My mother watched it from the first day so I was exposed to it before I actively watched it. But as a teenager I became interested in what it was all about. That was it. I was bitten by the soap bug. I would never be free of it. But I also wouldn't want to be without it. I have really strong recollections of the triangle. Naturally i had a great affection for Rachel but also Alice had been a thing for me, Pat's baby sister & I adored Pat. It seemed to me that the whole Matthews family treated Alice like she was something special. I guess that was so. But, don't get me wrong, Alice was not spoiled. If anything she was sweet, no pretensions, didn't put on airs, very level-headed. Now I've made her sound like some goody-goody which she was not. Likely she was just an ordinary girl, although she was very very pretty. Such a blonde, with long curls. She was the apple of many eyes. And, of course, her looks were diametrically opposed to the brunette Rachel, who almost looked ethnic in contrast. So each of them was a raving beauty. Steven Frame was such a lucky man. Rachel is called by some that raven-haired beauty who gave her mother so much trouble. That, too is accurate.

19 minutes ago, Contessa Donatella said:

For me it was the 70s. I began watching both AW & DAYS during that summer. 1970-something. Let me see if I can narrow it down. I think that I was 16, which would make it 1967. So not the 70s. That means that Rachel wasn't Rachel yet. By that I mean Robin Strasser was playing her. And, that is accurate. She was Rachel when I first watched the show. Oh, my, I just realized. Agnes WAS SAVING THE SHOW when I first started watching. Amazing! I can hardly catch my breath. This is too much. I cannot believe it. But I know it's true. 

Wow, this is truly amazing! I can't even process that I'm communicating with a person who watched AW from 1967 and was grown enough to remember and appreciate it! I am equally jealous and equally impressed and full of respect for you. All I know is that I'm going to treasure your experience with the show... and take everything you share with a special dose of trust - your eyes have seen some of the most treasured moments in soap opera history. Your ears have heard some of the most amazing dialogue that's even been written. I am in awe. Thank you for going on that walk down memory lane. This is the exact response I was dreaming of reading. ❤️ 

Edited December 29, 2024Dec 29 by Maxim

1 minute ago, Maxim said:

Wow, this is truly amazing! I can't even process that I'm communicating with a person who watched AW from 1967 and was grown enough to remember and appreciate it! I am equally jealous and equally impressed and full of respect for you. All I know is that I'm going to treasure your experience with the show... and take everything you share with a special dose of trust - your eyes have seen some of the most treasured moments in soap opera history. Your ears have heard some of the most amazing dialogue that's even been written. I am in awe. Thank you for going on that memory walk. This is the exact response I was dreaming of reading. ❤️ 

Yabbut I feel slightly stupid that I didn't realize this before now. It just goes to show that an unexamined life is not worth living. I should have examined these memories a long time ago, but at least I am doing so now.  That's what is most important. And I'm sure that you & others here will assist me in this journey, or memory walk as you have so aptly put it.

37 minutes ago, Mona Kane Croft said:

I had been aware of the show since the very beginning, 1964.  I was very young, but my mother watched AW daily, and I saw it occasionally on school holidays. I remember bits and pieces of Pat Matthews' first murder trial.  So the creator, Irna Phillips, was writing at that time.  

Later, I remember more details during Agnes Nixon's run as head-writer.  But still was not watching regularly -- only catching the occasional episode on school breaks.

I started watching regularly (meaning every day) in 1971 just as Harding Lemay was taking over the duties as head-writer (the first time).  And I was very quickly hooked by Lemay's unusual character-driven writing style.   Lemay wrote those characters as if they were real people.  His writing style was so unusual, I would almost call it experimental.  Very sparse plots, but each character was so fully-formed -- they almost didn't need plots.   

Oh my! 1964! Wow! And you started watching regularly just when the magic went in full speed - 1971! You saw the original Iris in her full glory!

And... I appreciate your definition and description of Lemay's writing style. I've experienced a few of his episodes from 1988 and... Your description fits the bill. Psychological, multi-dimensional, authentic... I would sell my soul to go back in time and watch in 1971 too. I'm so sad I'm only 29, going on 30 years old... 😂

Just now, Contessa Donatella said:

Yabbut I feel slightly stupid that I didn't realize this before now. It just goes to show that an unexamined life is not worth living. I should have examined these memories a long time ago, but at least I am doing so now.  That's what is most important. And I'm sure that you & others here will assist me in this journey, or memory walk as you have so aptly put it.

This will be an honor to be a part of!  A journey in Another World. 

1 minute ago, Maxim said:

Oh my! 1964! Wow! And you started watching regularly just when the magic went in full speed - 1971! You saw the original Iris in her full glory!

