Another World Discussion Thread

[vetsoapfan]

Yes, I've read that too.

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[amybrickwallace]

If you or anyone else is interested in reading it, here's the link to Part 1 (they link up the rest):

https://www.welovesoaps.net/2015/08/Steven-Rachel-Alice-1.html?m=1

 

Edited August 17, 2021 by amybrickwallace

[Paul Raven]

Do posters think that Tina Sloan would have made a good Alice? I saw her in some scenes as Olivia on AW up against Vana and she was much livelier and easier to watch.

Edited August 17, 2021 by Paul Raven

[vetsoapfan]

Thank you so much.

Another way to experience this story is by tracking down and reading the Another World novelizations (there are two), written by Kate Lowe Kerrigan.

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While the Kerrigan books are not high art, they are miles above the dreadful AW books put out by the Soaps & Serials company years later. The S&S paperbacks go over the same basic storyline, but in much less detail, with noticeably weaker writing, and with lots of mistakes. 

 

If you read the Kerrigan books, and watch/listen to all the video/audio material which survives from the period, it's the closest you can get to experiencing this mesmerizing storyline "first-hand."

[vetsoapfan]

Honestly, after watching her for the first 11 years of the show, I did not want to see any other performer cast in the role of Alice, other than Jacqueline Courtney. I think Tina Sloan could be a good actress, but she did not project the intense vulnerability and heightened emotionalism that JC had in spades. 

All that being said, I think Judith Light could have done it. 

[BetterForgotten]

Would you have preferred they killed Alice off rather than the recasts, @vetsoapfan? 

For all their biases, I'm surprised Rauch and Lemay didn't take it that far and just cut the character completely. 

[vetsoapfan]

No, I would have been furious if P&G had allowed Lemay and Rauch to kill off Alice too, after killing both Steven Frame and Mary Matthews.

My first choice would have been to write out the character completely. That way, after Lemay and Rauch departed the show, future writers and producers could have brought Alice/JC back, without permanent damage having been done to the character. 

I wonder if Lemay would have preferred killing off Alice. The character was basically ruined and/or useless after 1975 anyway.

Edited August 17, 2021 by vetsoapfan

[amybrickwallace]

Thanks for the recommendation. I'll see if my library or eBay has them.

[Xanthe]

IIRC, Lemay found out about the Kate Lowe Kerrigan novelization from something promoting her as the writer (or author?) of Another World and was quite peeved. I can't really blame him if that was the case. 

 

[Xanthe]

I have no memory of Alice before 1984 so I was trying to put together what the chronology of the recasts and their storylines must have been. It looks like Jacquie Courtney adopted Sally (Cathy Greene) before she left.

Susan Harney married Ray Gordon, was terrorized by Olive, raised Sally, and nearly married Dan Shearer.

Wesley Anne Pfenning was there for a brief period when juvenile delinquent Sally (Julie Phillips) ran away from boarding school and chased Joey Perrini.

Vana Tribbey dated Mitch (!!!) and some guy named Zachary, was overprotective of Sally (Jennifer Runyon) who was dating Leigh Hobson, and grew close to Mac.

Linda Borgeson got engaged to Mac before Steve came back from the dead. Reading the synopses I was surprised they developed Alice and Mac for so long and then recast for the engagement and the Steve story with an actress who was apparently even less popular. But Mac dating Alice seems like a terrible idea no matter how you slice it.

[vetsoapfan]

I doubt these paperbacks are the sort of thing most libraries would carry (soap-based novels are too low-brow, LOL), but you may be able to find them on eBay or amazon. I've seen the books being sold on both those sites.

[vetsoapfan]

Yes, there was a party scheduled for launch of the novels, and Kate Lowe Kerrigan was being credited as the author of the adaptations. Lemay became vexed because he had been the headwriter of the actual show for years by then, and had created the story and situations dealt with in Kerrigan's novels (well, particularly Book Two, since a lot of what took place in her Book One had been based on the work of Agnes Nixon).

I never heard about Agnes Nixon getting vexed about any of this. (Just sayin'.

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)

Isn't it common practice for the novelizations/adaptations of TV series and movies to be penned by different people other than those who wrote the original TV and film scripts? It happens...all the time. The copyright owners can do whatever they please, and hire anyone they want, to write the novelizations based on their property.

That being said, it would have been courteous and diplomatic for P&G to have a notice printed on the copyright pages of Kerrigan's books (or perhaps on the back covers), along the lines of, "Based on television stories and scripts written by Agnes Nixon, Robert Cenedella and Harding Lemay."

Then Lemay would only have had his third-place billing in the credits to grumble about. LOL! (I jest, I jest!)

[vetsoapfan]

I believe you are correct on all counts.

To be fair to the show, if the audience was not warming up to Vana Tribbey, and TPTB wanted a major story to play out with Rachel, Mac and Alice, it kind of makes sense that the producers would try out another actress and keep their fingers crossed that viewers would accept her. How they bungled the casting process and hired such an awful performer remains the principle mystery here.

[Xanthe]

Lemay seems to have interpreted (or assumed the fans would interpret) the promo as crediting her as the writer of the show and not specifically the novelizations. It's confusing because they both have the same title. I'd be curious to see the actual ad to judge how misleading it actually was. 

In his telling:

"A publishing friend sent me a newspaper advertisement for a large luncheon discussion featuring stars of “Another World.” Among the names and photographs displayed in the ad was that of an unknown writer credited as author of the serial."

I think the likelihood is it credited her as the author of Another World (meaning the novelizations) and Lemay read it as Another World meaning the show. What I meant though was if the ad was actually more actively misleading ("Kate Lowe Kerrigan, writer of the TV serial Another World") then he would certainly have been justified reclaiming his territory. 

[will81]

This might be the ad. Ran in the New York Daily News August 06, 1978

 

 

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