Y&R Actor off contract

[JackPeyton]

[y&r_fan]

DeeeDee, I think you're taking this whole thing way too personally.

And yes, I'm aware of the irony of ME saying that.

[ian]

Wow, I'm pretty flippant, blunt and not easily offended, but I found that to be incredible rude, and I'm white! It was a witty remark but I'd never actually write that to someone, for fear that they might smack my teeth out.

Oh right, anonymity of the internet. We can all hide behind our computers.

We apologize for this break in regular programming and now return to Mud-slinging.

[sheilaforever]

Good - Devon was useless (especially sans Dru) and now they just have to bring on NATE played by a capable charsimatic young actor...

[SFK]

This problem is so much bigger than Bryton. But Devon is yet another example that should not go ignored.

Devon has never been a character so much as he's been a felt board for issue-oriented stories to get slapped onto. He's Genoa City's patron saint of Afterschool Specials. Bryton's acting was never the problem. He is not brilliant, but we have endured FAR worse (Dee has named them). Losing Dru was a huge blow for his character not to mention Dru's biological family. Devon's birth mother had been a step in a great direction, never should have gotten rid of her. She should have stuck around town cracked out yet devoted to her baby, fighting desperately, pathetically, and ultimately heart-breakingly to win her son back. Instead, Devon gets two gimmicks for relatives, ANTM (and it just KILLS me that they named her Tyra, as if that women needs another opportunity to talk about herself), and a cute child singer who wowed 'em at The Apollo. That's not what daytime needs. It needs *actors* who are cast for their acting ability and desire to be on the show, not former flavors of the month/glorified guest stars who along with their management certainly have "bigger and better" projects beyond Y&R on the mind. TPTB are wasting their and our time with these fluff characters. We want meat. I mean, where is Amelia Marshall or Vanessa Bell Calloway, they should be playing Devon's mom or aunt.

The poster who said that they just didn't try with Devon said it best. And I don't think it has anything to do with his looks. Sure, he's scrawny compared to Marcus Patrick, but you honestly believe they'd write better for that spotlight whore? Okay, maybe he's like the worst example. And besides, there are a lot of girls who find Bryton attractive. It's just that his character is dull as dishwater, and just like Remy on GL, Frankie on AMC, and their patron saint, Anthony Bouvier on Designing Women, TIIC have kept his balls safely stowed in a glass jar high up on the top shelf. Frankie finally got handed his, forever it seemed like he'd be more comfortable cornrowing Randi's hair than slaying her. And Devon had NO business talking to old ass Ashley from Fresh Prince, that made him look even more pathetic, at least get him a 19 year old. I don't want to go off too much on this, but undeniably there are some folks behind the scenes who have issues with black people and black love and that just breaks my heart.

Dee may seem inexplicably heated, but if I may, I think her frustration speaks to the much bigger problem I'm trying to get at. It's great to see people of all types represented in daytime, but when only like a tenth of the characters are minorities it just really sucks and stands out when their stories get loused up or they disappear. Hello Santis and Montezes.

[Rhiannon]

I was going to make a post saying the same exact thing but it's already been said.

I haven't been able to look at Devon the same way after they had him lusting after Lilly the way they did for so long. The character of Devon never really clicked with me anyway and it's probably because they did such a poor job of fleshing him out properly. He was in stories but they never seemed to know which way they wanted to go with his personality, with characters that have been fleshed out better we kinda know how they'll react in most situations. The problem with Devon has always been that the writers at the time would change his personality based on whatever story he was in, and they never found a story for him that really clicked with the audience except for when Yolanda was in town but that story was nipped in the bud pretty quickly after Yolanda started falling for Neil.

[DeeeDee]

Not at all.

Exactly.

[DeeeDee]

TPTB did that instead of giving him a romantic interest.

TPTB don't make Daniel lust after Summer or Adam lust after Abby.

Minority actors are given expected to spin crap into gold & bashed when they can't.

Daniel's had NO story yet Graziadei was on EVERY DAY in EVERY story with plenty of love interests until SOMETHING worked.

Same with Kevin.

Devon gets next to nothing, is expected to create gold with it & given one love interest.

Nobody could make that work no matter how good they were.

[alphanguy74]

Dee dee after sleeping on it, I really think that I've been too blunt with you on this. I still have my opinions on the matter... but it's obvious you love the character, and you have every right to fight for him. I'm a person who loves spirited debate, but I also get too melodramatic bringing my point home sometimes, so I apologize to you for that. I hope something happens in the future that makes you feel better about this show, as someone else said.... recurring sometimes means your'e never seen... but sometimes not. I think we both love the show, so I hope we can call a truce over this .

