Speaking of ATWT, Donna Wandrey, the wooden but striking Roxanne Drew of Dark Shadows, auditioned to be Rachel on AW after Robin Strasser left, I believe the first time, not sure. They told her she was too nice. She went out shopping and when she checked her service, her agent told her ATWT wanted her to read for Barbara.

I've seen every DS on it's SiFi run. I know the character of Roxanne Drew, I just can't picture her face at the moment.. I can't imagine anyone else but Coleen Zenk as Barbara.

Wow... I can't believe I ignored this thread for a whole summer, besides the one comment about Kimberlin Brown almost Becoming Cassandra Rawlins on Y&R. haha time to comment on a few things i have seen while skimming through these pages.

Steve Burton - originally auditioned for the role of A. J. Quartermain on General Hospital

You know, maybe because he is bff's with Scott Reeves, I seriously thought that Steve would audition for the part of Ryan McNeil. I can actually see him playing that character, plus it wouldn't make the huge age difference between him and Victoria in real life that distracting since Steve is like five years older than Heather Tom, and Scott was like nine or ten years older than her. and it would be interesting to see Steve on a more sophiscated show like Y&R, then to the mob obsessed GH, but sadly i'm sure like they did when Scott played Ryan, they would have killed him off anyway in 2001... actually scratch that i could picture Steve being on there longer than Scott was for some reason.

Christie Clark - auditioned for the role of Victoria Newman on Young & the Restless when Heather Tom chose to leave

I don't think that that would have been a bad choice at all, Christie is a really great actress, and i could totally see her bring her strength that she had on days, over to Y&R as Victoria.

Katherine Kelly Lang - originally auditioned for the role of Caroline on Bold & the Beautiful

Hmm.... I can actually see this sort of happening.... KKL can definitely play nice very well, so yeah..... I wonder who would have been Brooke then?... Joanna Johnson?

That's interesting that Quinn Reddeker was considered to play Alistair on Passions. To be honest i'm not sure if that would have worked out very well... It just seems like after seeing old clips of Rex on Y&R, i guess Quinn seems a little too sweet for that role, it would be cool to see him, just because having Y&R actors coming on to Passions is interesting to me.

I've seen every DS on it's SiFi run. I know the character of Roxanne Drew, I just can't picture her face at the moment.. I can't imagine anyone else but Coleen Zenk as Barbara.

http://www.collinwood.net/cast/wandrey.htm

I can't imagine anyone but Colleen as Barbara either. It seems Donna was there for about a year, then Barbara was gone until Colleen came in at the end of the decade. Donna also said that Barbara was a painter at this time - I guess that was forgotten later on? But Barbara did become a fashion designer.

If you are interested, I posted a 1972 interview with Donna in the ATWT thread.

That's interesting that Quinn Reddeker was considered to play Alistair on Passions. To be honest i'm not sure if that would have worked out very well... It just seems like after seeing old clips of Rex on Y&R, i guess Quinn seems a little too sweet for that role, it would be cool to see him, just because having Y&R actors coming on to Passions is interesting to me.

He played a rough character on DAYS, although not psycho.

I think Reilly is very hammy, so Quinn might have been better, although what can you do with a character whose main purpose became raping young women?

Edited January 25, 201114 yr by CarlD2

Donna Wandrey was awful as the original Roxanne Drew from "Parallel Time," but what could you do with the dialogue and plotting on DS around that time? It was meticulously-crafted camp, good camp but camp, and totally plot-driven.

OTOH I thought Wandrey was smashing as the "Real Time" Roxanne, an immortal vampiric bitch with an axe to grind who went sappho on Maggie Evans. Her attacks led to Maggie's fairly ignoble exit from the show. I think she could've done a bitch on AW, but not like Strasser or Wyndham did Rachel.

I thought she had a lot of presence, which was about all you could have in a non-role like Roxanne in 1970PT. I just cringed at her bad line readings.

Besides the vampire story, which was good but a blur for me because I was deafened by Kathy Cody yelling all her lines, I enjoyed her brief run in 1840. She looked stunning and I enjoyed her relationship with her sister Samantha, and I liked seeing this woman who constantly put down pathetic undertaker Trask, refusing to accept society's idea that she had to get married. She had a lot of potential before they had her become Barnabas' fangpiece and then killed her off.

