James E Reilly interview 1999

[DeeeDee]

Passions was never the same after Josh's death.

[lovely_m]

It took them too long to find a new heart of the show after he died. I thought Endora filled that void, but it was too late.

[soapfan770]

I hated, hated some of the storylines for Katherine Noone's character Edna Wallace. Not only was it a waster of the Emmy-winning Noone's talents (who was superb on Sunset Beach), but down right insulting. For goodness sake she PEED on her daughter's wedding dress. Of all things to sabotage a wedding dress that is what they came up with? Worse moment came when the monkey changed her diapers and then later changed a six-year old Little Ethan's diapers because they forgot to potty train him.

[EricMontreal22]

I have to agree--if you tuned into Passions every other month or even month it was entertaining cuz it was so whacked out--that's why the non soap press (for a while) loved it, etc. But it just was too much to watch day to day because of the endless repetitive scenes and dialogue (I've dissed the actors a lot, but I admit a lot of the stuff the "straight" or "romantic" leads were given was damn hard to play--there's a reason actors I found insufferable on Passions, like Galen Gering, while not brilliant now have done a bit better on other soaps). I also say word to the couple of people who have pointed out how mean spirited much of the dramatic stuff was--this was my big problem with ANY of the gay storylines (which made me question Reilly's feelings about his own sexuality--perhaps unfair but when he writes stories and characters like that I find it justified) and Carl's mention of the endless rapes which were just in poor taste.

And yeah, Reilly's 90s Days period, while not my fave soap era, had stuff where you got why it did well. I think Waggert said in his '97 Soap Encyclopedia how the soap press jumped on all the bizarre and shocking plot devices he used (possession, etc) but behind that was classic soap stuff, liek endless triangles, etc. This is where Gary Tomlin's comment in the 90s that Reilly's Dayswas like Bill Bell classic stuff, but on drugs--because he knew how to stretch a story pas the beaking point, but have the pay off be so good that viewers found it worth it. I don't know about his last era at Days--I barely watched--but he never IMHO managed this with Passions, particular in its last year--it was just endless plot stretching.

(I said I watched the first few months even though I was disappointed the promos and previews of a genuinely spooky new soap were misleading--but there was some intriguing stuff back there like with that ghost girl (?) etc. I'm not sure if that was ever even revolved--it just went downhill from there.

[EricMontreal22]

That's why, if I wanted campy soap, I prefered Sunset Beach (at least during its bet brief era) to Passions. It had wittier dialogue, it MOVED a hell of a lot faster, and I didn't feel the mean spiritedness of Passions where I could almost be fooled to think I was watching a show that was trying to mock the genre and anyone who would actually watch it--whereas Sunset Beach (while far from always brilliant) celebrated it with its mockery.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

And even Sunset Beach was like a poor man's bargain bin version of Santa Barbara, though not as intelligent and well acted.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

Though many don't want to admit it, I think part of the reason why Reilly's 90's stint worked at DAYS worked was because of Tom Langan. Langan knew how to execute Reilly's vision and ground the hell out of it. He also had past experience at Y&R, and probably knew first hand what it was life producing stories that go on for a while, leading up to an explosive climax.

In the 90's, Corday generally let Langan steer that ship. Langan sucked when it came to BOTH writing and producing, but I don't think anyone has ever gotten Reilly's vision as well as he did.

[EricMontreal22]

Touche (even using some elements of its set!)

Right. Often when there's a great or well loved era for a soap writer, its his (or her) name that people fully associate with it--even the show execs themselves are guilty of this, and then they wonder what happened when they hire them back--not getting that it was tghe combination with the EP, and others, that often helped (witness McTavish, Malone...)

[ChitHappens]

May he rest in peace, but I am so glad I will never see Reilly's name on anything else! His "writing" was nothing short or absolutely hideous! His imagination went too far, almost childlike, and he never really wrote anything. Just junk with events that had no follow through. Just off to the next event. I always felt Reilly should have been a wedding planner because after the wedding, whatever happens is not his fault. Writing was not for him.

ANDREA

[Khan]

Lord knows I wasn't a JER fan, but I thought PASSIONS was terrible even by his standards. At times, I would read storyline recaps and previews and think, "This [!@#$%^&*] got past NBC? Really?" (Granted, NBC's no purveyor of good taste, but come on, lol!) If I didn't know better, I would swear that JER deliberately wrote the worst material he could think of, just to piss off the network b/c they might've screwed him over at some point (although, when and why are beyond me).

[Khan]

What's to get, really? Two-dimensional characters, portrayed by former adult film one-dimensional actors, trapped in the same idiotic situations, spouting the same repetitive dialogue, day after day like hamsters on a wheel, until somebody has enough gumption to say, "Let's just end this [!@#$%^&*] already!"

Say what you will about Bill Bell, but there was a method to his madness. JER, on the other hand, was just madness.

[bellcurve]

If Reilly were coupled with a better, technical EP and direction, it probably would have fared way better. Who knows?

I feel like Reilly had big ideas, but his weakness was not pairing himself with a stronger producer to execute that vision.

[Y&RWorldTurner]

That's true, but JER's first DAYS stint was noticeably different in tone and execution when compared to his second stint. While I'll chalk some up that up to growing interference from NBC and Corday, I think it was mainly the switch from Langan to Wyman that made the difference. I think Langan, who by all accounts Corday let run free with the show for a long time, knew how to execute that crap in a way that was more efficient and yes, even more watchable, than Wyman ever could.

I think outside of the slow pacing, there wasn't much similarity to Bell and Reily's styles. Bell knew how to develop, change, and mature characters. Reilly never could do that type of character writing. While characters would keep many of their core elements on Y&R, you always got a sense that they learned something from their mistakes or past blowups. On JER's DAYS and Passions, the characters were more like caricatures who would do the same things repeatedly and never grew or develop, they just kept on regressing.

Bell also could do much more diverse things and even though he recycled past plots a lot, it wasn't as repetitious as JER's style of writing.

[Khan]

Exactly.

[DeeeDee]

Sheridan/Luis/Fancy.

But that was more the fans than him.