Guiding Light discussion thread

[Matt Powers]

Having just completed the 81 episodes featuring Mart Hulswit as Ed Bauer, I've experienced a significant shift in my perception of the character. This marks the first time I've genuinely connected with Ed, a stark contrast to my previous experience with Peter Simon's portrayal. Simon's Ed consistently appeared disengaged, almost as if he were reluctant to embody the role. Whether this disconnect stemmed from the writing during Simon's tenure or his interpretation of the character, I can't definitively say. However, Hulswit's performance has been a enjoyable, a stark contrast to the dour Ed of he 1990’s

 

Edited December 24, 2024 by Matt Powers

[Khan]

I know they tried years later to give Matt some angst over living in Vanessa's shadow by having him lose all that money to bad investments or whatever, but to me, it just seemed to come about ten years too late, lol.

[Mitch64]

I disagree here...they have known each other for years, she was always in and out of his house, and the whole thing with Peter, the underlying current was, who is Ed going to support, Bridget or Vanessa? There is even a scene where Van confronts him and he explains why he supports Bridget "She is one of the last things I have left of Maureen"...Van "I AM one of the last things you have left of Maureen" (going back and considering things and how bad GL had faltered without Mo and the invasion of Buzz yelling at the top of his lungs..the storyline is really good..Ed siding with Bridget, then Dylan finally doing it and Van kicking him out of the house on Christmas Eve for doing so, Ross having to grill Van about giving up Dinah for adoption...I mean really people let that go, she didn't leave her on the side of the road) Later on Van is  sitting by herself during a break in the trial and Ed finds her and they have a discussion about how Bill and Van should be at Ed's house, having dinners with he and Michelle, and Van says  "But not of that is having...THIS is happing." After the smoke clears Van when having a dinner at the CC,(before she sees Matt is Bridgets brother) "We really are one big extended family, Chamberlin, Bauer, Lewis and Reardon," 

I blame McTavish for dropping all of that, Ed and Michelle barely interact with Bridget (who is too busy being forced into the ugly girl chasing after the hunk role) and Chelle acts like Vanessa is practically a stranger. 

 

I really have to chock that up to Wheeler and Hurst...they could have just forgotten Van and Matt existed, and this was the first realistic storyline the couple had..Matt would have no clue how to handle money...when Van was "dead" the Spaulding are trying to get his "vote" in the war with Roger (the show never did any research on how large companies were ran or controlled) and Matt has a hissy that he doesn't care about the struggle and leave him out of it..and it of course was meant to show good guy Matt not being pulled into the Evil Spaudlings, but it just showed how stupid he was not to worry about Dinah, Bill and Peter's futures(and really would Van leave control of the trust to dumb Matt and not Ross?) 

Edited December 24, 2024 by Mitch64

[P.J.]

He actually bitches this to Vanessa during the Dinah thing. When he voiced that during their final breakup, I thought the show pulled it out of their ass. I doubt the show researched though. LOL...complaining that your bread-winner wife doesn't let your non-business-person self rule the roost.... SMH.

[Khan]

I agree, lol! 

They really needed to play up Matt's insecurities over being married to an older woman who'd accomplished more and was more ambitious than he much, much sooner than they did.  In fact, as soon as they got married, we should've seen Matt really struggle to find his place within the Chamberlain/Spaulding corporate world; realize that, in fact, all he was was just a tight butt and a smile; and end up doing something really stupid and self-destructive that would've torpedoed his and Vanessa's marriage.  Instead, we got chat rooms and "Mr. Reardon Builds His Dream House."

Edited December 24, 2024 by Khan

[P.J.]

I really should rewatch more of the Peter custody fight. I did watch a scene where Van is just livid that Ross is representing Bridget and goes to Ed's. She winds up saying that Peter is as much hers as MIchelle was Maureen's...and Ed hits her with the fact that she wouldn't be raising Peter if Maureen had lived. It's just devastatingly good.

It's not that Van and Ed weren't connected through the years (Rick and Mindy date, Ed treats everyone in town,  Ed is Billy's friend..) it's just that it never seems like more than polite small talk. Then again, sometimes I struggle with exactly when everyone becomes friends. 

[P.J.]

And Vanessa being insecure over Beth. And getting lectured over how to parent from a novice with zero sense of family. RME. "tight butt with a smile...."   OMG ROTFLMAO.  We definitely agree---that relationship shouldn't have seen the light of day. Vanessa should've dumped him at the nearest childcare center and given Blake a run for her money with Ross. Then Billy could've roared back into town and schemed with Blake to bust them up.  