Edited January 25, 201114 yr by CarlD2

http://www.collinwoo...ast/wandrey.htm

I can't imagine anyone but Colleen as Barbara either. It seems Donna was there for about a year, then Barbara was gone until Colleen came in at the end of the decade. Donna also said that Barbara was a painter at this time - I guess that was forgotten later on? But Barbara did become a fashion designer.

If you are interested, I posted a 1972 interview with Donna in the ATWT thread.

Thanks for the link. I remember her now. I probably didn't pick up on her bad acting since I thought most of the actors on the show we're pretty bad, especially Grayson Hall. Anyway, I guess that's what make it special now.

She is a fine actress, a friend of mine did Trip to Bountiful with her. I didn't realize her soap career went that far back. I also have trouble imagining her as glamorous Lisa, and for some reson, the ages (in my mind at least, to lazy to actually look it up ) don't seem to match up.

She did this taped very soap-looking production of Tennessee Williams' "Talk to Me Like the Rain and Let Me Listen" for NY PBS which was mid-'70s, I guess a little after her Somerset gig. And this isn't a soap "They Almost Became", but Meryl Streep was the original choice for Lois' role as the kinda kooky gardener in Minority Report with Tom Cruise.

Lois is a huge fave of mine--and I love that televised version of Talk to me Like The Rain.You can get it on DVD as Dragon Country where it's paired with an at the time new Williams piece, I can't Imagien Tomorrow (with Kim Stanley!)

Lois Smith was also great on The Doctors for a couple of years in the 70s. Eleanor, I think her character's name was.

Lois is a huge fave of mine--and I love that televised version of Talk to me Like The Rain.You can get it on DVD as Dragon Country where it's paired with an at the time new Williams piece, I can't Imagien Tomorrow (with Kim Stanley!)

Yup, I own it! I wish Kim Stanley could have cast out those devils and knocked out at least one great soap stint. Even Geraldine Page's Loving movie appearance was greatly appreciated.

I wish the Loving Pilot movie hadn't been removed from youtube before I had a chance to watch more than a few moments

It does seem that the era of these great theatrical actors having a soap stint late in their career is gone--of course Lois Smith spent a month or two on OLTL 6 or years back, and we only lost Herlie from AMC recently, (not to mention Mitchell) but...

I saw a promo for Hamlet on the THIS network last week and it was nice that they billed Eileen in the commercial along with Olivier.

And of course there was Kim Hunter on EON. Would like to see Uta's work on OLTL too. Sandy Dennis was on GL before she was Sandy Dennis, but I would have loved to have seen her in some old Lemay-era AW clip. I think she would have been a fascinating Iris temp a la Carole Shelley.

Not exactly an ac-tress, but a Tony winner just the same, Jennifer Holliday appeared on Guiding Light during her Dreamgirls days and Jonathan Reiner was always shamelessly dropping hints for the GL people to send him some old tapes of her.

In a 82 SOD interview Thaao Penghlis states that GH told him on his last day that they planned to bring back Victor Cassidine. However they kept postponing the return so he took the role of Tony on DOOL when approached by Pat Falken Smith.. GH were not thrilled and let him know as much.He didn't score an official invite to the GH Xmas party but attended anyway and approached Gloria Monty. She was surprised and told him she was angry,but loved him anyway and they hugged!

That's a great story.

Julianna McCarthy said that she auditioned to be Jennifer Brooks, as she and her agent thought she was too young and attractive to be Liz Foster. She said thank goodness they had her take her makeup off. Then she was cast as Liz.

Alice Barrett Frankie AW - tested for Siobhan RH and Allison TX

Kimberly Simms Mindy GL - tested for Kelly SB

Jeff Trachta Thorne B&B - tested for Jack Y&R and Frisco GH

Paige Turco Melanie AMC - tested for Rocky LOV

Mary Ellen Stuart Frannie ATWT - tested for Chelsea and Meredith GL

Noelle Beck Trisha LOV - tested for Ryan RH

Yasmine Bleeth Ryan RH - tested for Trisha LOV