27 minutes ago, soapfan770 said:

My bad I mean DK as in David Kriezman.

Donna who would you have recast Ed with? Someone at the time suggested David Forsyth from AW as Ed; I would’ve tried to reach back out to either Robert Gentry at the least.

I wondered if you were really saying DK! 

David Forsyth is a great suggestion. I know he could play it. Personally I was not fond of Gentry. If only we could tweak the past. 

There was a meme that went around that said that the Bennifer wedding reset the timeline to 2004. With that set of circumstances what would you change? 

On GL I would fire Bradley & Frank & keep Jerry on contract. Also when everyone but Kim took the pay cut I would've fired Kim. (Unfair to the others not to.) I would've done away with both the island principality & the mob. (Gotta fire David, too, no need for Edmund.) Danny Santos would be discovered to be a long lost grandson of Mike Bauer. I would've recast Rachel Miner & Bryan Buffington. There would never have been a Grady or a Cyrus. I would have never hired Marty West. There would have been no baseball diamond set. Ellen Weston would have never been propped by co-HWs. I don't care how much fun Carrie Nye was BTS, there would have been no Maryanne Carruthers story. It goes without saying the words "sock puppet" would never be uttered. I would still tell the stories of Otalia & Jami. OH! Ben Reade, not a sex worker & no suicide. Find a way to keep Aubrey Dollar. 

 

So, 2004, what would you change? 

1 hour ago, soapfan770 said:

Donna who would you have recast Ed with? Someone at the time suggested David Forsyth from AW as Ed; I would’ve tried to reach back out to either Robert Gentry at the least.

I remember a couple of the soap magazines suggested Gil Gerard was being considered as an Ed recast.  But I have no idea what his physical condition (and appearance) was at that time. It may have been a rumor or someone's wishful casting, but I did see it in print.  David Forsyth had the acting chops, but he seemed to young to play Ed, in my opinion.   

Ellen Wheeler was the most inept producer. Kim Zimmer said that Ellen cried all the time. Ellen, we cry because you killed GL!  Peapack!! Worst idea ever!!

5 minutes ago, TEdgeofNight said:

Ellen Wheeler was the most inept producer. Kim Zimmer said that Ellen cried all the time. Ellen, we cry because you killed GL!  Peapack!! Worst idea ever!!

People who were there said Kim cried all the time, too. 

13 minutes ago, TEdgeofNight said:

Peapack!! Worst idea ever!!

I agree! While I'm glad that the actors and crew got to work for another year-and-a-half or so, I have to wonder if the end result was worth it. Maybe it would have been better to be unemployed than have your name attached to the inferior product that Guiding Light became during the Peapack era.

3 minutes ago, China Jones said:

I agree! While I'm glad that the actors and crew got to work for another year-and-a-half or so, I have to wonder if the end result was worth it. Maybe it would have been better to be unemployed than have your name attached to the inferior product that Guiding Light became during the Peapack era.

I think most actors would rather have the job. I don't really believe there was a huge industry stigma attached to Peapack. To most people, GL was a show their mother or grandmother watched, and not something still on the air in 2009. I don't hear Murray Bartlett going around saying that filming on the cheap for a year hurt his career.

2 minutes ago, DRW50 said:

I think most actors would rather have the job. I don't really believe there was a huge industry stigma attached to Peapack. To most people, GL was a show their mother or grandmother watched, and not something still on the air in 2009. I don't hear Murray Bartlett going around saying that filming on the cheap for a year hurt his career.

And, it's not just the actors. Also crew, staff, etc. I agree that they didn't suffer from some stigma. Yes, they did suffer because they worked under hardship conditions. And, I believe working with the threat of cancellation carries a serious level of stress, too. But, when push comes to shove, obviously people would choose to continue working. In fact, they actually did choose to. And there was an article, either 2007 or 2008, that indicated that GL was the only soap making money. Clearly, that's a double-edged sword. They were working on such a hardship budget, on the cheap, that that is what it took to be profitable. Yikes. 

2 minutes ago, DRW50 said:

To most people, GL was a show their mother or grandmother watched, and not something still on the air in 2009.

Yes, I guess you're right, considering the fact that even I wasn't watching in 2009: I recently viewed the Peapack era on YouTube. The thing is, I used to watch GL (and the whole CBS daytime line-up) with my grandmother, so it was kind of tough to see one of the shows we looked at together go out like that.  

