Guiding Light discussion thread

[vetsoapfan]

I am not the sort of person who critiques material without having first-hand knowledge of it.

I hope this puts your mind at ease.

[Contessa Donatella]

Yes,

[slick jones]

Trying to understand what watching GH has to do with a  Guiding Light Thread.    

Even with her on ignore, I see she's still pestering posters about the wrong topics.

Cheers @vetsoapfan.

[Contessa Donatella]

Oh, thank god you've arrived! These people brought up GH here. I mean what were they thinking?!!!

[Contessa Donatella]

Okay, so you watch GH. I called it that Ava means to find who is behind the meds tampering. What are the odds this is her fatal flaw?

[Reverend Ruthledge]

How did you find that Pat Collins, Robert Gentry, Mart Hulswit and Richard van Fleet failed to capture the essence of Ed Bauer as well as Peter Simon did? 

Edited May 1, 2024 by Reverend Ruthledge

[chrisml]

AT least the Ben Read nonsense gave MAtt Bomer something interesting to do, and if daytime emmys were given out to the best performers, he would have been nominated and won. JFP and Beyond, I felt too many of the producers had real contempt for the audience and the characters. They never seemed to understand what made the show special. I think JFP did immense damage to the show (and not just the mistake we're still talking about 30 yrs later) but it could have been salvaged. There were times post-JFP where the show did right itself, and then the wheels would fall off again. The whole Zaslow "wizened old man" controversy shows what kind of people had power at the network and P&G.

[Paul Raven]

Seeking some clarity re Lynne Adams. She played Leslie 66-71.

Did she choose to leave? I imagine so.

GL recast with Kathryn Hays and then Barbara Rodell. Did they drop Kathryn when Barbara was killed off on Secret Storm, perhaps feeling Barbara would do better in the role?

I'm assuming Kathryn wasn't there long and wasn't working out for whatever reason. 

Then also in 71 Lynne takes over as Amy on Secret Storm and plays that role until Jada Rowland decides to return to the role. I can see why SS would want Jada as she was t most identified with that role.

If Lynne left GL to spread her wings she wasn't away long before coming back to soaps.

So Lynne is out of a job at SS so GL drops Barbara so Lynne can return.

However it appears Barbara was popular as Leslie so why would GL dump her for Lynne?

Can anyone give a definitive response/timeline?

[Mitch64]

Oyyy..what did Watros do to her face???? Between her and CM;s face, (well and his pecs) there was so much plastic to keep a recycling factory going for 50 years! Agree with the rest besides Harley, the shrew years, Buzz any minute he was on screen, Jonathon after he started taking hints from Zimmer on relying on "little tricks" to get you by (his was his annoying laugh) and when Kreizman started blowing him in his writing, and Otalia and Jami...but to each their own!

[danfling]

The Guiding Light could have employed BOTH Lynne Adams and Barbara Rodell.

I am pretty sure that Lynne Adams choose to leave The Guiding Light.

I do not remember Kathryn Hays in the role at all.   Barbara Rodell, who had been killed off both Another World and The Secret Storm, became the third Leslie.  I think that she was popular in all three of those roles.    She had also appeared on A Flame in the Wind/A Time for Us and, later, on As the World Turns (on which she was fantastic.

Agnes Nixon had created the roles of Leslie Jackson, R. N. and also Dr. Steven Jackson.  Their relationship, I am told, was a lot like that of Palmer Courtlandt and Nina Courtlandt, two later characters who were also created by Agnes Nixon for All My Children.

For years, there was a painting of Mrs. Jackson, the supposedly deceased wife of Steve and mother of Leslie.  However, Mrs. Jackson was not really dead (much like Gillian Spenser's role of Daisy on All My Children.

Jada Rowland left The Secret Storm for the third time, and CBS placed Lynne Adams as the fourth Amy.   I am not exactly sure why she left the show, but the father of her child had been murdered, she had appeared on the first season of the PBS program Sesame Street, two of the longtime actresses had left The Secret Storm (Marjorie Gateson and Haila Stoddard), the show had a new owner, and Ms. Rowland was also working as a puppeter.

It is said that Ms. Rowland was traveling across the country, and, when she was somewhere in the South, she contacted the show and told them that she was out of money, asking the show to forward her enough to get back to Manhatten and show's studios.

At that point, Lynne Adams was taken off the show and replaced by Jada Rowland.

Lynne Adams returned to The Guiding Light to replace Barbara Rodell.

But, if the show had really done the smart thing, they would have kept Barbara Rodell as Leslie, and also hired Lynne Adams to play Victoria, who was the mother/wife seen in the portrait.   Ms. Adams could have worn make-up to make her look old.   (She wore a older woman's hair style when she was on The Secret Storm.)

Actress Carol Tietel (who had completed a role on The Edge of Night) was hired to play Victoria.

The Secret Storm was cancelled around Thanksgiving of 1973 and left the air in February of 1974. The show was sold to American Home Products (its original owner), and that company attempted to syndicate The Secret Storm.    (My local CBS affiliate, WJTV, was said to have been the first station to purchase the future show.)   But, alas, the proposed syndicated version never materialized, and the show was hastily drawn to an uncomfortable conclusion.

 

Two of the show's popular stars, Dan Hamilton and Stephanie Braxton, joined the cast of All My Children on ABC.  David Acroid moved to NBC to played Dr. Gilcrest on Another World, and Bernard Barrow (Dan Kinkaid) joined the cast of The Edge of Night.

There was a consideration by NBC to revive The Secret Storm, but the decision was made to produce How to Survive a Marriage instead.

By the way, Jada Rowland was considered for the role of Dr. Faith Coleridge on Ryan's Hope in 1975.  The show's owners had created the role for Ms. Rowland, but it was decided that she was a little too old to play Faith.

[P.J.]

Reading synopses of 80-81, I wish even more there was more of that period online. 

[Contessa Donatella]

Yeah, CM should be punished for doing that to both her face & to her eyes! But perhaps she is being punished by having to live with it. She still has one of the most animated faces around but she's lost some flexibility she used to have. 

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Alan Locher just posted this, as he said, "rare" look at Ellen Wheeler's apartment near the end of the show. Jill & Ellen worked here, a lot. Almost all of the time there would have been extra hours, after full days at the studio or at Peapack. I know that one of their routines was to take the scripts for Otalia & read them aloud. It was a kind of extra check. I realize this is not going to mean much to most of you but it means a great deal to me. This in a real sense is the birthplace of Otalia, one of the world's great, engaging love stories. 

[TEdgeofNight]

To this date, Ellen Wheeler was the most inept EP in the history of daytime. She killed my GL. That stupid Peapack crap. Enough said. 

[Mitch64]

I know you and others like Otalia( Olive and Holly would have been hotter..Natalia was a bore) but "world's great and engaging love stories"??? If only they would have focused as much on the rest of the show and characters. 

Come on...you didn't  agree with putting the actor with the most longevity who was the defacto patriarch of the show on recurring, then having Rick and Phillip unwittingly kill him? All for non stop Jami, Gush, Coopers and freaking Jeffery all over the place?

[Contessa Donatella]

Who is Olive?

I don't know if you know it or not, but Claire Labine pitched Olivia & Holly! Can you imagine if they had told that story *then* and with Labine writing it?!!! Phenomenal!!! But, of course, Paul Rauch shot down every single thing that Labine pitched. 

And, I will stand by "world's great and engaging love stories", one of ... 

Edited May 6, 2024 by Contessa Donatella
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