OLTL: Question about 1991 cast transition

[Carolyn1980]

There's one thing that stands out in my mind about Grace Phillips at the time...and maybe this feeds into Connie's impressions of Gottlieb...

Phillips was always griping in the press about what direction she thought her character should go in (for instance, Sarah fell for her psychiatrist, Christopher Jonas...played by a well-known soap actor at the time whose name escapes me....and she said Sarah would never have fallen for him, even though she'd only played the role for about 9 months at the time), so maybe Gottlieb didn't like that, lol?

But that is TOTAL speculation. We will probably never know for sure.

[SFK]

MarlenaDLC, I was just reading an article online where you wrote that once upon a time, the "ever-grandstanding" LG was one of your favorite "punching bags" Were you one of the folks in the industry who felt that she was trying too hard to fix things that weren't broke, or did you perhaps feel that she was a little too ambitious, misguided even, when it came to her particular vision for daytime?

[DRW50]

Didn't people used to write things like Linda "Dirty Dancing" Gottlieb? I can see where her being new to daytime and being ambitious probably annoyed people. It's interesting though because she and Wendy Riche both turned their shows around, although Wendy probably stayed too long. Now you have producers who have soap experience but don't seem to have any idea what they are doing. Who knows if that's on them or if it's network interference.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

Am I the only one who preferred Mia Korf's Asian Blair? I've never liked Kassive DePaiva, I've always found her to be too hammy, and yeah, annoying. I also liked the character a lot better with Korf, though it was certainly a different character than what she would become under Depaiva.

OLTL had a terrific casting director during the Gottlieb era though.

[SFK]

You are not the only one, Kassie should have played an entirely different Cramer cousin.

[Carolyn1980]

I actually preferred her, too, lol. When Kassie DePaiva debuted...ugh, she was horrible. But she improved, and I enjoyed her initial story with Roger Howarth's Todd (though I've always been annoyed Susan Diol's Angela was dumped because TPTB said once Blair came back, Angela was "redundant").

I'm also probably one of the few who sided with Skye during the whole Blair/Max/Skye triangle, though I thought both women should've either told Max to eff off, or hook up with each other, lol. I thought Robin Christopher just blew Kassie DePaiva out of the water acting-wise.

That said...I don't hate KdP.

I can say for sure, however, that such a recast (changing races) would NEVER go over in today's internet-driven world. Back then, you went, "WTF?," but what were you gonna do...write a letter? Most wouldn't bother. Today....oy....you could go online and 500+ people would all be saying, "WTF?," lol.....and then you could all organize....

They would NEVER try that today.

[Carolyn1980]

My favorite line from Skye during her OLTL tenure was when Max asked her where Blair was (after Skye had told her some secret I can't remember), and she said she was probably "headed for the hills, screaming like a banshee."

That's Blair to me, in a nutshell, lol.

[SFK]

HA! That's our Kentucky Fried Cramer! And I agree, it's not that I totally dislike her, it's just that to this day I can't reconcile the fact that she's the same Blair Mia Korf played. I try to convince myself it's like a Julie Newmar/Eartha Kitt-type thing, but... We posted about this a while back, and someone said that Malone's original concept for Blair was a Scarlett O'Hara-type. I'm imagining Lisa Peluso's Lila on Another World.

[Carolyn1980]

LOL.

See...I never bought that Malone's original concept was that Blair was a "Scarlett O'Hara" type....because while he technically "created" the character, Mia Korf was hired through another one of Linda Gottlieb's "innovations," whereby she interviewed various actors, and designed new characters around the actor (she only did this in 1991, when she first arrived). That's how Luna, Jason, and Blair were all created....based on interviews with Susan Batten, Mark Brettschneider, and Mia Korf.

So I always figured that having Malone say that later on, once Kassie DePaiva was cast in the part, was just part of a revisionist history to try to convince any naysayers that she "fit" the part.

Because really?.....the role was created for Mia Korf.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

Mark Brettschneider was gorgeous...LOL!

I wonder what happened to him.

[Carolyn1980]

He did a cameo as a TV host in the movie "That Thing You Do" back in 1996...and he was involved in David Ledingham's (ex-Suede,OLTL) theater project in LA in the late 90's (along with Kirk Geiger)...but since then, he's dropped off the face of the earth.

[bellcurve]

Would have killed to see this play out on OLTL, given how honest most of the storytelling seemed back then.

Exactly. And in addition to those shows being misogynistic and having useless characters, the people behind the scenes aren't concerned with putting out the best quality product.

Doesn't matter whether she was the bitch from hell who thought she was better than everyone else in daytime. She cared. And that's more than what we can say for everyone across the board these days.

The directing was great also. She really utilized every single corner and every single area of a set and props.

[DRW50]

Did Gottlieb come up with the David Vickers story, and the sexual abuse story for Viki?

I wonder what would have happened with a few of those stories if she'd stayed. I didn't think Malone had a good handle on characters like Tina. I wonder how she felt about them.

[Carolyn1980]

She was there when Tuc Watkins arrived, but departed shortly thereafter.

YES, she was behind the sexual abuse story for Viki, in conjunction with Michael Malone. In fact, as Roy Thinnes has confirmed, it was supposed to happen a year before it actually did. They delayed it when Clint Ritchie had his tractor accident....and it also gave Thinnes more time on the show (he was supposed to die within a year of his debut), since the long-term story was always designed to have Viki enamored of Sloan (who reminded her of her father), and then have that relationship (as he was dying from cancer) bring about the repressed memories of her sexual abuse...and then eventually, Viki would've reunited with Clint. It was a long-term story planned far in advance, and while I personally preferred Sloan to Clint (and Sloan had become a popular character), I admired the show's commitment to the story as planned, even though it meant Sloan had to die (nowadays, a focus group would've determined the outcome of the story).

Ultimately, when Gottlieb was gone, it was Slezak who put the kibosh on a reunion for Clint and Viki.

[DRW50]

I wonder sometimes if Slezak regretted that move since she had no story from 1996-1999, but then she did get the Ben story, which some liked (I did not).

I didn't realize until I came here that they had ever planned to reunite Clint and Viki, or what the true plans of Sloan were about. This place is such a great resource.