Guiding Light discussion thread

[DramatistDreamer]

Ha, why did Zimmer immediately come to my mind too? 

[Soapsuds]

Beth isn't an emmy award winner so it can't be her. Its probably Kim.

[Khan]

Yeah, I went back and re-read the article to make sure.

Maybe it was Jordan Clarke?

There's a part of me that just refuses to believe that KZ behaves like your average TJMaxx shopper.

Edited December 6, 2023 by Khan

[Soapsuds]

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I was thinking Justin Deas.

[Khan]

As if Justin would DARE show up for a liquidation sale.

[Soapsuds]

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Well who was around till the end? The show was so bad that I blocked out everything.

Could it have been Crystal Chappell??

[Vee]

Kim would absolutely dive for that. Her book is pretty candid about a lot of things and she doesn't have many airs about herself. When your Hollywood party games with longtime friend Alec Baldwin involve carrying objects between your buttcheeks from place to place....

[j swift]

Considering a Jaguar clasp is indicative of a Cartier purse, it is hardly TJ Maxx quality, and worthy of a dive

[kalbir]

Today (December 6) marks 25 years since Michael Zaslow passed away. RIP.

[DramatistDreamer]

Where did I mention TJMaxx?

[wonderwoman1951]

according to online sources, kavovit left ‘world turns in october 1991. the role wasn’t recast until model john howard’s short run in 1996. scott holroyd took over in 2001 until replaced by roger howarth in 2003. 

[Liberty City]

Considering Ellen Wheeler's office was in some hotel-looking closet, that goes to show it was working on a very basic budget (which cast then was trying to sell as "great product"). I mean, one "house" housed sets and makeup, etc. It was BAD. Real bad.

It would have been but, again, it was too early for this kind of thing to happen. And as someone else pointed out, even TOLN suffered from the move (due to mismanagement from Prospect Park).

Oh, what a fun read! Thanks for sharing!

SAME! Or any of the older dames, too.

F**k. I'd dive for that, too, whether I used it or not, haha.

Damn. RIP.

[Contessa Donatella]

A number of different things were going on in a general time frame but at the same time. 1. Budget. It was dire. Definitely a hardship budget. They did not have enough money, period. 2. The new production model. This was initiated by CBS & was made a mandate as part of an agreement between CBS & P&G that if CBS would not cancel them, then, P&G would change things about their production techniques. Obviously, implementation brought in another aspect. 3. Yes, adding the Peapack location was both to be able to afford to produce & to enhance how they could produce. 4. Ellen Wheeler's ideas & things she initiated like using offices as sets & like selling P&G products within the show, etc. 

[Contessa Donatella]

This is from a blog I wrote with permission. It's from an essay in a book that most fans aren't going to have access to. The author was invited to the show to learn about the new production model. I think people might get something out of reading it. 

This Blog is from THE SURVIVAL OF SOAP OPERA: TRANSFORMATIONS FOR A NEW MEDIA ERA. Edited by Sam Ford, Abigail de Kosnik, and C. Lee Harrington. University Press of Mississippi/Jackson. © 2011.

GL Relevance and Renewal in a Changing Genre by Patrick Erwin

Patrick Erwin is a freelance writer and journalist and author of the soap opera blog ‘A Thousand Other Worlds’ (http://1000worlds.wordpress.com/). He has also written about soaps for the Marlena De Lacroix site (http://www.marlenadelacroix.com/). While he watches a variety of daytime serial dramas airing today, he was a lifelong viewer of ‘Guiding Light’ and ‘As the World Turns.’

“GL” and “ATWT” were the last two PGP soaps when at one point PGP had had more soaps than anyone else. When GL was renewed in 2005, some actors were put on recurring and taken off of contract, where they would only be paid per appearance. The actors who were retained on contract status, were asked to take a 15 per cent pay cut. Some veteran actors left the show at that point, including Jerry verDorn, who was a multiple Emmy winner for his portrayal of Ross Marler. As it happened OLTL was in dire need of a replacement Clint Buchanan, having lost the actor who had played Clint before. They called Jerry and within days he was signed to a contract with OLTL. Now, there could be no two characters any more different than Ross Marler of Springfield and Clint Buchanan of Llanview. That’s just how talented Jerry verDorn is! GL then experienced another major transition in 2008 when the show migrated to a dramatically different production model. Patrick was one of a group of people invited to the set for a December 2008 taping to observe, talk to actors, writers and producers.

