4 hours ago, DRW50 said:

The whole twins with two fathers story was her favorite. She says she never believed that Ross was Kevin's father because it was just Annie's word and she thought that would be a good story idea for the future. She also said that falling in love with Ben was her least favorite story, as she felt Blake falling for him was much too rushed. She said that only happened because another story fell through.

LOL...the hope of **** and Blake having an affair, allowing Ross and Vanessa to reunite LIVES!!!

1 hour ago, DRW50 said:

Sadly, Blake is not that big a character by the end of GL, but she is much more present in that last year than she was before (I think - someone can correct me - at one point she was in a coma for a year)

At some point Liz went recurring. (I think it was after Jerry left). I swear Blake was in a coma twice, and once was about a year.

13 minutes ago, P.J. said:

At some point Liz went recurring. (I think it was after Jerry left). I swear Blake was in a coma twice, and once was about a year.

It was, yes. She was asked in the interview about having to adjust to recurring.

Blake/Matt as an endgame pairing would have made sense, although I think she would have gotten bored of him judging her.

2 hours ago, DRW50 said:

It was, yes. She was asked in the interview about having to adjust to recurring.

Blake/Matt as an endgame pairing would have made sense, although I think she would have gotten bored of him judging her.

Blake mostly cared about action between the sheets. As long as that was decent, she could've overlooked the rest.

32 minutes ago, P.J. said:

Blake mostly cared about action between the sheets. As long as that was decent, she could've overlooked the rest.

And I just have to imagine it was more than decent with Matt

As much as I hate to admit it, and as much as I never wanted them to be endgame, I still think Blake and Ben had some hot chemistry. Hearing that Liz wasn't really into it because she was pregnant and tired surprised me, because I thought she played the dangerous flirtation yet torn up/anguished emotions really well.

2 minutes ago, alwaysAMC said:

And I just have to imagine it was more than decent with Matt

As much as I hate to admit it, and as much as I never wanted them to be endgame, I still think Blake and Ben had some hot chemistry. Hearing that Liz wasn't really into it because she was pregnant and tired surprised me, because I thought she played the dangerous flirtation yet torn up/anguished emotions really well.

Well, Amanda didn't pay him for his MENSA abilities.

It does amaze me when actors sell stories they don't like, or like stories we as the audience don't. I can imagine that trying to sell a new relationship (that's not well-motivated and likely to piss off your fan base) would be a little extra draining when you're pregnant.

Edited Wednesday at 04:00 AM2 days by P.J.

IIRC, Blake was in a coma for a little over a year. She became mayor after Ross and I think she did some underhanded stuff or won the election under questionable circumstances.

I think they played it as a nervous breakdown. She ran for mayor while she was sleeping with Jeffrey, who was also running (I think). Blake was exposing people's secrets on some web gossip site at the same time. I forget how she landed in the coma--she may have caused an accident and gotten caught by it herself. They then shipped the kids off to be raised by Holly offscreen.

I would've kept Tony past 1985. Recast if necessary. I'd have Tony pivot to a police officer. Giving Maureen one sibling to have around. A. stereotypical TV Irish family like the Reardons should have had a cop in the family.

1 hour ago, Spoon said:

I would've kept Tony past 1985. Recast if necessary. I'd have Tony pivot to a police officer. Giving Maureen one sibling to have around. A. stereotypical TV Irish family like the Reardons should have had a cop in the family.

Recasting challenge! Who would have been a good replacement for Beecroft?

I say his brother David, who also auditioned for Tony, would have been a good replacement. They look SO much alike. And it wouldn't be the first time a sibling replaced a sibling, i.e. Michael Storm replacing his brother Jim on OLTL as Larry Wolek.

I agree that writing out Tony was not a great move, but it was clear that they were off the Reardons. Maybe they had long-term plans for Tony and Annabelle, maybe they were going to feature them in more mystery stories, but for whatever reason they dropped the idea. Jim was clearly brought in for one storyline that did not need him to be a Reardon so it's no surprise he was dumped. Chelsea was always a faux Reardon to me. They just didn't seem to have their heart in the family. That's probably why Long created her own blue collar family, the Coopers.

Edited 19 hours ago19 hr by DeeVee

27 minutes ago, DeeVee said:

Recasting challenge! Who would have been a good replacement for Beecroft?

It's tough for me to picture anyone but Greg Beecroft as Tony, but I dunno, maybe Patrick James Clarke (ex-Patrick Ryan, RH; ex-Jack Benton, SFT)?

I liked the character at first but grew to feel wary about him as he moved closer to resembling the nastier side of men in my family - my father's generation. His cousins. Some in laws on both sides. Similar culture.

But I was always wonder what he was shouting by showing off his martial arts moves in the opening credits. (The disco opening where the lighthouse LIGHT is replaced by a disco ball)

Is it HE - LEN - A !

If we get to keep a Reardon, I'd prefer we kept Bea. My opinion of Beecroft and Tony has eroded a bit over the years.

Tony owned a bar. I don't know how much more stereotypically Irish the show needed to be. They didn't have main characters as cops on the show yet.

Edited 17 hours ago17 hr by P.J.

Re: Reardon family. Douglas Marland introduced Bea, Nola, Tony, Maureen. Pamela Long introduced Jim. Chelsea arrived in late 1986 so I think Sheri Anderson introduced her. Nancy Curlee introduced Bridget but I don't believe we ever met Bridget's father.

8 hours ago, P.J. said:

Tony owned a bar. I don't know how much more stereotypically Irish the show needed to be. They didn't have main characters as cops on the show yet.

One of my big complaints about GL's later years is too many main characters being cops. It's a soap opera, not a prime time cop show. Even EON didn't have that many cops.

Running an Irish pub was a great occupation for an aspirational character like Tony. He wanted to lift himself up in the world, like Nola, but he wanted to do it through work.

Bea could have remained as a character like Ina on OLTL or Myrtle on AMC. Running the boarding house set her up to be a surrogate mother to younger characters starting out their lives. They even did that for a while with Beth and Lujack.

8 hours ago, kalbir said:

I don't believe we ever met Bridget's father.

Matt and Bridget's father appeared briefly. His name is Sean. There are one or two episodes with him that are available on YT.

There are two missing Reardon siblings, in my view. One was erased by Chelsea being made the youngest, when Marland made a big deal out of Nola being the youngest who resented her older siblings leaving her to help her mom with the boarding house. It would have made more sense if Chelsea had been a Reardon cousin.

There is definitely a missing sister who was never seen. Supposedly she was mentioned at some point and her name was Lana.

Edited 8 hours ago8 hr by DeeVee

Re: Cops

I say they they should've had a cop in cast and it was a major oversight that they didn't, AW and ATWT already jumped on that bandwagon. I would've upgraded that female dayplayer cop from the 80s- the actress was ater Frannie on ATWT. Even Y&R had cops and they were far from an exciting adventure soap. Especially if GL wanted to ride the action adventure fad, they should've had a cop in a core family before Rusty in 87(?).

Of course Frank didn't quit working at the family diner when he became a cop.

Beautiful would've made sense as a matriarchal type, but if Maureen was going to grow into that role the Bea would be redundant. I'd recast Tony. Was Richard Bekins (Jamie, AW) available in '85?