Guiding Light Discussion Thread

[vetsoapfan]

 

Actually, Steve Jackson vanished without explanation  in 1981, two years before Bill Bauer died.

 

While I agree with your point, I look at it from reverse: With well-established characters on the show who already served specific purposes, why dump them in order to use NEW, unfamiliar characters to then serve the exact same purpose? TGL had Rita to go against Alan, so why bother with Reva? The show had spent years weaving Jackie into Phillip's story, so why artificially insert Alex (who had never existed before) into the mix?

 

Why eliminate characters whom the audience already knows and cares for, with strangers whom viewers may or may not ever accept? What reason would the show possibly have for firing Charita Bauer, for example, only to cast a new, older woman named Gert Lauer (LOL) who buys the Bauer house,. starts volunteering at Cedars, and dishes out advice to the people of Springfield? Would viewers of Y&R understand the mentality behind firing Jeanne Cooper, and then introducing another semi-bitter reclusive matriarch to Genoa City, one who lived alone in a mansion, hated Jill Foster, and made it her life's goal to make Jill miserable?

 

Why throw out what you've already got, when it works so well, unless there's a valid reason like an actor's quitting or dying?

Edited August 27, 2018 by vetsoapfan

[zanereed]

Lenore Kasdorf was asked to return in 1989 along with Michael Zaslow and Maureen Garrett, but she declined. I believe the reason was that she would have had to relocate back to New York. However, I think Pam Long would have written Rita very well, and would have definitely found ways to distinguish her from Reva. It would be hard for me to visualize Kasdorf with Simon's Ed, of course.

 

And yes, Kasdorf left in 1981 because she didn't think that Marland had a good handle on her character, and she was probably right.

[BetterForgotten]

It boggles my mind that Marland would struggle with charters like Rita and Holly. Perhaps he was just more fixated on creating and writing for his own characters at GL. 

 

At last we would later get to see Holly return to some great writing later on (even if they eventually lost the plot on her character by the mid/late 90's).

 

Edited August 27, 2018 by BetterForgotten

[zanereed]

 

I was actually surprised that Marland let Steve Jackson go. I figured that Marland would have kept Steve Jackson around, not only from a legacy standpoint but also because of his connection to Bert as a peer.

[Soaplovers]

 

Even some of Marland's very own creations weren't all that great... it helped that they were played by very good actors. 

 

Rita, Holly, Amanda, Hope, and Katie were characters I've heard Marland struggled to write.  Sometimes it could be due to how a writer sees the character,  or it can turn out that how the actor sees the character differs from how the writer sees the character.

 

I found an article/interview with the original actress to play Holly (lynn deerfield) and she had expressed how for the first four or five years. the writers let her give input on how Holly would be.. but than she mentioned over the last months of her playing the character, the writers were trying to change her character and that it seemed to go against what she thought the character of Holly was.  I'm guessing she was referring to the Dobson's.. and possibly how Rita (their creation) was keeping Holly/Ed apart.. and that Holly was more passive and less assertive (based on what I've read of what was going in 1975/6).  

[vetsoapfan]

 

While I originally found fault with Long's camp fantasy plots and disinterest in history and factual reality, she drastically improved over time, and I do believe she would have gotten a handle on Rita and written the character effectively. Long's insight into characters deepened as she went on. 

 

Marland tattled to the press once that Kasdorf hated working with Mart Hulswit, but they had wonderful chemistry on-screen. I cannot say that I would have loved to see her with Peter Simon's E, who was always so morose and listless. Rita needed someone with some passion and fire, who could give back as good as he got. Could Simon have risen to the challenge?

 

 

I know. At GH, he was great at capturing the essence of legacy characters like Lesley Faulkner, Jessie Brewer, Monica Quartermaine, etc. So why did he stumble at TGL with some of its most iconic female leads? For the most part, I liked the characters he created, himself, for Springfield, but it hurt the show to lose people like Holly and Rita.

 

 

Marland later said in an interview that axing a bunch of the older characters was a direct mandate from P&G, who wanted him to youthify the show. Adam and Barbara Norris Thorpe also got the heave-ho along with Steve Jackson. Marland said he regretted that order, because if he had been able to keep them, he "would have found something for them to do." (This quote sticks in my mind because it suggests he may have been wondering how to write for them.)

