol was the odd case of the network reaching out to a producer instead of a writer --- and it didn't work terribly well or terribly long.  

 

5 hours ago, Broderick said:

But that show itself always seemed to be hopelessly spinning its wheels.  From day one, it was more of a "producer's show" (John Conboy) than the clear vision of any specific writer, and the whole show seemed to suffer because of that.  I'm not sure it was a good idea to contract with a producer to launch a new show instead of contracting with a writer; CBS seemed to pursue a writer in 1973 with Y&R and again in 1987 with B&B.  Capitol was the odd case of the network reaching out to a producer instead of a writer --- and it didn't work terribly well or terribly long.  

@Broderick Are you at least somewhat familiar with Santa Barbara?  If so, do you think it was much better than Capitol overall?  John Conboy did have a stint as executive producer of Santa Barbara in the early '90s.

John Conboy was all about  the visuals- sets, costume, lighting etc, which was fine if their was the story to back it up and the actors to bring it to life.

Too often there was no substance to back up the glitz.

Someone called Conboy 'the Ross Hunter of Daytime TV' referring to the movie producer famous for lavish productions. When Hunter teamed  with Douglas Sirk, some fabulous movies resulted. With other directors/writers the results were less compelling. Similar to Conboy.

I wonder what the legendary Michael Logan, who at least used to write about daytime soap operas for TV Guide, has thought of Capitol.  I wonder if he has had an opinion of Kimberly Beck's work on the show.

15 hours ago, FlyRightOrchestraGuy said:

@Broderick Are you at least somewhat familiar with Santa Barbara?  If so, do you think it was much better than Capitol overall?  John Conboy did have a stint as executive producer of Santa Barbara in the early '90s.

Yes sir, I'm somewhat familiar with Santa Barbara, but never gave it much thought.  It wasn't for me.  The critics mostly considered it to be a clever show with potential (that often wasn't realized.)

John Conboy's most "celebrated" work was on The Young and the Restless between 1973 and 1982.  With the financial backing of Screen Gems/Columbia and the amenities of Television City in Hollywood, Conboy was able to achieve a "cinematic quality" in Y&R that no other show possessed.  There was dark "mood" lighting, lush sets, pretty clothes (provided by Giorgio's of Beverly Hills), a lot of attention to hair and make-up, sweeping camera angles, and other qualities that completely set Y&R apart from other shows at the time.  

When Conboy left Y&R to create Capitol, I was concerned that Y&R would suffer without his production influence.  It didn't.  It actually IMPROVED, lol.  And Capitol (unfortunately) lacked the writing expertise of Y&R and folded after five years, despite Conboy's trademark production style.  

11 hours ago, Broderick said:

Capitol (unfortunately) lacked the writing expertise of Y&R and folded after five years, despite Conboy's trademark production style.  

@Broderick You mean the writing for Capitol was painfully mediocre overall?  Do you think it's just as well that Kimberly Beck appeared in the slasher movie Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter in the spring of 1984 instead of on Capitol?  (Um, when did Beck's final scenes on Capitol air?)  It's very much worth noting that Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert hated The Final Chapter back in '84.  In fact, Siskel and Ebert hated the Friday the 13th feature film franchise in general during the first half of the '80s.

14 minutes ago, FlyRightOrchestraGuy said:

@Broderick You mean the writing for Capitol was painfully mediocre overall?  

I'm really not qualified to answer that.  I'm sure some posters in this thread were big fans of Capitol throughout its run and can offer a better critique of it.  

It lasted 5 years, and it went through about 5 different teams of writers during that time.  Seems like the creators were the writers for a few months, then the Corringtons, then Peggy Somebody, Henry Slesar, James Lipton.  You'd think a show that lasted a mere 5 years would've had only one or possibly two headwriting teams, but Capitol had about half a dozen failed attempts to find a consistent writer.  

