Another World Discussion Thread

[Mona Kane Croft]

Was Bay City ever said to be in Michigan?  Is Marlena monitoring this message board and cursing those who disagree with her?   LOL.

Edited November 16, 2023 by Mona Kane Croft

[j swift]

Ms De Lacroix may get her facts confused, but I doubt she'd ever use such a grammatically odd sentence as "I did want to be clear that I EVEN do understand what was said"

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[Contessa Donatella]

I've never seen Connie/Marlena here. When she comes to my soap group on FB it is as Connie, not Marlena, and it is as a Visitor or Guest, not a Joiner. She posts but she doesn't come often. If she were here, I think she'd use one of her 2 names!

Michigan as far as I know is a total non-starter! Never heard it before the other day when Neil posted that she'd said it. I was nonplussed! Had you ever heard it? 

I cry foul. I have been following your stated wishes. It's not right for you to quote me or criticize me under the circumstances you set. Now I would have PM'd you with this but you made that an impossibility. 

Edited November 16, 2023 by Donna L. Bridges
typo

[Paul Raven]

 SUNDAY DISPATCH,Pittsburgh  FEBRUARY 25 1979

A bold and innovative step in network history takes place when "Another World , becomes television's first 90-minute drama series this Monday. Four years ago last January, "Another World became the first one-hour drama in daytime television when it expanded from its 30-minute format. Despite the obvious pitfalls and dangers that accompany such a daring move, most insiders are betting that the venture will succeed.

Michael Brockman, Vice President Daytime Programs, NBC boasted "Another World production team made the transition to 60 minutes so easily and so successfully that we are extremely confident it will enjoy a similar success with the new format." Paul Rauch, executive producer of Another World" added. "Our talented cast and production people are excited about this development which will once again thrust 'Another World' into the role of a pioneer in the industry.

It is expected that Another World" will carry at least 40 regular contract players in addition to extras and bit players. Some familiar faces from cancelled shows who will join the cast include BRUCE GRAY (Ex. Neil Chapman, High Hopes") and CHRISTINE JONES ("For Richer. For Poorer"). Also JOE HINDY will portray "Burt McGowan in the expanded series.

Understandably, the show will have to use bigger sets, more actors and faster-moving story lines. There will be a special emphasis on location shooting which will increase the possibilities for more varied physical action. All this will enhance the program and reward loyal Another World fans with action-packed entertainment and high drama. Although production emphasis has been centered on keeping the viewer entertained, much care has been taken to keep the actors from collapsing after a long, rigorous, workday. Actors will be divided into a morning and an afternoon group to tape scenes out of sequence.

In this way an actor does not have to be on-call all day to complete his shooting obligations. After the complete days shooting, the scenes will be rearranged in proper sequence before airing, using the show's new. Sterling tape editing machines. Always noted for its quality performances and performers, Another World has won a total of four Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Daytime Serial in 1976. The series has also earned numerous awards from television magazines for writing, directing and acting.

[chrisml]

All this talk about Victoria Wynham made me search for interviews, and I found one with Sandra Ferguson that interested me. She talks about an actor behaving inappropriately towards her on her second stint on the show. I wonder who it could be. I was not watching AW much then so don't know who she would have been working with. Interview

[Contessa Donatella]

I only know about her problems with RKK & supposedly they have made peace with each other & he would've been her first tenure, so that doesn't work out. When she came back, most of the time she was with the actor who played her daughter (Alicia Leigh Willis) & the actor who played Cameron (Michael Rodrick), plus Victoria & Matt Crane, IOW, family. Sure sounds like the kind of problem that would be with a romantic scene partner, which would mean Rodrick. But, I don't know. 

OY. 

[Contessa Donatella]

I've read the interview now. I was amazed that they spelled Cory wrong. I was fascinated that they had bodyguards when they went to Canada!!!

It's funny that she describes her & Victoria having some discord between them, at first, but then becoming very close so much so that they kept in touch for a long while after the show was over. That is just about a one to one echo of VW coming in to be Rachel after Connie had been working with Strasser. They immediately clashed but then became like family they were so close.

Thanks for sharing this interview. 

Edited November 16, 2023 by Donna L. Bridges
just had a thought

[vetsoapfan]

Actually, yes it was.

Bay City and Somerset were both said (on air) to be in Michigan.

On a talk show years later, when she had found success on primetime TV, Audra Lindley also referred to Bay City as being set in Michigan.

This is why I was so annoyed when AW suddenly started to refer to the town as being in Illinois. TPTB not doing their homework (or making arbitrary changes for no fathomable reason) is egregious to me.

Throughout the decades, I have found historical inaccuracies posted and printed everywhere. It's frustrating, of course, but trying to combat the problem is like trying to prevent the tide from rolling into the shore...with a spoon, LOL.

What did MdL say about Ryan's Hope that was wrong? (I did not see her piece about that show.)

[Contessa Donatella]

Well, isn't that something. Officially it is said that it was no place in particular until 1982 when they located in Illinois. But, I am no longer surprised since that moment last year when Lance Jackson said, "Why am I the only person who remembers that Kathy on SFT had the first legal abortion?!!" (Brought about from a discussion where Y&R anniversary primetime claimed Ashley had the first abortion and Y&R was the first soap to do social issues storylines. HUH?!! 

