Guiding Light Discussion Thread

[Contessa Donatella]

Well, Beverlee needed to go back to work. I think 2 shows were interested. I'm not sure how she decided to go with Kobe/Long but that is when Alex was created for her. 

[DeliaIrisFan]

I think Nadine keeping Bridget locked in her attic (wasn't Bridget still a minor at that time?) so that she could be Nadine's handmaid was pretty evil.

I feel like the show (or, more specifically, Nancy Curlee when she returned from maternity leave) realized that as well and tried to memory hole Nadine's role in Peter's origin story, even while his parentage and custody continued to be an umbrella story for another year.  For a long time, Bridget and Nadine had no scenes together, and even once or twice when they were in crowds together, I could swear there was deliberate staging/editing to avoid any interaction.

I also don't agree that Jenna was written as the "favorite" for Buzz.  I remember Lucy and Nadine and even some under-fivers who were playing random Fifth Street neighbors constantly degrading Jenna.  I just think Buzz was sexist/ageist, and perhaps more importantly someone behind the scenes (clears throat) had internalized some of those same attitudes.  So it was just a given that a much younger woman would find the new patriarch irresistible, and not one character questioned why she would look twice at him.

I preferred Buzz and Jenna in the '90s to Buzz/Nadine, but I think that was partly because I misremembered Buzz/Jenna as something that started as an odd-couple friendship subplot and became something more organically.  I rewatched much of 1993 on YouTube a few years ago and they still have chemistry, but the way they were presented was jarring, and made me like them together much less.

[Khan]

I agree. 

TBH, Nadine was a character I could take or leave on GL, but her keeping Bridget in that attic and then trying to pass off Bridget's baby as her and Billy's was pretty much when I was done with her.  In fact, I was actually surprised that she didn't wind up in prison for that or get thrown out of Springfield afterwards, because that was how I had expected the story to end.

Also, you'll never convince me that that story wasn't in some way JER's "baby," so to speak.  The whole premise of a greedy, grasping housewife keeping an unwed, pregnant teenager in her attic for months on end just so she can take her baby and claim it as her own - all while fooling everyone in town into thinking she's pregnant by wearing pillows and [!@#$%^&*] - has his fingerprints all over it.

[P.J.]

Bridget was hiding in Nadine's attic, but it wasn't against her will. Bridget would've been a college freshman (the excuse they use to get Bridget out of town for the last couple of months of her pregnancy is an internship to Appalachia...RME) While she should've encouraged Bridget to confide in Maureen, Bridget was insisting she couldn't keep the child. The most evil thing I recall her doing is giving Vanessa's name to the tabloids when Vanessa pressed charges against Jack Riley for the attempted rape. They made a point of every woman on the show supporting Vanessa in some fashion, and there's Nadine being petty because she's desperately trying to hang on to a marriage. (I think Billy finding out is why she faked the pregnancy, but it's been a while since I watched it.) 

The other really shitty thing she did was not to tell Bridget that Maureen had died until after the funeral was over. 

Nadine always whined until she got her way. And when her scheme blew up in her face, it was never her fault. When Billy divorced her, he was a lot more fair than he had to be.

I haven't watched the end of 93, so I'm not sure how much she interacts with Billy or Vanessa either after the divorce, or if she sticks her nose into the Peter custody fight. I don't think they really knew what to do with Nadine after Harley left in 93. Yes, Frank was still on canvas, but Harley was always the one to call her on her crap.

Edited June 10, 2024 by P.J.

[Paul Raven]

Those sort of stories have their place on a soap, and they can work if the character motivation and beats of the story are played. 

And they should be few and far between.

Trouble is GL and others constantly used these sort of stories as their mainstays so they lost any sort of impact and there was no fallout in terms of punishment or redemption. People just carried on until the next evil twin, back from the dead or murder spree occurred.

[DRW50]

Nadine did terrible things, but I never really held it against her because she did pay in the end - she had no one in her corner (often do to her own insecurities) and was consigned to scraps at Fifth Street for her last few years on the canvas. JFP also tended to have characters do extreme things and then try to move on without proper focus (Alex and Eve being the same). Jean Carol made the character more sympathetic to me.

I do think the show preferred Jenna to Nadine. Nadine was mostly there to move stories of other characters along while Jenna was in a central role even though the show never really had any idea what to do with her after the marriage to Roger ended. Jenna wasn't treated the best by Buzz, but that's typical of how JFP views female characters.

[MichaelGL]

As a huge Jean Carol fan, I must admit I can't help but to feel Nadine as a whole was a Nola Reardon stand in. 

This. 

[Mitch64]

First there was Harley and then Nadine as a Nola stand in (though Frank was a less sexy and definitely less smart Tony stand in...) I think that is why I always disliked the Coopers..they were all rip offs.  And yes, I think JC really did make Nadine more sympathetic than the writing did..never my favorite character but consigning her to pine for Buzz in that ugly diner was punishment enough! I always wondered what an Ed/Nadine short term pairing would be..especially when Nola found out that she manipulated Bridget into the attic. 

[DRW50]

That would have been a fascinating idea, especially as Nadine was so unlike any of his love interests. And I'm sorry we never really got any Nadine/Nola interaction.

[Khan]

As far as I was concerned, there was only one option for Nadine after that whole debacle with Bridget, and that was to leave Springfield in disgrace.

[Sapounopera]

Bridget Reardon was in some ways the Sami Brady prototype. 

I think Conboy wanted her as Myrna Claig on Capitol. Since I didn't care at all about 80s GL, I wish that she had returned to AW as Iris. 

Edited June 10, 2024 by Sapounopera

[Contessa Donatella]

OMG! SO obvious. I never tumbled to that!!! Of course. 

Capitol makes sense. I'm with you, though. I really really wish she'd returned to AW & Iris. SIGH. 

[kalbir]

But mostly the middle of the decade though.

[Khan]

I can see it! 

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[P.J.]

I think of Nadine as an exaggerated loser version of Reva, actually. She married her high-school boyfriend and he turned out to be a creep.