 

For the record, Marland also said that when he took over GH, he happily wrote for the vets like Jessie Brewer, but ABC told him to stop it, to backburner them and concentrate on the younger characters and on the few older characters whom the teens in the audience wanted to see, like Edward Quartermaine.

 

 

When new writers take over, they often have different perceptions of various characters, and sudden personality changes can be quite jarring for the viewer. When Harding Lemay arrived at AW, he imbued pre-existing characters with traits they had never had before. Sometimes it worked very well, and made the characters more three-dimensional and realistic, but in a few cases, it left me scratching my head. Mary Matthews, for example, who had been a warm, protective matriarch with a wry sense of humor, suddenly became somewhat shrewish in her domineering behavior over her adult-children's lives. I was able to justify this by saying that by then, Mary had watched her children suffer so much, she had just HAD ENOUGH, and gone into Mama Bear mode. But it happened quite suddenly. Alice Matthews had always been a charming, capable young woman until Lemay started writing her as a sad and fragile Dresden doll who would fall apart and run away at the first sign of stress. Again, I eventually justified it in my mind by saying that years of pain had finally worn Alice down to the point where she was exhausted and unable to find much strength to fight anymore, but the Agnes Nixon version of of Alice and the Harding Lemay version of Alice were quite different.

Edited August 27, 2018 by vetsoapfan

[Soaplovers]

 

I will agree with you on the Alice situation on AW. Nixon basically used the Tara/Phil/Erica story on AW with Alice/Steve/Rachel cause at the time she didn't think AMC would be picked up. With that said, Nixon adjusted the Tara aspect to fit with the character of Alice.. who wasn't insepid.. but was confident, sarcastic, and had backbone.  Plus, when Cenedella carried on with the story.. he maintained the version of Alice established by Irna Philips/Agnes Nixon.

 

But I think if a new writer comes in and sees the character differently than the actor.. it will cause problems.  The actress that played Rita quit because of that, and so did Maureen G in late 1980 (stating that she saw the growth of Holly being regressed after the Santa Domingo story while she envisioned Holly becoming stronger as a result.. and the actress had a good point since the character did survive prison the year before).   Sometimes writers don't always fit on all soaps.

[zanereed]

Very true, @Soaplovers. Marland was a better fit on ATWT versus TGL.

 

Holly *should* have become a stronger person post-Roger, not weaker. I really wanted to see a storyline after Roger's death where a proactive Holly aids Mike in trying to uncover what evidence Roger had on Alan. This would bring Mike and Holly closer together, which in turn would make Ed jealous (at the same time he's trying to reconcile with Rita).

[Darn]

The ending credits to Guiding Light series finale are great. Shame it ended in 1993.

 

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jk

Edited August 28, 2018 by Darn

[Khan]

Man, that sequence tears me up to this day.

 

GL had suffered extraordinary losses in the past, but there was something about losing Maureen that was difficult for many to take.

[DAMfan]

Never forgave the writers for ruining Alan and Hope 

[vetsoapfan]

 

 Yes, as it turned out, it was the definitive nail in TGL's coffin. Sure, the show limped and then staggered along for years afterwards but it was a pale imitation of its former self. The light never shone brightly again.

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Before the show's final episode, TPTB had ruined so many things.

[Darn]

How many times did Ed cheat on Maureen? I know there was Michelle's mother and Lillian but he slept with Holly too while they were married? What were the circumstances?

[Soaplovers]

 

The holly situation wasn't black and white.  Ed and Maureen were having problems before Holly came back to town..and they separated..before Ed and Holly hooked up.  So maureen forgave it because the circumstances were not cut and dry.  

[Darn]

 

Ah okay. Thanks, I had a feeling it wasn't an out and out affair based on the Maureen/Holly scene I watched earlier.

 

Do you think Blake was diminished by the recast? I'm watching 92 GL and she's a much more interesting character, a real combination of her parents and not nearly as matronly looking as Elizabeth Keifer's version. I always thought she looked too old to believably be Maureen Garrett's daughter.

Edited August 29, 2018 by Darn