Shortly after it was cancelled, Bill Bell, who launched the replacement series for the show, remarked to Soap Opera Digest that "while Capitol was brilliantly produced, it lacked consistent writing.  Everyone seems to agree that was its biggest problem."  [Not the exact quote, but that's the gist of it.] 

Several years after the show bit the dust, John Conboy grudgingly admitted, "We needed a Bill Bell as our writer. We didn't have one."   

@Broderick When you get a chance, check out this article.

17 hours ago, FlyRightOrchestraGuy said:

@Broderick When you get a chance, check out this article.

Thanks, I hadn't seen that.  According to that article, there really were about a half dozen headwriting teams over the show's (brief) 5-year life.  That's an almost unheard of turnover rate.  (And of course with each switchover, there was a change in tone.)  My main memory of the show is that it was TERRIBLY inconsistent, and most of the "experts" in the article seemed to place the blame on the lack of a clear vision from a consistent headwriter. 

 

On 9/5/2017 at 6:18 AM, John said:

Did Kimberly Beck quit or was she fired and replaced by Catherine Hickland?

@John I have recently said the following:

Quote

I have some conflicting information regarding Kimberly Beck's 1983 departure from Capitol.  Both this Lynda Hirsch article and this Jon-Michael Reed article appear to indicate that she was fired from the show.  In answering someone's question in late 1983, however, Pat Hilton basically said that Beck departed from Capitol so she could "pursue other acting interests."  There's no doubt that Beck's slasher movie Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter was released less than year after she left the soap opera.  According to this page on IMDb, The Final Chapter began filming on October 3, 1983, less than a month after the articles by Hirsch and Reed were released.  I do know that Capitol and Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter had the same casting directors (Fern Champion and Pamela Basker).  I would like to know if Beck was cast in The Final Chapter before or after she was notified of her departure from Capitol.  Did Champion cast Beck in The Final Chapter out of sympathy with her?  Consider the iconic status of the Friday the 13th franchise and the fact that a lot of Friday the 13th fans think very highly of The Final Chapter (Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert didn't), I wonder if Beck herself has cleared the air regarding her '83 departure from Capitol in the decades since The Final Chapter was released to movie theaters in April of 1984.  (Catherine Hickland, who replaced Beck as Julie Clegg on Capitol, was unable to do so in a 2020 interview with Alan Locher.)  Perhaps Beck's departure from Capitol was more amicable than the articles by Hirsch and Reed would lead people to believe.  Yes, I am aware that David Mason Daniels, who played Julie's significant other Tyler McCandless on Capitol, was himself let go in early 1985.

@DRW50 @SoapDope78 Can someone possibly tell me when Kimberly Beck's final scenes as Julie Clegg aired?  By the way, I came across this 1982 video interview with Kimberly Beck and Debrah Farentino today.

I recall reading a Slesar interview after he joined as HW wherein he wryly mentioned that the writing structure was different for him in that he had two break down writers and 2 script writers (with a third freelance writer coming in here and there..including Lois Kibbee who wrote about 4 episodes before Bettina Bradbury was put on contract). The show had no deep roots or complicated plots from which Henry could draw on.  His 15 months was admirable and logical but somewhat boring. The Baxter casting was terrible and that was a pivotal role in Henry's main plot. I think Henry should not have been fired. The ratings were dropping and didn't improve under Lipton who was terrible.  I think Conboy probably would have stuck with Peggy O'Shea but she went back to OLTL where she finished her career and I'm sure paid handsomely by ABC. The California actors also were not suitable for Henry's style of writing. But I do think Henry lasted the longest of the five sets of HWs.

Um, was the late Nicolas Coster ever considered for a role on Capitol?  How about Robin Mattson?  Kin Shriner?  Considering the sheer number of daytime soap operas that each actor appeared on, it wouldn't surprise me if I were to find out that they were considered for roles on Capitol.  Would Robin Mattson have fared well as Julie Clegg on Capitol?  It's my understanding that Ms. Mattson left General Hospital around the same time that Kimberly Beck left Capitol.

Edited October 4Oct 4 by FlyRightOrchestraGuy