Guiding Light discussion thread

[Mitch]

Great pic!!!  While they don't have the ATWT vets aging genes...Grant/RN looked great, and PS always looks the same age, 30 or 60, and Hammer looks the same also. MOL looks good with the grey (they should have let him go like that instead of that black ink they put in his hair) and JVD just always looks like a nice guy. I don' t know who the baldies are but most likely behind the scenes?

LOL..I hated the Santos but I never minded the Danny actor...despite his..petite frame he never came off as super silly when he acted tough...(I always thought Underwear Model Tony was more ridiculous...) its just too bad they made Danny and Carmen cartoon mobsters..they would have been so good as foils to the law and order suburban Bauers..and if I did write a gay storyline for Danny it would not involve any character played by Brad Cole....UGGGH!

[dc11786]

Ron Raines is the bald guy in the blue shirt. I didn't recognize him until I saw Robert Newman label everyone.

 

I believe Bruce is Bruce S. Barry, a longtime director. A quick google search would suggest Locke is Locke Wallace, the show's stage manager.

 

I was never a huge Santos fan or Michelle / Danny fan, but I did love the warehouse bombing and how Danny started to become a bit of a pariah in Springfield after his image as the mayor was tarnished. The show had a chemistry test with Danny and Blake, when Dinah returned and Roger had died, and I liked the potential in that pairing, but the show pursued Danny and Marina instead.

[NothinButAttitude]

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[katie_9918]

This is such a great period that's being uploaded right now, and this dude's been doing it for several years now.

 

I'd say it wasn't until mid 1994 that the wheels really started to come off and Reva's actual return was the death knell. 

 

I'm so glad to be able to relive this great period and my first real soap crush David Grant isn't far off.

[DRW50]

 

For me it was mostly 1993, especially the second half of 1993. 

[NothinButAttitude]

 

You didn't enjoy '93 of GL?

[GSGfan2017]

Marcy Walker joined the cast of GL in '93, but her Tangie Hill character didn't catch on.  I imagine that a significant number of GL fans felt like Marcy/Tangie was being forced down their collective throat.

[DRW50]

 

The absence of most of my favorite GL actresses at that point (Sherry, Beverlee, Ellen Parker) and my anger over Maureen's death wasn't a good start, and then when Jordan Clarke was fired (and at the time I had no idea why as I didn't read soap magazines - I just knew he'd been replaced by a very annoying man with a fake Southern accent) and Buzz came in hamming it up, it was all steadily downhill. Harley left, there were two bad Mindy (a favorite of mine before) recasts, Nick was a sanctimonious bore, Lucy came in and I felt she was a bad Harley ripoff who got way too much airtime, I was not happy with the writing or casting for the new Alexandra, etc. I wasn't happy with Jenna being changed to a more generic ingenue or Nadine being subjugated to a triangle, I wasn't happy with Alan-Michael being the third wheel in his family and in the Frank/Eleni story, etc.

 

There were some good parts (Bridget, David, Gilly, Kat, Eve, Holly, Ed, Michelle) but at the time, I can't say I was thrilled. I haven't watched back on an episode-to-episode basis to reassess my opinion. 

Edited July 13, 2017 by DRW50

[katie_9918]

 

For me, Tangie's initial run got better with age, especially since Josh's prospects took a steep downhill turn after Annie 1.0 (the non-insane one).

 

I still hate the pairing with Alan that turned out to be her swan song, however. It's a shame they never seriously considered pairing her with Patrick Cutter. The chemistry wouldn't set the world on fire, but it was serviceable.

[DRW50]

 

The thing is I really liked Marcy on Santa Barbara, so I was happy to give her a chance. Unfortunately it never clicked. Not helping matters was that I didn't like Josh very much. 

 

I read an old SOD interview where producers answer fan questions and JFP was asked by a fan about pairing them up. Reading between the lines I got the feeling she wasn't thrilled viewers weren't responding to the Alan-Michael/Tangie/Alan triangle. 

[katie_9918]

 

Wasn't NuBilly played by the acTORR who played Sky Rumson on Dark Shadows?

 

I literally laughed for DAYS when I made that connection when I made it that far on my Dark Shadows DVDs.

 

"NOT!Billy!" 

 

Fun times, I tell you.

[DRW50]

 

Yes. He couldn't act on there either, although at least he gave Angelique some good scenes (no one really talks about Dark Shadows here but the Leviathan arc gave some of my very favorite Angelique scenes). 

 

Looking back I was probably a real brat with my reaction to recasts (thankfully I had no Internet access) but I couldn't take him, or Alex, or Mindy, or Blake. They were some of my very favorite characters. It wasn't like recasting Lillian or whatever for me. 

 

Over time that changed - oddly enough it was the messy McTavish era that made me accept Marj and Liz (I enjoyed Alex and Hawk bantering and I thought Liz did yeoman's work in the "twins with two dads" saga). Mindy, it was mostly her last months when Michael O'Leary came back and Rick and Mindy reconnected as Eve was dying. It's a shame because I loved Barbara Crampton as Leanna but her Mindy was just plain boring and vapid. 

 

The GL of that era was a cautionary tale in bringing people just because they'd been on another soap.

[katie_9918]

 

The first sign of a pulse I ever got from Crampton was with Hoxby's Cutter and Michael O'Leary as Rick and she was on her way out at both points!

 

What could have been, in both cases!

 

Marcy Walker and Barbara Crampton are classic examples of not adjusting stories to fit what the actors bring to the table. They held onto the idea of Marcy as leading (though I liked her with both Newman's Josh and Hoxby's Cutter) far too long and they also held onto Nick and Mindy opposite a completely different Alexandra for far too long.

 

Chris Bernau was equally awful compared to Not!Billy opposite Marie Wallace on Dark Shadows in the same storyline, but I blame her for that one, considering what he achieved as Alan Spaulding.

[NothinButAttitude]

 

Well you broke it down for me, buddy! 

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By '93 wasn't A-M being moved into Gilly's orbit and then they reneged and put him with Lucy? I remember that p-ssing me off as Gilly and Alan Michael had serious chemistry. 

 

I liked Nick except for when he was preaching and coming down on Roger. I got it that he didn't like him for his part in the Mindy/Eve matter and how he treated Alex. I liked him early on with Kim Simms' Mindy and later when he got paired with Susan upon VI was leaving for AMC. I would've loved to have seen Nick be brought back (along with either KS or KT's Mindy) and to be in a triangle with Beth, who was drawn to Nick b/c of his resemblance to Lujack. 

[katie_9918]

Nick and Susan were so sweet, and as a long term Alex fan, I really appreciated that the writers didn't go the easy route of  Nick and Susan leaving town to get away from Alex's toxic disapproval. Alex ADORED Susan before she and Nick started dating, and it was so good to see them not fighting over Nick's personal life, whatever else was going to hell in a handbasket that year (the entire show going back to centering around Reva, Phillip, and Harley - though it was later) that the memory of Nick and Susan just makes me smile. I love them.