 

4 minutes ago, DRW50 said:

I think most actors would rather have the job.

I agree.  Peapack was an embarrassment for everyone concerned.  Nevertheless, a lot of people were depending on its' success in order to maintain their livelihoods. 

In the end, you can't fault anyone responsible for trying to do whatever they could to keep GL going and keep everyone employed.  They just needed more competent leaders at the helm.

1 hour ago, Mona Kane Croft said:

I remember a couple of the soap magazines suggested Gil Gerard was being considered as an Ed recast. 

Gil Gerard would have made for a better Clint Buchanan recast on OLTL.

I, myself, would have reached out to Mart Hulswit to see whether he were interested in returning to the show.  He might not have been a hunk, but I think Ed was past being a romantic lead anyway.  Plus, having him there with Maureen Garrett as Holly might have made the Sebastian storyline less absurd.

36 minutes ago, TEdgeofNight said:

Ellen Wheeler was the most inept producer. Kim Zimmer said that Ellen cried all the time. Ellen, we cry because you killed GL!  Peapack!! Worst idea ever!!

Yet Ellen Wheeler was EP for some 5 1/2 years. Of all the EPs GL had in its final 25 years, Ellen Wheeler had the second longest run after Paul Rauch (6 years).

21 minutes ago, China Jones said:

Yes, I guess you're right, considering the fact that even I wasn't watching in 2009: I recently viewed the Peapack era on YouTube. The thing is, I used to watch GL (and the whole CBS daytime line-up) with my grandmother, so it was kind of tough to see one of the shows we looked at together go out like that.  

I can respect that. To be honest, any shame that I think my family would have felt with what GL had become had already happened. For me, anything after the decision to claim Ben was sexually abused and being sexually abused made him a serial killer was just not going to reach such a low...although goodness knows they tried with that incest-loving hambone Jonathan, Cassie's kid who electrified his father and got lots of closeups looking pouty to make sure we knew he was evil, and so on.

You remember the speculation that Stuart Damon was being considered as an Ed Bauer recast?  I would've liked to see Mart return in the role as that tied into GL's past.

Absolutely.  If they couldn't have gotten GA back, they should've made a call to John Bolger.

5 hours ago, Khan said:

I said the same thing as the storyline was playing out.  If GA was not interested in returning, I said, then recast Phillip, so there would be a point to the "Who Killed Phillip?" storyline.  I also said he even could return using a different name, like Scott Marler ("Scott," for Jackie; "Marler," for Justin), to illustrate how repentant he felt about the way he had treated all his loved ones before he was "killed" and that he wanted to clean the proverbial slate.  Not an ideal situation, mind you, but at least there would have been a purpose to "killing" him off.

 

14 hours ago, Donna L. Bridges said:

The point was to give other players some time on the front burner. Typically the front burner was used up by Reva & by Phillip. Personally I thought it was great that Grant did it & also that it was temp & not perm. And probably as an actor he worked on something else while he was gone. Actors like that. And, jobs on soaps used to afford that kind of variety to the hired help. 

It's silly to have an "off-screen" Phillip being an elusive boogey-man.  It's bad storytelling.  Let other players share the spotlight, but that story was weak.  They never should've revealed Phillip was alive until they were able to show him on-screen- it was so stupid. Show, don't tell.

5 minutes ago, Spoon said:

It's silly to have an "off-screen" Phillip being an elusive boogey-man.  It's bad storytelling.  Let other players share the spotlight, but that story was weak.  They never should've revealed Phillip was alive until they were able to show him on-screen- it was so stupid. Show, don't tell.

I may just have to call this another Minority Rapport. I actually liked Phillip's return. 

I never understood why they made Phillip into the Big Bad both in his exit and then offscreen, had him invisibly stalking his family and friends for several years as they struggled to get GA back, etc. and then when he does show up he is mostly fine! Very little is mentioned of his psychotic break or all the crazy stuff he's pulled both before and after his 'death!' Except for one thing, when he literally throws that creep Grady off a cliff and no one ever finds out! They just go back to more folk-rock scenes of Phillip strolllng the dilapidated streets and bonding with people! WTF?!

Edited December 27, 20231 yr by Vee