Guiding Light Discussion Thread

[P.J.]

Ugh...right? At least if Chris Bernau had been able to continue in the role, it would've been intriguing to watch Alan manipulate Reva.

[DeeVee]

I don't remember that. What I recall is Alan living at Revabend, working as a farm hand and listening to Reva b!tch about money. Truly, I felt sorry for Pilon having to play that.

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[P.J.]

Well, I can't help but think it would've been written different with CB still there

[DeeVee]

I keep forgetting a huge chunk of that year was written by scabs.

You're probably right, because by the time the strike was over, they were likely planning an exit for Alan's character as it must have been obvious by then that Bernau was not going to return. If he was still there, it's also doubtful they would have approached MZ and MG about coming back. Wild.

[P.J.]

In that way, at least we were fortunate.  The Daniel Pilon/Ron Raines decisions...not so much.

[DeeVee]

Again, Bernau's illness impacted that. It's pretty obvious Pilon was always meant to be temporary. I read an article from that period that said he was working on both Ryan's Hope and GL at the same time. So he wasn't on contract for either show. (Maybe that explains somewhat why his performance was so low energy, because he was overworked doing two soaps).

Later, they put him in the opening and in commercials for the show. That must have been because they were certain Bernau was not returning. Around that time, they approached Zaslow about being the permanent replacement for Bernau. He turned them down and suggested coming back as Roger.

Pilon stayed so they could re-introduce Roger and write an exit for Alan. I'm guessing if MZ had not wanted to come back, they would have had no choice but to keep Pilon (which I don't think they wanted, or maybe Pilon wasn't interested) or send out a casting call for a new Alan. I think they wanted to avoid that because they were really determined not to let the nature of Bernau's illness to become public knowledge. At this point, they were still keepin up the fiction that he was going to return even while this stuff was happening BTS.

 

Yeah, it seems crazy now, but people forget how stigmatized AIDS was back then. I'm convinced the idea to ask Zaslow to take the role came about so they could replace Bernau as quietly as possible. Everyone would have been so surprised it would have taken the focus off Bernau not returning. It makes a kind of twisted sense. Still, thank goodness Zazlow said no and they said yes to his suggestion to return as Roger.

The way everything worked out gave GL a few more strong years. I guess it's the nature of soaps, you never know what things in real life will end up strongly impacting the show, both negatively and positively.

(Something just occurred to me. If Zazlow HAD said yes to playing Alan...he would have had to play being in love with Reva.

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Edited 4 hours ago by DeeVee

[SanCristobelsFinest]

I understand that no one could ever replace Bernau, but Ron Raines is somewhat of a different beast. Still great (to me) though. He spent his entire TV run in one role, that was impossible to do justice correctly. 

[j swift]

Brittany Snow is on Las Cultch.  

She talks briefly about working with Hayden Panettiere and mentions that Laura-Bell Bundy "saved her ass", but no details.  It sounds like being a kid on a New York soap was a wild time.