Another World Discussion Thread

[Contessa Donatella]

Well, one thing that NBC and P&G did was they took turns selecting EPs & HWs. So, this would have been P&G's turn to choose HW. And, yes, that meant sometimes the right hand and the left hand were playing different piano pieces!!! 

[Jdee43]

For the 86-89 period, I never understood  why they would bring on Denise Alexander and Chris Robinson. Were they trying to recapture the magic of Rick and Lesley on General Hospital? Were Rick and Lesley even that magical that they deserved to be reunited on another show? Would people really tune in for that? If they were going to take stars and couples from other shows, how about taking younger ones? Or better yet, how about mining Another World's own history and the history of its spin-offs for people to bring on? 

 

Edited November 30, 2023 by Jdee43

[Contessa Donatella]

Well, Denise Alexander was so popular that several times people really fought to get her. I think that readily explains her. And Chris Robinson as Jason Frame, did they ever try to put Mary & Jason together? I always thought that they just hired him to play Jason & it had nothing to do with Denise. Am I being naive? I dunno. 

[Jdee43]

It's just funny, in the late 80s, Days of our Lives gets General Hospital's Laura, while Anotner World gets Laura's parents. Another sign of Another World's second class status by then.

Edited November 30, 2023 by Jdee43

[Khan]

I think so.  Next to Luke and Laura, the Lesley/Rick/Monica/Alan quadrangle was (and still is) GH's most memorable storyline, and probably the story that catapulted GH to the top of the ratings, too.  Denise Alexander and Chris Robinson were available at that point, so I can understand P&G's wish to lure in GH viewers by hiring them.  (Frankly, I think they would've done better to lure away actors from either ATWT or OLTL, since those were their time slot competitors, but I digress).

Unfortunately, P&G believed that the mere act of hiring them would be enough to attract and keep new viewers.  It never dawned on them that viewers don't just want to see their favorites on screen again; they also want to see them supported by good writing, too.

[AbcNbc247]

They were probably hoping to lure that fanbase over to AW. Soaps have done that for forever.

Hey, Days is doing that right now with Steve Burton and Tamara Braun.

[j swift]

Historically, hiring Denise Alexander in hopes of increasing ratings is an age-old trick going back to when GH scooped her up from DAYS.

Edited November 30, 2023 by j swift

[Contessa Donatella]

A reminder to us about Denise Alexander. Schemering p. 253

Then it talks about her work in the live theatre. Next, she gets exclusive with prime-time TV shows, over 200 of them including Father Knows Best, Ben Casey, Twilight Zone, Dobie Gillis and The Virginian. 

1960 she started in soaps. The Clear Horizon, Ben Jarrod. 

 GH got her away from Days with a very lucrative deal. She was part of the ratings explosion brought about by Marland & Monty. She was voted Daytime TV's Best Actress in 1972, 1973 & in 1980. She was in their top 10 more than anyone else. 

The bio goes on but you get the idea. 

[j swift]

It bears repeating that one of the missed opportunities was showing us what Mary loved about Reginald.

I don't know if it is attributed to the limits of the actor or the writing, but Reginald was such a jerk from the moment he returned, that it was a fête accomplice that Mary would reunite with Vince.  Even though, Vince was no treasure and had explosive anger issues.  Giving Reg some vulnerability through his relationship with Mary and Scott would have gone a long way in humanizing the character.

I would have adored if Mary pulled an “I choose me” scenario and used her new degree to work at the hospital or open a clinic.  It was just too unreasonable that she never missed her philanthropic work, her huge house in Paraguay, or her staff from her prior life.  She could've run the shelter where Kate and Tomas showed up and spoke Spanish to the many Latino males that were cast in the late 90s.

Edited November 30, 2023 by j swift

[Paul Raven]

AW got back on track in terms of structure in 86.

The McKinnons and the Loves 2 contrasting families. The Corys representing whatever history the show had left.

If they could have introduced some Matthews at that time even better.

But then they systematically began chipping away. As stated Reg, who could have been a compelling villain was given no nuance. Mary's dilemma was not explored properly.

Ben was dropped and forgotten, MJ recast and her character changed for the old 'I was once a prostitute' plot. 

Zane killed off. Cass and Kathleen left,so did Jake and Marley,Nicole ,Peter,then Nancy. Quinn murdered.

And so on-one bone headed move on top of the next.

[AbcNbc247]

I do wonder if it was a mandate by the network/P&G to make AW more like Days around that time, or if it was just Margaret DePriest writing what she knew lol

[Contessa Donatella]

NBC absolutely did say/tell/ask P&G to make AW more like DAYS. 

When they said it? ... unknown. Apparently it came up, so to speak, more than once. 

Remember when Tomas thought he saw a vampire? Specifically written to be more like DAYS. 

[Paul Raven]

Was Corinne Jacker given free reign? It seems that way. 