SIGNIFICANT CHANGES The new production style began airing on February 29, 2008. As part of the new model, producers TeleNext (funded by Procter & Gamble) started taping the show entirely with digital cameras, made substantial changes to studio sets, and began featuring several scenes a week taped on location. The producers also modified the storytelling approach to match the on-screen changes.

CAMERAS Prior to the production model changeover, GL had used the traditional stationary three-camera format. Cameras were placed on ‘runways’ and aimed at three-wall sets. They captured the sets and the actors just as an audience member would view a theater performance, by facing the proscenium framework of the stage. These cameras were large and had to be mounted on wheels for mobility. Though the camera range was substantial, the agility of the camera itself was limited. In many ways this method had remained the same since the 1950s. The new model used digital cameras for ‘all’ taping. ABC’s “All My Children” began using digital cameras for some of its scenes, but GL was the first show to adopt this format exclusively. These handheld cameras can be used in a wider range of settings, and allow for both indoor and outdoor taping, as well as taping in spaces that may have been too challenging or too small for a traditional stationary camera. This flexibility was the catalyst for embracing the other major components of the new production model as well.

INDOOR SETS For decades, GL’s primary studios had been in midtown Manhattan. Instead of larger temporary sets, the new approach allowed for smaller permanent sets to be built. According to Executive Producer Ellen Wheeler (2008), “Before we went to this model, we could play eight sets a week. We’ve moved from eight sets a week to what is in our studio space (about forty-five sets). If you count the sets that are actually built in our studio, and the offices, and the other locations around the building where we shot on a regular basis, we have another forty sort of regular locations here.” To maximize the number of available settings, many of the GL production offices had a ‘double life.’ Writer Jill Lorie Hurst’s office doubled as a motel room; Wheeler’s office also served as a chapel. Wheeler noted, “We shouldn’t be spending money on storing 250 sets in a warehouse when I could be spending that money on the screen.” 

OUTDOOR SETS The most visually dramatic change was the migration of a number of a significant number of scenes to an outdoor setting. Traditionally, soaps had only used outdoors to underscore the culmination of a big storyline; those scenes are generally limited in scope and play out on air for only a few days. In the mid-1990s, some soaps took advantage of developing recurring outdoor locales. ABC’s “The City” used a number of outdoor locales for New York City shooting, and NBC”s “Days of Our Lives” created an outdoor mall set which they used with great regularity. The outdoor taping for GL was especially notable in its approach—the show essentially set up a second studio in a small town in New Jersey—and its scope—approximately 40 percent of the show was taped there. Wheeler and location producer Lou Geraci looked at several settings before settling on Peapack, New Jersey, located less than fifty miles west of New York City. The production usually coordinated taping all exterior scenes on a single day of the week. GL made arrangements with many of the town’s businesses and institutions to serve as exteriors in taping. Thus, the local cemetery where Tammy Winslow Randall is buried, the exterior of an ornate stone house doubled as the patio of the grand Spaulding mansion, and the porch of the Gladstone Tavern stood in for the porch attached to Company, Springfield’s eatery. TeleNext also leased a house in Peapack that the production staff referred to as the “show house”. The house included a kitchen/break room, a make-up/wardrobe area, and several other indoor sets.

STORYTELLING As the changes in production were being made, Wheeler and the writing team also modified storytelling practices. On air, scenes were more streamlined and less complicated. Co-headwriter Jill Lorie Hurst (2008) confirmed this observation during my set visit: “It’s not that no one will ever have a long speech or that there won’t be a big theatrical, dramatic exchange. But, for the most part, we do try to keep it simpler (…) It works with the whole look of the show, and for editing purposes.” With a trimmed-down cast and enormous visual changes, many of the scenes became “vignettes,” short scenes with one or two characters. Rather than move a long-range story arc forward, these scenes were more a slice-of-life. Characters were seen in their kitchens or driving their cars, generally living their lives. Although they shaded the experiences and feelings of a specific character, these scenes seldom fed into a traditional long-range story arc. 

