All: Claire Labine Interview

[dragonflies]

Great interview:

http://www.welovesoaps.net/2009/11/soaps-hope-claire-labine-interview-part.html

[Michael]

Thanks for linking to this! I never get tired of seeing these people who truly respect the genre talk about their craft. Can't wait to read Part 2.

[Ann_SS]

I was about to post the link to the rest of Labine interview.

Part 2: http://www.welovesoa...ew-part_03.html

Part 3: http://www.welovesoa...ew-part_05.html

I can't believe this hasn't gotten more comments. I loved the Labines' GH and am pleased to get inside her head. I have to run, but will return with more thoughts to share.

[Sylph]

I can't wait to hear more about the GH stint.

[Ann_SS]

Yeah, the GH gossip promises to be interesting.

I find Claire's admission that she writes for herself to be very honest. I have always thought that most headwriters do. Fan campaigns are a waste of time and irrelevant because stories are planned out weeks ahead and follow the headwriter's vision. Guza definitely writes for himself. You can tell which characters he loves and finds interesting or when he gets bored and drops a story.

Robin is my favorite GH character so I was crushed when the Labines made her HIV+. I still resent it. I think that the disease has given Guza an excuse to limit her romantic stories though because Robin is not in the mob, it probably doesn't matter. It is unfortunate that Guza and Phelps are uninterested in exploring Robin's HIV. It was barely mentioned when she was pregnant. They may be right that it is too serious a topic.

[DRW50]

I have mixed feelings with the longevity of Robin given her HIV. I think that if she didn't have it, then Guza may have been more tempted to kill her off via bullets or click boom, to send some type of message about women who move on from the mob heroes.

I'm sorry I didn't respond to this more. I will say I am VERY glad she said she'd write the gorilla story again. Of all the reasons to criticize RH in that time...you had the Oompa Loompa Kimberly shoved on people 24/7, you had the mob literally invading the show, you had the Ryans being dismantled...and the biggest problem was a quick King Kong knockoff? If anything that was better than most other Delia stories during Randall's time in the role.

I think the "too depressing" criticism was something which was more for GH viewers. For GH, given its history, that era was depressing. Viewers weren't used to such pain back-to-back. Looking back, I'm sure a lot of them would choose that era over the snuff porn/mob porn era ever since, but thy did't know that at the time.

[Ann_SS]

Good point. I had never considered this possibility.

Like I said before, I never considered the Labine era as depressing. It was organic and full of well told stories with some comedy and lightweight stories thrown in. I would rush home to watch GH. I had not done that since the Robert/Anna/Duke era and have not done that since.

I only saw the depressing tag this in the soap mags. I remember an article about the state of the soaps which had dropping ratings where a producer said that the Stone's death was too depressing and that was why the viewers tuned out. The producer might have been JFP.

[Sylph]

The HIV tale is very un-Lemayesque.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

I never considered her GH to be "too depressing" either. she might have done a few heavy-hitting socially conscious stories, but there was a lot of romance, comedy, and family interaction that balanced everything out.

And I'm glad she wrote the show she wanted to write. Too many HW's and EP's try to appease fanbases these days they they don't know how to craft a cohesive show.

I wish Labine (and Wendy Riche for that matter) would make a final return to daytime and get a strong producer to back her up and defend her vision to the network for her.

[DRW50]

I think a lot of the era had good balance, but I think when it came to the time of Monica's breast cancer story and Paige dying and Alan almost having sex with Bobbie + Stone dying of HIV as Robin waits to see if she has the disease + Sonny and Brenda and Luke and Laura breaking up. This was all going on around the same time, with some of the lighthearted character like Sean and Tiffany written out, or like Felicia, sidelined. A lot of this was very heavy emotional material, and a lot of it wasn't rooted in the escapism of the Monty era. I remember Marlena de la Croix writing a column about the men who loved GH in the Monty era and how many stopped watching during this era.

They were even going to have Audrey get Alzheimer's at this time, which they dropped.

[Ann_SS]

One of my favorite Labine stories was Annabelle and Foster's romance. Lucy's hijinks were also hysterical. These stories also represent the Labines era to me. I can see why men tuned out with the adventure stories gone, but the audience was declining for all the soaps. Again we have more and more women going into the work place. The daytime audience was dwindling no matter what was on the screen.

[Sylph]

That will probably never happen.

Your only hope are her children.

But isn't their quality as writers a bit unknown?

[DRW50]

All of daytime was definitely on the decline. I think GH got more notice at the time because they had some big drops in 1994-1995, moreso than a number of other soaps. I think one was during that Puerto Rico remote, so I guess it was more than just depression taking viewers away.

[Ann_SS]

Wasn't the Puerto Rican remote, Sonny and Brenda's adventure or am thinking of another story?

[LoyaltoAMC]

I also found Labine's GH too dark and depressing, and could never get into it. I was schooled on Monty's GH, with its energy, quick pace, and electricity. That was GH to me. Yes, there was more of a depth to her writing than in previous eras, but it was all so gloomy and dour. I found it unwatchable. Don't get me wrong...I think she's one of the better writers that daytime has seen, but in hindsight I wonder how much of the brilliance of RH in those first few years can be attributed to Paul Avila Mayer instead. I was never impressed with much of Labine's post-RH work, or even her solo stint at RH near the end of its run. You never hear much about Mayer. When people speak of the brilliance of early RH, Labine is the one inevitably credited. Anyone know anything about him other than the fact that he was married to Sasha von Sherler(sp?), who played Brooke's mom Jane on AMC in the mid 80s, and that he had a not-too-successful run as SFT HW? I would love to get some insight into his working dynamic with Labine. Oh and by the way, and I'm the last one to defend him, but I think that Guza, with all his many flaws, has done the right thing concerning Robin. By keeping mention of her HIV status to a minimum, it sends a subliminal message to the viewers that people with HIV should not be defined by their HIV status. She is a character who just happens to be positive. I think it's right that it's not used as some cheap plot device.