[bellcurve]

EXACTLY!

Had to stop when reading this and kind of agree with this in some way.

But, I don't think this is exactly a network issue. If Maria "It's My Show And My Vision" Arena Bell wanted to write story for "gray" black characters, I think she could do it without interference from the network.

I think it's a combination of Bell more/less afraid of pissing off African-American viewers(see: Dru's ABW under Latham) and her simply not having an interest in those characters or actors. I can't fault her for that. I'd much rather a writer devote sufficient airtime and story to something he/she is passionate in rather than a story he/she has no interest in writing and are doing it to woo and tease a niche audience(NUKE THIS MEANS YOU!).

She's in a very precarious situation. Everyone is clamoring for Drucilla's return(and we all know THAT will never happen) and they refuse to accept anything else. Maybe the lack of the Winters family on Y&R has been her test to see if the show can survive without them.

Just keep on walking to your parking spot if you see Paul Rauch chasing you down after work, Kristoff! Take it from Lillian!

[SFK]

One thing I'll give Rauch, it was his idea to finally bring back the biracial Spauldings on GL (which was totally botched). We only got one biracial Spaulding, and they shouldn't have killed off Victoria Sr., off-screen no less.

As I said, Devon worked better when Dru was still in the mix, that family has crumbled (of course they pair Lily with all these guys so she's a safe little ingenue). But Devon's relatives that they brought on just weren't written strong enough. They had C-plot written all over them.

Let's look at a satellite character like Devon, and one like Kevin. Look at how Michael and Gloria have eclipsed the original family member on the canvas. That's the kind of power with which Devon's family could have been written, but Devon himself never had a juicy "give an innocent girl an std and try to kill people" s/l like Kevin did to begin with. He had those soft PSA storylines. I don't think they ever had any intention of Devon being a true front burner character, and to be fair, that may have nothing to do with race, there are a lot of characters like that.

[bellcurve]

There's irony, considering you had to clarify your "It's a Family Thing" statement in a previous post, which I believe could be misconstrued as "The Bells Are Homophobic." Whether or not that is what you meant(or whether you really meant the whole Kay gets hit on by the lipstick lesbo almost killed the show as you later corrected), it still goes.

I think DeeDeee is entitled to the way he/she feels without being accused of wielding some sort of an agenda.

[Money]

RE: Lily

Can someone tell me what her story will be if they decided to pair Cane with Mac or someone else? Or should we not be surprised if KC is also given the axe. This character is so isolated and it's part of the overall problem with the Winters. They are ALL isolated. Every single one of them. The only time Neil is allowed to get outside of the Winters' bubble is when he's interacting with Victor and kissing his ass.

Yeah YR is a step above the rest in terms of diversity but giving them airtime is not enough. Until YR decide to stop using the Winters as their claim to diversity and actually showcase them outside of the little box they're in then they would always perpetuate the belief that their black characters are elevated tokens.

And as far as having "grey" Black characters. There's no such thing. You're either a cop, lawyer or doctor with no in between across the spectrum. TPTB are too afraid to actually gasp! give their minorities layers sine they're far too content to write them as everyone's BFF in backburner hell. It's ridiculous.

[rangethatrover]

Just keep on walking to your parking spot if you see Paul Rauch chasing you down after work, Kristoff! Take it from Lillian!

OMG Bellcurve that was incredibly funny and incredibly sad at the same time.

Paul Rauch (as much as i love the guy and his years at OLTL) was a bastard.

[Chris B]

It's sad whats become of the Barber-Winters clan when there is still so much potential. Devon and Colleen could make a viable couple. Bring on Laman Rucker as Malcolm for Olivia and cast a strong young actor as Nate. Then you have Vivica Fox as Stephanie and you know a short term stint from her can easily become long term if it's successful enough. You could potentially have Roxanne related to her thus giving both ties to the canvas.

My overall point is, I thought of SOMETHING in two seconds. These writers have had months and have not explored this side of the show at all. Even LML was better than that. Victoria Rowell's exit doesn't mean the black storylines have to suck, but they aren't trying. Why is Eva stuck with Kristoff when they have no chemistry? Why hasn't the show even attempted to chemistry test her with someone in her own age range? It does seem awfully shady and old school racist. I'm not saying it's intentional (is it ever?), but they're being very small minded and condesending in their thinking and storytelling for black characters. That insults me more than LML's writing for Dru (or Devon) ever could.

Y&R is extremely good right now, but it won't be able to reach that ratings plateau or creative zenith until the rectify the diversity problem.