As The World Turns Discussion Thread

[adrnyc]

Gosh - whenever I see clips from this early in the show, Barbara always blows me away - she's just so young and my word, she looks like every model in the magazines at the time. Simply Stunning!   I did not recognize many of these characters although I knew their names. It's fun to see Dee, Barbara, John, Craig so early. Those 70s/early 80s sets that look so dull and lifeless. I'm never able to get used to Deas' Tom - a little too shouty most of the time for my liking. Still....I'd pay good money to watch all of these episodes in full!

[Mitch]

If you think he is shouty here wait until you see his "Buzz" on GL! Both Tom and Margo were so shrill at this time. "Steve" was shouty and obnoxious too and I really hated the Dobson's semi misoginistic writing... Kim of all people was cow towing to both Nick and Steve..a long way from her "LOOK buster" days.

 

The show was rudderless with Nancy and Chris gone and the obscuration of the Hughes family. Now this version of ATWT looks like the Dobson's test run for SB.

 

Ariel was great as she was totally a comic vixen...the actress had great comic timing and no matter the awful things Ariel did they always blew up in her face and you couldn't help but kind of feel sorry for her.

 

[j swift]

I was surprised to read in vintage soap recap from Tumblr dated July 20-24, 1981 that Barbara had a brother named Rick and James Steinbeck had a brother named Lars when he was first married to Barbara. 

 

What happened to those characters?  I remember the whole thing about the Steinbeck heir and Gunner but, did James have a brother in Europe the whole time?  And did Barbara (and Jennifer) forget that she had brother?   

 

I am amused by soap opera law wherein illegitimate heirs become instantly wealthy when their lineage is discovered despite wills and trusts.  There are at least two illegitimate heirs of Prince Albert of Monaco who wish that law worked in real life.

Edited March 20, 2018 by j swift

[Dax7000]

Can someone tell me a few things about Lisa? She was my favorite character, but I unfortunately was not alive during the character's heyday and she was largely a supporting character from the 80's on, minus a few stories.

 

I am curious exactly how she got rich? She didn't seem incredibly rich after her marriage to Grant. Well off, but not as rich as someone who could later afford a high end boutique, multiple restaurants, a newspaper, a hotel, some investment in the Yacht Club and various other things. Was she originally portrayed as money hungry? I keep seeing comparisons to her and AMC's Erica, but Erica wanted fame and fortune. I do think Erica's Jeff Martin marriage may have been an attempt at a Bob and Lisa type thing for AMC. 

 

I'm also curious if anyone knows of any Youtube videos that chronicle her late 80's sleeping pill addiction? I think it was apparently around the time she was being manipulated into believing her late husband Earl was trying to drive her mad. I think James Stenbeck was behind it, which I would love to see. I rarely saw Lisa and James interact.

Edited March 20, 2018 by Dax7000
Additional question

[Paul Raven]

Didnt Lisa become rich from her marriage to Whit McColl?

That was the 80s, where the wealthy characters became uber rich, which never made sense as to why they would be hanging around small towns and mixing with middle class folk.

But the networks saw Dallas and Dynasty and thought they were all soaps so why not copy the successful nightime trend?

[Dax7000]

Oh, yes. I keep forgetting about that marriage for some reason. I thought Lucinda ruined his business, but I haven't seen much of that story. I did like how Lisa actually had a house, not a penthouse over a restaurant, during that time.

 

I've long had a bit of an eye roll that some of the world's richest people would not only live in small towns, but be so easily accessible. A random unemployed person can show up at the front door of a multi billionaire on these shows.

[DRW50]

 

Rick's main presence on the show was under Con Roche. He was there with Barbara and their mother Jennifer in the early '70s.  

 

He left town and then popped up again briefly in 1981.

 

You can find a bio on him here:

 

http://soapcentral.com/atwt/whoswho/rick.php

[NothinButAttitude]

 

Weren't daytime soaps already adding upper-class character in soaps previously beforehand? Or are you saying that soap characters that were upper-class  weren't as ostentatious as they were at that point?

[DRW50]

 

The soaps ramped it up around 1982-1984 or so. There was a shift in how rich characters were treated - much less focus was put on their ordinariness (just compare the way rich characters were written on GL in the late '70s to the way they were written by the time Bev arrived as Alex). The biggest sign of the shift for ATWT was Lucinda. 

[NothinButAttitude]

 

Oh OK. 

 

B/c wasn't Penny's hubby, Jeff, from a somewhat rich family? I could've sworn I read that somewhere. 

[DRW50]

 

I think so, yes.

 

There had been rich characters on ATWT before - Annie's husband Beau was rich, and his mother (played by Georgann Johnson) meddled in his life. James Stenbeck was rich (before they took that away from him).

 

It's just that there was a certain stuffiness in the way wealth was treated. With Lucinda you got the shift toward wealth being more flashy and fun and ridiculous, and also with it becoming more and more embedded into being a part of daily Oakdale life. This eventually led to the stuff Harding Lemay complained about in the mid-90s when three different characters had their own private jets. 

Edited March 21, 2018 by DRW50

[DramatistDreamer]

@j swiftBarbara's brother Rick Ryan also returned briefly in 1986.  Check out 12:18.

 

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Edited March 21, 2018 by DramatistDreamer

[NothinButAttitude]

 

True.

 

I think that is why Lemay was one of the greats b/c he understood the importance of having class structure on his shows. Do you think that, that would appeal nowadays to soap audience? I just don't. I feel like people are SUPER ostentatious nowadays and care all about material goods. I just don't see kitchen sink drama boding well over here like it does in the UK. 

[Franko]

I think kitchen sink drama appeals to audiences, but the idea of saying it's "like a soap opera" carries too much stigma and stereotyping right now.

[NothinButAttitude]

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