TRANSITION TO NEW MODEL MOTIVATION For years, GL was the lowest rated US daytime drama among the eighteen-to-forty-nine-year-old female demographic. Further, after NBC moved “Passions” to ‘DirecTV’ in 2007 and then canceled it altogether in 2008, GL took on the role of being the consistently lowest-rated soap overall. With a downward trend in viewership and thus increasingly smaller licensing fees paid to TeleNext for the show, the production renovation was largely driven by financial necessity. The changes in sets and camera not only led to the visible on-screen changes mentioned earlier, they also meant a smaller crew could produce the show. Press reports suggested that, in late 2007, approximately fifty members of the show’s staff—mostly on the production team—lost their jobs. Wheeler said, “There are people who no longer work for us because this change means we don’t have those job functions any more. They don’t exist in the new model.” (Levinsky 2008) For example, the portable monitors of the new digital cameras led GL to terminate its studio-based control room, thus eliminating a number of processes as well as the employees who performed them. After significant budget cuts, staff reductions and implementing the new model, GL appeared to be more profitable. Manager and agent Michael Bruno indicated that GL was, “saving an enormous amount of money. They’re making money, and believe me, that’s what gets looked at.” (Levinsky 2008) When the new model was unveiled, Wheeler attributed the changes to budgetary concerns but also expressed a desire to reexamine old production methods and implement more efficient ones. So, a secondary motivation (and the one that TeleNext and GL focused strongly on in the press) was the need to update and/or bypass some soap opera conventions. In the old model, characters seen at the start of the show could be reasonably expected to appear on the same set and within the same camera range —and visual palette—for the duration on the scenes. With the new model, producers and directors had flexibility in how a scene could be shot. For outdoor shots, sequential scenes were often positioned at different angles within the same set. A scene might begin with actors inside a gazebo. The following scene might show them at an adjacent bench, or walking on the grounds around that landmark viewed in the scene before. 

PRODUCTION ISSUES Since soaps are in production continuously, there was no opportunity for significant testing of the new model. Several problems had to be worked out “in real time, live, on the air”. The most common issue plaguing the show was audio quality. That showed up in post-production or even while on the air. Adverse weather conditions, rain for example, muffled actors’ dialogue. Wheeler talked about their trying “lavalier microphones” but that not working out. Eventually they switched to boom mics: “If there is an airplane overhead, we can EQ it out but we couldn’t EQ out the sound of “lav mics” brushing against clothing. (“EQ”, equalization, allows techs to remove a background sound while retaining the main foreground sound.) Early on, the digital cameras produced the “shaky cam” effect. People learned how to work the digital cameras better. A major issue in timing was that the Writers’ Strike ran from Nov. 5, 2007 to Feb. 11, 2008. Much of the new production model was hampered by scripts written during the strike. 

REACTIONS TO CHANGES STAFF REACTIONS GL actors were, for the most part, supportive. Liz Keifer loved working outside in Peapack. Someone complained to Carolyn Hinsey about having to change clothes in a car in Peapack. Maureen Garrett returned to the show and was overwhelmingly negative: “You do not see the other actors. There are no rehearsals, no monitors on which to watch the action, Actors are led from hair to make up to a kind of holding pen. Then they’re guided through the maze of pieces of sets to their spot (…) There’s no director, no time, no spontaneity. If this is what has to be done to save the form, I think there’s room for debate about trying to preserve the process, too. You can’t really create connections or foster ” ‘chemistry’ without the work.” (Torchin 2009) VIEWER REACTIONS Initial viewer reaction was overwhelmingly negative for a variety of reasons: Those issues with audio and taping The change itself and especially the visual palette was jarring to viewers & interrupted the narrative. Up so close Early action did not use the new model well. Even after fans got used to it the reviews were “mixed”. Some people loved it. (I did.) Some people hated it. 

AFTERMATH AND CONCLUSION GL regained its hold on storytelling. Phillip The King returned! “Otalia” was a brilliant much adored international draw. However, it did no good. But, GL led the way for all of soapdom in their new production model and many soaps came to GL to find out about it. On July 24, 2009, TeleNext announced that no new venue had been found for GL. The final episode aired on September 18, 2009. The announcement that ATWT was also being canceled came along next. 

NOTES 1. The other with Patrick that day in Dec. were Sara Bibel and Roger Newcomb, both of whom have essays in this collection. 2. Timberg and Alba give a more detailed account about the cameras. 3. See Metzler’s essay for more about the strike and its impact. 

[Mona Kane Croft]

Glad you brought up this book, Donna.  This is a great read.  Every chapter written by people who take soap operas seriously.  Much more academic than anything in the soap-press, even in 2011.  

I heard an interview with one of the authors (I think it was Sam Ford) around the time the book was published.  That guy really knows what he's talking about.  Too bad he's not in the daytime business -- at least I don't think he is/was.  Not sure if the book is still in print, but anyone who likes to look at soap operas from the serious side, should read it.   

Edited December 7, 2023 by Mona Kane Croft