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) 

Ain't it the truth?!!! It literally took me weeks to correct one thing wrong about Beverlee McKinsey's special billing on Texas on both IMDb & on wikipedia. And, frankly, I was pleased that it actually did come to pass! 

It is up thread here in a post by Neil about a review of Tom's book. Off the top of my head it was 3 things - 1st soap to be a real location, Mary Ryan 1st journalist, and something else ... 

[Mona Kane Croft]

She said RH was the first soap opera set in New York City, and the first soap opera to be set in a real location.   Both incorrect.  She also said the Ryan's were the first identifiable ethnic family on a soap opera, and that Mary Ryan was the first female journalist on a soap opera.  Also both incorrect.   When MdL starts spouting out "firsts," she really seems to go off the rails.  She needs an editor or a researcher.   

[vetsoapfan]

Right. The same applies to Harding Lemay's book. So many fans take it as gospel, yet it is filled with one man's subjective opinions, nothing more. (That's not to say it is bad for someone to interpret situations and people subjectively in his own memoir, but it just does not equate to universal, subjective truth.)

ITA. Often people read something somewhere that completely contradicts what viewers witnessed first-hand, on screen. In my experience, newer viewers (who never watched the material in question) tend to disbelieve folks who actually did see the events as they played out on screen, if it contradicts other reports from  second-hand sources.

[Contessa Donatella]

Or maybe just to be younger. Last year the incredible, amazing Lynda T. Hirsch made 3 or 4 errors of fact & published one item as news when she had inadvertently picked up something from 4 years before. YIKES. I fear as we age we may be more subject to having to publish OOPS, ... ya think? Of course, I doubt you're looking at old age as I am. Bette Davis, who was a daily watcher of both AW & ATWT, said, "Old age is not for sissies." And, she was completely correct! 

Might as well go ahead & say the trifecta. Also AW fans - Tallulah Bankhead & Greta Garbo. Val Dufour, said to know everyone, was a friend of Garbo's. It is said that Bankhead would call the studio & actors & make suggestions & she was the impatient type who would've wanted someone to hit Aunt Liz with a big pocketbook, for example. 

Quite different from people who like to avoid the BTS stories, I love them. 

I would pick a nit here. Certainly saying "nothing more" diminshes the fact that it is his lived experience. He was there when it was happening. Eyewitness testimony is both revered and detested & both are probably correct. And, while of course there was subjectivity in 8 YRS IN AW, I would suggest that there is also objectivity.

Edited November 16, 2023 by Donna L. Bridges
typos!

[Mona Kane Croft]

When it comes to listing "firsts" on various soap operas, it seems people have the attitude, "If I don't remember something, then this must be a first."  When in many (if not most) cases, it isn't a "first" at all.

I don't remember any divorced women on soap operas before Lisa Hughes, so I'm going to publish that Lisa was the first divorced woman on a soap.  LOL.

Edited November 16, 2023 by Mona Kane Croft

[vetsoapfan]

There was an interview posted in an on-line soap-opera website once (the name is not coming to me), in which the ill-formed interviewer was asking Claire Labine about her past work on Love of Life. He wanted to know the details of how she handled Ben Harper's victimization in prison, when thugs tried to rape him. The thing is, that storyline happened a long time after Labine had left the show, and she had nothing to do with it. If the interviewer did not want to do his research, why couldn't he have simply asked, "Ms Labine, were you at the show when Love of Life tackled the issue of sexual assault in prison?" Why start with the premise that she had been involved, when you have no clue?

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So wait...she wrote that Bay City was originally set in Michigan, AND she wrote that Ryan's Hope was the first soap to be set in a real locale?

Didn't AW debut in 1964 and RH in 1975? Isn't Michigan a real place? Bay City is an actual city in that state.

I guess Nancy Karr was introduced on The Edge of Night after Mary Ryan debuted on RH.

UGH. 

I can understand newbies making obvious errors like this, but MdL should not. (Alan Locher is terrible with facts, too, which is why I have trouble watching his interviews on youtube.)

 

[j swift]

I have a question about Mac's kids.

Around the time of Rachel's pregnancy with Matthew, we learn that Mac is impotent (which we know is imprecise soap-speak for either male infertility or erectile dysfunction), that is how we knew that he wasn't the father of Rachel's baby.

However, if we assume that he wasn't impotent during the conception of Sandy or Paulina, was his fertility issue a result of his being drugged?  Was it a cardiac issue?  Or, did we never learn the specifics.

Also, am I confusing Sandy with his mother, or were they both sex workers?  And was Paulina's Mom a sex worker as well, or just some gal?  And, who was the woman (beside Rachel) that Mac and Carl had in common?  Was Reg involved with her too?

OK, last question of the morning.  Was there confusion over when Reg and Carl met?  Because when Donna was introduced, we were told that Carl was her ex-husband that she met and married in Europe after Reg left for South America.  But later, isn't there an insinuation that Reginald and Carl shared a past?

Edited November 16, 2023 by j swift