DAYS: Corday on plans for Frances Reid

[Eric83]

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DAYS's Corday on Plans For Reid

Ever since Frances Reid passed away on February 3 at the age of 95, fans have been wondering how DAYS is going to address Alice's death. In an exclusive interview with Digest, Executive Producer Ken Corday reveals their plans. "We'll most likely have an internal memorial service for her sometime in the next month," he says. "The way we're going to deal with her death on screen is we're not going to one day walk downstairs, as it was with Mickey, and say, ‘Oh, Grandma's dead' and then have a day or two where everyone comes to the show and we have a funeral and you cut to Marie for one line and Doug and Julie for one line and it really becomes 'lip service' to such a great character. So, what we've decided to do is we will play her as being ill and the end is coming and one by one, characters who loved her dearly or are related to her, from the past, will come to the show and 'visit' with her. You can start to imagine the list. I don't know what we're going to do with Bill Horton, because the last person who played him was not Ed Mallory, it was Chris Stone, who is gone, too, so that will be a little tricky. We're working that out. And unfortunately, because we're so far ahead into writing the show, it won't air really until the end of May sweeps. But I believe it's far better to do it that way then to just have a day or two of she's gone, here's the funeral and on we go. It's too important and there are too many individual relationships that needed to be remembered and have flashbacks as opposed to a flashback show. I think it's an honest and sensitive way to deal with something like this. It will give the audience time to prepare, even though many of our fans know this has happened. We will put a bumper up at the end of the show on February 18 or 19 with a picture and her dates, but it's impossible to stop the machine now, write a show or two in the next week and bring everyone in. It was just not the right thing to do."

[Dr Neil Curtis]

Sounds good to me. With The Bill situation, I was hoping that Stuart Damon would be Bill, but its best to cast a soap vet to play Bill and Tommy long before the death of Alice. Bill: Peter Simon, one of The Storm Brothers, Robert Gentry. Tommy: Larry Brygman, Nicholas Coster, Don Hastings. It would be great to get a vet in those two roles. I wonder if the return list consist of: Marie, Steve, Scotty, David, Sandy, Melissa, Sarah, Phyllis Anderson, Marlena, John, Don, Shawn, Belle, Jenn, Jack, Neil, Liz......??

[bellcurve]

Are they gonna CGI Alice like they did Tom Horton during the Salem Stalker story?

[jcar03]

I think we will just see those individuals talk to her while she is laying in bed.

[Michael]

I like the idea. It could come off a little bizarre, and I hope we do get a funeral to pull it all together, but I like the concept of actually acknowledging that Alice is ill. And it might allow these visitors to interact with the regular characters more than Melissa did when she showed up for ten seconds.

[Guest dc cubs]

I like the idea too. Corday didn't specifically mention a funeral for Alice but there has to be one. Sometimes at funerals there are so many people there the show can't portray the relationship to the deceased justice. There isn't enough time. This way if relatives are coming to visit Alice there could be more attention and detail to that person's relationship with Alice.

As far as how they go about doing it without showing Alice, I think the returning characters might come downstairs from visiting her and then share memories with other relatives such as Maggie, Julie, Doug or Hope. Perhaps the visits will be a couple of weeks and then there is a funeral.

I was surprised Corday mentioned May sweeps as I thought they would need more time to pull things together. I believe they are taping shows right now that will air in mid April. They still need to line up the returns and write the scripts so May might be a little optimistic.

[Paul Raven]

Of course,one of the problems is Days ignoring the Hortons over the years,so that when an event like this comes around,it's difficult to pull together.

Bill should have been killed off when Edward Mallory died.As Bill was in Africa at the time,it could be mentioned onscreen that the funeral was taking place in London where Jack and Jennifer were and that the other family members were meeting there.Maybe a brief flashback montage.

Again,when John Lupton died,Tommy should have been killed off also.

Other characters should have at least been mentioned eg phone calls at Xmas,Hope going to see Melissa,Julie mentioning David etc

Better yet,characters like David,Sandy etc should have been woven into the plots over the years.

[DRW50]

I don't think there's a need to kill off Tommy. He had not been a major character in a long time. There's still story for him and his children if they want to try.

I do sympathize with them about Bill but I think enough time has passed to where they could bring him back. But then, with Lucas gone, there is less reason to see Bill.

I hope they will at least bring Maree Cheatham back.

[tylerbo20]

i think to deal with Bill i would just cast someone in recurring role and bring him on to mix with Kate and bring in Laura and that way the new audience will know who Bill is. i think they could ignore Tommy issue as i dont even think he was around for Tom's funeral. Im sure the ones that will return will be Jack/Jennifer Melissa(cause we just saw her) and Marie and probably Lucas. I think Marlena should come back but if Deidri Hall doesnt want to i dont blame her to return for a funeral show. Since it would be weird that she would return for Alice's funeral but not to help Sami deal with her children issues. Maybe its time for Deidri hall and Drake to reutnr to the show?

[AllMyDaysatGH]

I am glad that Corday is going to take his time with this, as opposed to how he and the show handled Mickey's death. I can't wait to see who returns, I hope to see Melissa Reeves back as Jennifer, the show really should try to get Bryan Dattilo back as Lucas for a short stint for this, Deidre hall definitely! I'm interested in seeing how this develops in the coming months.

ETA: Just read that paragraph more in depth, LOL is it me, or did Corday basically admit that the show handled Mickey's death in a crappy way? Because it sure did.

[JackPeyton]

Yes, lol.

But, sad wrong as it may be, Mickeys death wasnt about the death of a horton or mickey. It was about adressing a situation that needed to be fixed. Its just to badd the falloput from it, maggie drinking, was changed.

I like this plan. a lot. lets see if they can pull it off.