Maybe if she had been given more guidance or an experienced co writer ,things might have been better. She claims to have watched from the start, but nothing onscreen reflected that.

Courier Express, 27 December 1981

Playwright enters Another World by Tom Jory.

-Corinne Jacker was hired by producers of NBC's "Another World" to pump new life into the slumping daytime serial, and the Obie-winning playwright says she knew right away what had to be done.

"I'd followed the show from the start," says Ms.Jacker, who took the job as head writer for the series in October, "so it was easy. I felt the stories they'd been using lately had taken 'Another World' away from the things that I loved about the show. "I told them 'I wanted the show to reflect normal life -- no gangsters, no dope, no towns freezing over. I said I wanted to find drama in the people, the characters.

"IT SEEMS TO ME the soap opera is as close as you can get to a novel by Dickens or Balzac - which, by the way, were serialized first in cheap pulp editions. And that's what I hope to do, only more. Because when you look at Dickens, he's characterizing in broad strokes - villains are villains and good people are good people. I want my characters more finely drawn.

"And I think we're beginning to accomplish that," she says. "The kinds of things I didn't like - 'The Breather," the rape scene - are gone, and there's no more organized crime. Remember, there's plenty of drama in life, like in Dickens and Balzac, and that's what's happening in 'Another World.'

"'The problem with the other stuff," she says - the city froze over in ABC's 'General Hospital" - "is it works for a while. You tune in to see Liz Taylor on 'General Hospital," and it's exciting. Then the others try to imitate that, and it doesn't work, and the viewer is less thrilled."

IN ADDITION TO MS. JACKER, the series' producers hired two new directors and a new scenic designer, and changed the show's music and opening. There have been several cast changes under the new head writer, and Ms. Jacker is busy adjusting the demographics for Bay City, the fictional setting for "'Another World." 

The hourlong show, once on a slide opposite "All My Children" on ABC and CBS "As the World Turns" and "Search for Tomorrow," seems to even have begun stabilized - maybe even began an  upward swing. Ms Jacker's background is in the theater theater and, she says the stories will get deeper, with more wrinkles. My reputation is of a serious dramatist. I've never a written  episodic drama. I'm  a little more interested in the subtleties of characters than others might be."

SHE'LL ALSO INTRODUCE what Paul Rauch, the program's executive producer, calls "contemporary issues." One of the first characters Ms. Jacker created was Harry Shea, a union boss, played by Ed Power. "We're  having a black family come into the show as a core family and I think I'm right that it's the first black family in a soap where one member is not a doctor, lawyer  or other professional person.  And we've got an older mother who gets pregnant. In other words," she says, "'we're trying to deal with issues that affect all of us."

Ms. Jacker has been prominent as a playwright off Broadway and for regional and repertory theater for more than a decade. Her "Bits and Pieces" at the Manhattan Theater Club in 1975 won an Off-Broadway Obie award, and "Harry Outside," produced at the Circle Repertory Theater in '76, was similarly honored. She is playwright in residence at the Circle Rep.

MS. JACKER  ALSO has written extensively for television. She wrote the script for Katherine Anne Porter's ''The Jilting of Granny Weatherall," an "American Short Story' presentation on +public TV in 1980, and developed and wrote scripts for three episodes of "The Best of Families," a public television miniseries broadcast in 1977.

"My feeling in taking this was that the key lay in the organic development of the plot," she says. "So I've restricted myself to the longterm plot and the daily story breakdown. The five writers who work with me do the dialogue." Ms. Jacker says she develops biographies for all the characters in the show, for use by the dialogue writers, and they're working now on a map of Bay City, to help with geographical relationships.

[TVFAN1144]

 

Edited December 2, 2023 by TVFAN1144

[Mona Kane Croft]

I was watching at the time, and I can't remember specifically anything Jacker did at AW, other than continue the return of Steve Frame, which Rauch had already decided to do, and the previous writer had laid the groundwork for that.  In my opinion, she botched Steve Frame's return by making it too unbelievable (isn't a return from the dead already unbelievable enough??), by surrounding it with over the top details, secret rooms, Harry Shea as Steve's "best friend" even though the viewers had never seen him before, etc, etc. And for someone who supposedly watched AW from day-one, how did she happen to ignore so many details of Steve's previously established history? And his previous relationships with Alice, Rachel, and Jamie?  Nearly everything seemed to be made up as she went along, rather than relying on established history, which many fans at the time still remembered very well.  I realize casting was also a problem, but the writing was far worse than the casting.  Believe me -- that much is true.  Nobody will ever convince me that David Canary was not capable of playing Steve Frame. Canary was one of the best actors in daytime.  All Canary needed was a lesson in Steve's history, and some direction (you know, by the director).

But back to my original question -- aside from Steve's botched return, what else was happening in Bay City during Jacker's time as head writer?  It must have been forgettable, because I have forgotten it.  LOL. And how long did Jacker stay at AW?