All: Claire Labine Interview

[quartermainefan]

Well she is referencing a sentiment of his from 15 years ago. I agree with TG that Luke worked better as a character in plot oriented adventure tales, and it was a huge transition. The same problem hit Felicia. She never was able to successfully make the transition to the domestic dramas of 90s GH.

[EricMontreal22]

Don't forget she gave Todd a parrot.

[NorrthCafe]

I thought that was a very insightful interview and loved how candid she was (especially about Nixon wanting the 'Ryan's Hope' timeslot for 'Loving' and how the network trashed RH.

I do hate the comment from writers that they don't write for the audience but for themselves. That's what I call a freakin' hobby. Stay home and do that. Write for the audience, as much as possible, and maintain your integrity as a writer. I don't know if there are prime time writers who make those sort of statements, but I think it's telling that so many daytime writers want to prove their bona fides as tough writers who do things 'their way'... that's what sucks about daytime, now.

[DRW50]

It still seems to be his opinion today, based on his comments during the Ethan story, and the general level of writing for Luke after Laura's departure.

It seems to go even further now, in that now it isn't just not wanting to be a stay at home husband or father, but also feeling justified to sleep around.

I wish they'd written the story this way from the start. To promote Luke and Laura as any type of happy couple when Geary hated the idea was a con job, one which led a lot of viewers to feel betrayed later on.

[Ann_SS]

The adventure era of GH which I loved ended in the 80s and not because the Labines showed up in the 1990s, but because soap budgets began to shrink across the board. What made those adventures work on GH were the climax that occurred in gorgeous location shoots. By 1990s, location shoots were less frequent and much shorter. Monty quickly discovered this during her second stint at GH. The reality is that since the 1990s soap stories have been constrained by their budgets.

I don't care that TG was not happy with Luke. I want him and Guza to stop lying about what happened on screen between Luke and Laura. TG's interviews show that he has no respect for soap fans so I have none for him. He needs to retire.

I did not like Labines on OLTL.

[AdelaideCate007]

I loved the Labine era on GH- it felt very balanced for me. A lot of her stories- BJ/Maxie, Monica's cancer, Katherine/Ned/Lois, Lucy/Kevin- are some of all time favourites, and while there were definitely some clunkers- the [!@#$%^&*] with Lucy and the psychic, Sonny getting Karen hooked on drugs- it was a far more balanced and enjoyable than it is now.

I had no idea she didn't like Genie and Tony Geary just needs to be quiet.

I think the Labines were responsible for that; all I can remember about that story was him cheating on her with that DA and then Tiffany trying to kill herself when she found out.

The best thing about that story was that it ended up with Kevin and Mac dressed up in drag...but that got old really fast.

Is she the one who that surrogacy story with Scott and Dominique? and did she create Brenda or was Brenda already there?

[DRW50]

She didn't do the story with Sonny getting Karen hooked on drugs. She ended that.

Brenda was already at GH. She had arrived a while before that as Julia's bratty sister.

I think she did the Dominique story, but I can't remember.

[R Sinclair]

Pardon me for bursting your bubble... but it's been that way since the dawn of the playwright. This is nothing new, and definitely nothing unique to daytime.

Just as you wouldn't tell a singer to only sing songs the audience wants... or an actor to only portray characters their fans want... it's incredibly naive, and quite honestly, uninformed about the craft of writing in general, to expect a writer to maintain their integrity by writing for the audience as much as possible and not for themselves. That's like saying "Do everything I tell you to do while ignoring your own personal feelings... but maintain as much of your self-respect as possible!"

Every writer has their own views, their own voices. They have their own strengths and weaknesses. If they don't stay true to what they believe their vision is, then they're no longer a storyteller... they're just a transcriber. Writing down what other people want to happen in a story they've created in their minds.

The problem is selecting the appropriate writers whose vision and voices are in line with what the audience wants.

[Sylph]

And the audience sometimes (read: always) does not know what it wants.

Also, if a writer says he/she is writing for the audience, you know they're not really telling the truth, to use a circumlocution.

[Vee]

Carlivati did not start at OLTL under Claire Labine; he came there at the tail end of Michael Malone's first run.

I liked a lot of what she did at OLTL (Canton, Mel, etc), but I hated other stuff. The hatchet job on Blair was inexplicable, to say the least.

[Faulkner]

Lord hamercy...I hated hated hated Labine's vision of Lucy Coe as this dizzy, manic "funny" character. I never understood how Kevin put up with her. I also hated the "funny" Quartermaines. Labine's humor on GH, OLTL, and GL has always been this kooky, sort of Preston Sturges-esque slaptick, which I don't like on soaps. And tonally, the "light" stuff was just too jarring juxtaposed to the dark stuff. Going from watching Stone dying to Lucy cackling just didn't work for me.

Looking back, Labine's era on GH was a bit uneven, but I do look back on it fondly. Between Reilly's DAYS and Labine's GH, those were really the last times soaps took your into a world driven by one creative vision.

[quartermainefan]

I did a little professional writing and my editor taught me two things I will stand by forever:

A hero is someone who makes a decision

If the audience says it wants something, never give it to them

[Sylph]

You had a wonderful editor!

[quartermainefan]

For that definition of hero alone, I would take anything he said at face value. What was the Maltese Falcon's defining moment? When Sam Spade told the Mary Astor character "Brigid O'Shaughnessy" that she has to go to jail even though he was in love with her. And we have seen this again and again through the years and on soaps. Scorpio had a similar moment with Holly back in 2006 and the virus on GH, and much earlier where he had to do the right thing about Lucas even though it was costing him Bobbie's friendship.

Today there are very few heroes on soaps. They make choices and do acts, but then like cowards cover it up so they don't have to face the consequences. Tad Martin buried someone alive on AMC and I don't think he ever faced a single consequence for that.

[Vee]

I think heroes are very important. However, soaps, and drama, are also built on indecision. In terms of sheer story, you have Hamlet; in terms of soaps, you have romantic angst or long-running triangles. You have to have anticipation as well as defining choices. That's what drama is about.

That's different, however, from what has become of the characters on GH or AMC, where everyone is warped not into a ditherer but into an amoral antihero in order to satisfy the whims of failed, bitter writers who couldn't make it in primetime or cable. It's not that Tad (or Sonny, or Jason) made no choice; it's that they made the wrong ones, and never seem to do right again.