Guiding Light Discussion Thread

[chrisml]

I have never liked the slapping thing. I don't care who's doing the slapping. 

I went back to some GL episodes and it does seem like the writers were setting up something for Sonni and Roger in July 1989. I don't remember if anything came of it. A real shame as they had a lot of chemistry, but then both could have chemistry with a block of tofu.

 

[DeeVee]

They had a brief affair before Sonni left to take a job out of state. He liked that she knew nothing about his past and she liked that he knew nothing about hers. I don't think they built much more story around them. As I believe someone mentioned, Forbes was not interested in staying on soaps.

[P.J.]

LOL...I was going to say there were a couple of times Vanessa just wailed on him. it was some time after he left her at the altar, and she says something like "that felt good...I'd like to do it again!"

Jordan must've embraced the physicality, because he's always doing something.  

[vetsoapfan]

I have a long-time friend with whom I used to watch soaps religiously when we were kids.

When I told him about SON recently, I suggested that he jump into the forums so he could join the discussions about vintage daytime TV.

He was incredulous that this TGL thread alone was up to a whopping 1183 pages.

He asked, "How can anyone even talk about a long-cancelled soap that much?!?"

Then I reminded him that he has brought up the topic of The Guiding Light EVERY SINGLE TIME he has phoned me in the last 50 years!

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So, he became sheepish and embarrassed, but relieved to know he's not alone in is undying love for his favorite show.

TGL community rocks!

Edited 20 hours ago by vetsoapfan

[alwaysAMC]

Haha I love that!  Welcome, to your friend! 

[alwaysAMC]

My Kim Zimmer book just came in the mail today 

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Very cheesy cover, but she got some good names to give quotes on how great the book is: Susan Flannery, Alec Baldwin (random), Pamela Long, Paul Rauch, Robert Newman, TV Guide, Soaps In Depth, and others. I'll have to let y'all know what I think when I get around to reading it haha.

[Kane]

She and Alec Baldwin were on The Doctors together.

I hope you post your thoughts on the book as you have been on the show. I've thought about giving Zimmer's book a read for a while, but I've never gotten around to it.

[Mitch64]

A funny scene, Roger and Sonni go out to eat, at that place that had a colonial theme (I love when soaps have very specific places to eat..I hated the diners on GL, ATWT and AW) and this is just after Rog came back and Sonni hit the headlines and the waitress scremes.."Oh, Roger Thorpe, and YOUR...please dont' hurt me..." and they are all like, "Hey, were just hungry!" (most soaps now have someone go on a murder spree and the rest of the cast and extras look like they havent heard about it."

[alwaysAMC]

I'd be happy to!

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I just read the intro and first chapter and I'm already hooked. I know she had a co-author, but I can tell Kim is a firecracker and I'd love to have wine with her and talk sh!t haha. It makes reading the book pretty easy and entertaining.

Intro - I had no idea she got a DUI! She shared 3 bottles of wine with a friend at dinner one night in LA, got in her car, was pulled over and thrown in jail overnight.  She admitted it wasn't her first time drinking and driving, but learned a valuable lesson that night. Out of the gate, she's not holding back or hiding anything.

Chapter 1 - the announcement that GL was being cancelled. She was driving to Peapack and got a call from Bradley Cole who told her the news. First, that's BS that as one of the faces of GL, you hear the big news from a fellow co-star on your way to work. Granted, the "suits" were traveling to Peapack that day to tell the cast and crew, but still, seems icky. Ironically the news came on April Fools Day. Apparently that was the last day the network could decide whether to cancel or renew, but to Kim's point, couldn't they just pick the day before to avoid the callousness of the 'holiday'. Obviously a sad day in GL history. I thought it was funny, she said the one thing she thought of is "what would Susan Lucci do" in this situation, post-cancellation. And of course she said she'd "find something to hawk on the Home Shopping Network" 

You all would know better than me, but part of the title of her book is "seven husbands" and in her intro, she uses Reva's full name: Reva Shayne-Lewis-Lewis-Spaulding-Lewis-Winslow-Cooper-Lewis-Lewis-O'Neill.  However, in the first chapter, she said Bradley Cole was "her 8th (or was it 9th?) husband". Well, Kim, that already contradicts the title of your book and your character's name you touted. 

[Spoon]

BC played Jeffrey O'Neill, her last husband- the ninth.

 

Yes, April Fools Day 2009 is a date that will live in infamy for GL fans but I feel we all kinda expected it at that point.  The soap press reported that GA's return as Phillip was basically the show's final chance at getting the ratings up.  A Hail Mary if you will.  It didn't extend the show's life but it was fantastic to see Phillip back in SF where he belonged.

[DeeVee]

Not to be that person (lol), BUT:

Reva's marriage to Alan was annulled, so that doesn't count. Also, I ASSUME she had not yet been declared legally dead when she married Richard, so that one also probably doesn't count.

As I've said before, it's not unusual for actors to slip up on storyline details, so I would be shocked if these were the only gaps in her memory of this kind.

And, yeah, the more names, the funnier it is, so...

[TheyStartedOnSoaps]

And Susan did find something to hawk when All My Children was cancelled. Susan was right in the middle of a book tour to promote her autobiography. So she was facing questions from interviewers about AMC cancellation, while trying to sell her book at the same time

Kim Zimmer must be clairvoyant - explains why TPTB at Guiding Light made the character Reva a psychic!

[chrisml]

Kim Zimmer gets a lot of details wrong. Since she gave it to so many people to read (if they actually read it and didn't just blurb it), you would think someone would have pointed out these errors. I don't know if it's just confusion on her part or if it's because she wrote it out of anger. She has admitted she was extremely angry in writing the book. I was not surprised she left out Michelle Forbes because it must have come as a blow to realize that viewers had quickly latched on to another actress.  That's probably why she was not always kind to Cynthia Watros (something she admits to).

Jeanne Cooper and Victoria Rowell published similar memoirs where they were determined to get even with costars and producers they felt had wronged them. Zimmer is a lot more measured than those two.

Edited 12 hours ago by chrisml

[Mitch64]

I can't imagine it was a shock to any of the actors, especially one so industry savy as Zimmer. However, it must have been like all of us, watching a loved one fading away and knowing it was going to happen but still being shocked when it does.

Wheeler is to blame for waiting so long for that Hail Mary pass to be thrown. Its funny but this was the time that the writing seem to be getting better so someone fixed that, but why didnt it happen sooner?

Again, at least the GL I saw go off the air, despite looking like it was filmed in my backyard, was the GL I knew with the right characters coming back and the right things happening. Unlike ATWT.....

[j swift]

Hold on to that thought, because I'll be eager to know if you feel the same way as you progress through her journey, after that evening.