Edited December 24, 2024 by P.J.

[DRW50]

I would put some on McTavish, as her writing was so allergic to proper characterization or history, but it was also the end result of recasting Michelle into a generic ingenue and saddling Vanessa with WM's Dinah. From the time she arrived Vanessa just became Dinah's hand-wringing mother, subjected to much verbal abuse she was apparently meant to deserve. 

The custody battle and Julie scheming to get Frank were the only stories that kept me interested in the show in 1994. 

I was in and out in those years but I didn't remember a relationship either, aside from through Maureen. I mostly remembered Ed and Ross...Ed seemed so isolated by that point, and maybe he always was by the mid '80s due to the Bauer decimation.

The show was, in some way, savvy to try to turn their relationship into a sweeping romance novel in time with Vanessa's return, but that's where it should have ended. I never would have had her pregnant again - it just seemed like they had no idea what else to do with the character, or women in general. I'm surprised they never gave Reva a kid at that time (I mean carrying a child, not the Jonathan retcon). And none of the story was in Vanessa's voice, just as the story where she went back to work and somehow it became about her being told she should get plastic surgery was also not about her.

[Khan]

I wouldn't say it shouldn't have seen the light of day - I would've been fine with Vanessa staying with Matt until the end, just because I thought the ship had long sailed for her and Billy - but I do believe their relationship could've been written more honestly than it was. 

GL's writers would've been wise to watch "All That Heaven Allows," starring Jane Wyman and Rock Hudson, and see how you handle a May/December relationship between an older, well-to-do woman and a younger, less refined man with care.

Which was odd for me to watch, because I could've sworn that Dinah and Vanessa had laid a lot of their issues to rest when Jennifer Gatti was still playing Dinah.

Frankly, I never understood why Vanessa was supposed to be wrong for giving up Dinah for adoption.  She was ill-prepared to raise a child alone at that point in her life, so she did what I thought would've been the responsible thing for any woman in her position to have done.  Was it Vanessa's fault that Dinah ended up being raised by some low-class carnies?  Absolutely not.

Edited December 24, 2024 by Khan

[P.J.]

 I'm not sure they knew what to do with Ed with Roger off the canvas. Hulswit's Ed was messy. When PS came on, I don't recall him doing much other than be an upstanding citizen. Some of Ed's reserve is Simon, but in hindsight, it seems like Ed got lost in the shuffle a bit. 

Later in life pregnancies seem to be an epidemic around this time. Holly had Meg, Vanessa has Maureen, and that's between Jenna's pregnancies (ok, she's a bit younger, but still.)

I'm okay with Vanessa having another child....it just should've been Billy's.

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[DRW50]

It was just easier - oh, poor little Dinah, she's wicked because she was put up for adoption, and so on. There was zero nuance, on a show that at its best had some of the most nuanced takes in daytime. All they cared about was making a whiny and unsympathetic cipher our lead at Vanessa's expense. I can still hear all that whining, 30 years later. I had no knowledge or interest in Dinah and resented the whole thing. Even her sleeping with Matt, which the show so clearly wanted to do, I couldn't have appreciated as great soap stuff because I knew it would somehow be treated as Vanessa's fault.

[P.J.]

I'm unsure who exactly brings Dinah back (Broderick?). But especially with the age tweaking, it ended up that Vanessa and Reva should've been pregnant about the same time. There's a vague insinuation that Vanessa coming from a more privileged background should've simply sucked it up and raised a child out of wedlock, no matter how immature she was. 

Nonetheless, they could've written Dinah as emotionally needy without the constant blame game she played with her parents.

[Mona Kane Croft]

If anyone remembers Meta Bauer's Christmas toast in the Bauer kitchen from the early-2000s (the one where she speaks about remembering Reverend Rutledge), I was able to use the Shazam app to identify the version of Silent Night we hear in the background of that scene.  It is Silent Night recorded by Lorie Line, and was released on one of her albums,  The entire song is available to hear on YouTube.  Ms Line may have recored more than one version of Silent Night over the years, but the song Shazam sent me to was definitely the same arrangement featured during Meta's speech.  During Meta's scene, they use a segment from near the end of the song. So that is the part that will sound familiar. 

Edited December 28, 2024 by Mona Kane Croft

[DRW50]

Thanks. Great work.

[P.J.]

Wait ---the year Guiding Light won the award, but it got handed to Y&R, they submitted the episode with Vanessa taking responsibility for Reva's miscarriage? AWESOME. I wish the entire episode were up in English. Bonus: Margo slapping the smack out of Barbara's mouth.

 

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