And... I appreciate your definition and description of Lemay's writing style. I've experienced a few of his episodes from 1988 and... Your description fits the bill. Psychological, multi-dimensional, authentic... I would sell my soul to go back in time and watch in 1971 too. I'm so sad I'm only 29, going on 30 years old... 😂

I would sell my soul just to have the Lemay years. Even one or two of his first years. It is truly a tragedy that we don't have his material. 

38 minutes ago, AbcNbc247 said:

My first experience with AW was in 1996. But I was 3 going on 4 so idk if that really counts. That year, it was first written by Tom King&Craig Carlson. And then by Margaret DePriest again. It was also a time that the network was really trying to turn AW into a Days clone. 

I got back into it when it first started being shown on SoapNet in 2003. The first episode I saw was MJ watching her hooker tape 😂

I remember liking most of it, but at the same time, I didn’t have much to compare it with. But I also remember thinking that it was weird that the Michael/Donna/John triangle was dropped so suddenly.

Ah, that infamous prostitute Modesta... she was a lot of people's first I assume, since SoapNet started airing the episodes from that moment. Thank you for sharing this with me! And I really feel petrified of the thought that... by 1996 AW was looking like DAYS. I don't want to say anything bad about DAYS, but...  I'm scared.  Which era of DAYS did it resemble? 😂 The context is in the details.  

6 minutes ago, Maxim said:

Oh my! 1964! Wow! And you started watching regularly just when the magic went in full speed - 1971! You saw the original Iris in her full glory!

And... I appreciate your definition and description of Lemay's writing style. I've experienced a few of his episodes from 1988 and... Your description fits the bill. Psychological, multi-dimensional, authentic... I would sell my soul to go back in time and watch in 1971 too. I'm so sad I'm only 29, going on 30 years old... 😂

Yes, I watched Beverlee McKenzie's Iris from her first AW episode until her last.   And I've always felt Carmen Duncan was a very good replacement.  The writing for Iris was very different in 1988-89, so that caused some unexplained changes in the character.   But none of that was Carmen's fault or responsibility. Despite her bothersome Australian accent, she successfully replaced Ms McKenzie.  She may have been the only actress who could have done that.   

1 minute ago, Contessa Donatella said:

I would sell my soul just to have the Lemay years. Even one or two of his first years. It is truly a tragedy that we don't have his material. 

Maybe we can sell both our souls in a package... if anyone is buying... if it's going to up our chances of getting these episodes. 😂 Joke aside - I will truly lose hope only when I'm not alive and breathing. Till I am... I will look forward to some day waking up and seeing someone has uploaded a large collection of 70s episodes. I like to believe in the impossible. I would even settle for scripts only... I have to do my research on that... I would settle for only reading scripts from that era.

 

3 minutes ago, Mona Kane Croft said:

Yes, I watched Beverlee McKenzie's Iris from her first AW episode until her last.   And I've always felt Carmen Duncan was a very good replacement.  The writing for Iris was very different in 1988-89, so that caused some unexplained changes in the character.   But none of that was Carmen's fault or responsibility. Despite her bothersome Australian accent, she successfully replaced Ms McKenzie.  She may have been the only actress who could have done that.   

I agree. Carmen's Iris was substantially different, but it would have been no matter who was playing the recast Iris. The important thing was that she fulfilled the requirements. She WAS the daughter who interfered with her father's marriage at every turn or any opportunity that she could make. Duncan didn't have that honey-mouth "Daddee" but she still wanted to come in between Rachel & Mac. And, Rachel was still a contemporary of hers which only complicated matters even more, just as it had with Beverlee.

Just now, Mona Kane Croft said:

Yes, I watched Beverlee McKenzie's Iris from her first AW episode until her last.   And I've always felt Carmen Duncan was a very good replacement.  The writing for Iris was very different in 1988-89, so that caused some unexplained changes in the character.   But none of that was Carmen's fault or responsibility. Despite her bothersome Australian accent, she successfully replaced Ms McKenzie.  She may have been the only actress who could have done that.   

And this my friend... is something I am truly envious of (not the bad bitter envy, but looking through a window thinking - ah, how I want this for myself too-envy). ❤️

And I agree about Carmen being a perfect replacement. She did a different take on the character, which is important after you follow such a L - E - G -E - N - D. Beverlee will be THE Iris. She embodied her 100 percent. There is no doubt in my mind.

I find myself completely satisfied with Carmen's version too. Even my husband who is very critical of actors on soaps (I am more forgiving than him) thinks she's the best in the show in the episodes we are watching right now. He loves to hate her. And that is a huge compliment to Carmen's ability.

