Guiding Light Discussion Thread

[Khan]

I would say (with great reluctance) JFP.  Whether or not she coasted on Robert Calhoun's accomplishments, or she owed her success more to Nancy Curlee and Stephen Demorest's writing than to her own skills as an EP, I think it would be hard to deny that it was the last time that GL would be successful at the Emmys, in the ratings or with the critics.

As for the others...

Ellen Wheeler was in over her head, producing (with no experience) a show that was beyond help, or hope.  Just about any other producer would have known better how to handle the transition to Peapack.

John Conboy and Paul Rauch were old-school producers, but neither had a vision for GL that was consistent with its' core themes.

Michael Laibson probably would have been more successful as EP.  However, P&G was interfering too much by that point.  Also, he had to work with a HW who possessed both a dark vision of humanity and a huge axe to grind with the show she had worked on previously.

Joe Willmore was another old-school producer like Conboy and Rauch, but he did not have any vision for GL, let alone one that was wrong for the show.

And Gail Kobe might have pulled GL out of its' post-Douglas Marland funk, but she also decimated much of its' core by 1985/1986, causing the ratings to flatten and to stay flat for the rest of the decade, and making her probably the most destructive EP that GL would ever employ, with Wheeler a close second.

Edited December 28, 2023 by Khan

[Paul Raven]

What was the story behind Gail Kobe leaving GL? How long was she there for?

Would the show have been in better shape had she stayed on for a few more years?

[robbwolff]

Kobe was credited as EP from around February/March 1983 to March or April 1986.

[BetterForgotten]

Kobe next went on to be involved in the early stages of B&B not long after - I wonder how she got associated with the Bell’s. I had heard she was particularly instrumental in helping with the casting of the young heroines (Johanna Johnson and KKL) there.

[MichaelGL]

IMO the show would've been better off with Allen Potter as EP during the 80s. 

[Mitch64]

I agree, this was the last, best attempt to save GL...(Taggart/Culliton) and Weston and Conboy put the final nail in. 

I would say MADD, who was supported Rauch in all his interference and excess, and put Weston and Conboy in place. She was the final say at P & G and she had a vision of GL which was not consistent with what the show was (gloss and glamour and ROMANCE all the time...) The P & G shows were not ABC shows and she could never get that out of her head.

Someone mentioned that McTavish had an axe to grind with GL...what was it? I know she got her start there so she should have been excited to be back. I can believe it, the way she wrote Nola was terrible (Nola, sad and lonely???) and she basically shat on Java (and I am not their biggest fan.) Rick screws what his basically his uncle's wife, and he grew up for years thinking it was his sister, and its all for shits and giggles????

 

[Khan]

No, it was not with GL, @Mitch64.  It was with AMC.  I still am not sure whether she was fired or she quit, but as we all know, she did not take too kindly to having one of her stories altered in the wake of the Murrah Building bombing in OKC.  (In her original plan, Janet Green was going to stop Trevor and Laurel's wedding with a bomb hidden inside a package.  However, after the real-life bombing, I think it was changed to a gun).  So, I suspect she took the HW'ing gig at GL at least partially out of spite, because God knows she did not have the right temperament for that show.

[Contessa Donatella]

Oh, certainly agree. She was the root of the ABCification of P&G soaps. But, she was a fierce protector of her shows & it was a huge mistake when P&G chose not to continue the position of Executive In Charge of Production for their soaps when she retired. 

[robbwolff]

Had Kobe stayed, I think we would have seen Pam Long return sooner than 1987, which may have spared the show from the disastrous Munisteri/Barrett and Anderson/Manetta regimes. We may have also actually seen the return of Hope Bauer, which Jeff Ryder previewed in SOD.

[Contessa Donatella]

I believe it was Kobe who got McKinsey for GL but at that point Pam Long was H'writing because she created Alex for her. So, that's a different date than 

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this one! 'Scuse me. Nothing to see here. 

[chrisml]

I'm not going to dispute that Conboy and Weston were a menace, but on an episode by episode basis, I found them somewhat compelling. I didn't stop watching the show as I did with other regimes. I also appreciated the Maryanne Carruthers (sp?) story was meant to bring the actors into one umbrella story. While I appreciated it and it had its moments, it was still one big illogical and tortured mess. The obsession with Marty West and the baseball set made no sense either. However, I'll take that regime over the show during the post-Maureen's death, Amish Reva, and San Cristobel periods (I'm assuming those three periods had different producers, but I could be wrong]. I have a vague recollection of Reva being obsessed with a painting, but I might be misremembering as I came and went as a viewer.

[Sapounopera]

I always thought that Arianne Munker (Christine) was originally cast as Hope (she even looked like Elvera Russell) and that an altered version of the Valere story would involve her. 

[Contessa Donatella]

Oh, yes, Reva & Olivia & I'm not sure how many others, stepped through that life size painting & traveled in time! At least, though, then we got neat costumes. 

Marty West, baseball diamond, gently aging twink, older man with power & a crush? I thought that one was obvious. And, the Carruthers story seriously challenged history & the character integrity of 5 different adult men in Springfield. And, sock puppet, teens tunneling in the underground & then they fell through the roof in Danny & Michele's apartment. West lost control of his sweatpants in one scene when he was supposed to be romancing Marina & the show was fined for showing buttocks. 

[MichaelGL]

That would have been a good choice casting wise. 

[Mona Kane Croft]

Donna, that is the most creative metaphor I have ever read.  LOL.   I think I want you on my writing team.