If I have to be honest - from what I've seen from the OG Iris and comparing her to Carmen-Iris - Beverlee played a more sinister and cold version. With a romantic twist of course. She still makes you smile and laugh, but it's more... smile... at the level of superiority she exhumes and the way she dominates people and scenes. Carmen's version is a perfect late 80s antagonist in my eyes, her version makes me laugh like hell. I find her more Disney-Cruella-over-the-top, but not in a bad way. I love both of them. 

1 hour ago, DRW50 said:

Bekins was definitely the best for me, even if I wonder how he'd be with Reinholt.

My introduction to the show was through AWHP. I saw some of their '80s tapes and read their site at the same time as I started watching the show, which was much worse in comparison. I think the first "new" episodes I watched were from late '96.

AWHP really is the place that we would not be able to survive without. I find myself constantly visiting that site. It's in my first bookmarks. And here is another statement that in 1996 things were quite worse than the late 80s. Was it De Priest who was writing the show in 96 or am I mistaken? I have a bad experience with her writing so far. 

6 minutes ago, Maxim said:

AWHP really is the place that we would not be able to survive without. I find myself constantly visiting that site. It's in my first bookmarks. And here is another statement that in 1996 things were quite worse than the late 80s. Was it De Priest who was writing the show in 96 or am I mistaken? I have a bad experience with her writing so far. 

That would have been DePriest, yes (I didn't realize her work was still appearing in January 1997). At that time I'd just seen select clips of '80s AW, so had rose colored glasses, but I did prefer them. The best I can say about late '96 AW is you had some good actors who made you care when the writing didn't. They were also smart enough to center Rachel, even if the story was dumb (the twins and the tumor).

1 minute ago, DRW50 said:

That would have been DePriest, yes (I didn't realize her work was still appearing in January 1997). At that time I'd just seen select clips of '80s AW, so had rose colored glasses, but I did prefer them. The best I can say about late '96 AW is you had some good actors who made you care when the writing didn't. They were also smart enough to center Rachel, even if the story was dumb (the twins and the tumor).

And what do you think of this 1996 intro?  🙃

 

5 minutes ago, DRW50 said:

That would have been DePriest, yes (I didn't realize her work was still appearing in January 1997). At that time I'd just seen select clips of '80s AW, so had rose colored glasses, but I did prefer them. The best I can say about late '96 AW is you had some good actors who made you care when the writing didn't. They were also smart enough to center Rachel, even if the story was dumb (the twins and the tumor).

That was the fans, well, some of the fans. VW didn't want to have late-in-life babies. But the show was convinced that the fans wanted her & Carl to have their own family. You know how that goes. So VW was stuck with it. And, yes, there always had to be story for Rachel. 

2 minutes ago, Maxim said:

And what do you think of this 1996 intro?  🙃

 

ACK! Jill Farren Phelps spent big bucks that the show could ill afford on this ER/NYPD Blue wholly derivative schlock fest. IOW I couldn't stand it!

Edited December 29, 2024Dec 29 by Contessa Donatella
typo

7 minutes ago, Maxim said:

And what do you think of this 1996 intro?  🙃

One of my least favorite soap opens. To me it has dated much more than the Gayle/Morris intro. And then they could not afford proper updates (although they had a few, like Rhonda Ross - hell knowing P&G by then maybe she paid for it herself). My "favorite" was when they didn't bother to update Kevin McClatchy leaving but kept the shot of Dahlia Salem, so we just got shots of her spinning in some unknown figure's arms. Any time I see that I keep expecting to hear "AAAGGGHHH!!!" and to see her go flying.

7 minutes ago, Contessa Donatella said:

That was the fans, well, some of the fans. VW didn't want to have late-in-life babies. But the show was convinced that the fans wanted her & Carl to have their own family. You know how that goes. So VW was stuck with it. And, yes, there always had to be story for Rachel. 

So that's when they choose to listen to the fans...

I did see a fanfic on here a long time ago that made good use of them but the possibilities in the last years of a soap were not much.

At least they didn't go through with the plans to have Carl bring Satan to Bay City (imagine a possessed Rachel).

Edited December 29, 2024Dec 29 by DRW50

2 minutes ago, DRW50 said:

 At least they didn't go through with the plans to have Carl bring Satan to Bay City (imagine a possessed Rachel).

Oh My God, that would have been rock bottom for daytime as a whole. 😂

8 minutes ago, Contessa Donatella said:

ACK! Jill Farren Phelps spent big bucks that the show could ill afford on this ER/NYPD Blue wholly derivative schlock fest. IOW I couldn't stand it!

Your comment is spot on! Copy-Paste ER.