As The World Turns Discussion Thread

[DRW50]

 

Michael Logan used to talk about parties Marland threw and stories they shared, so I figure he was out to the industry. 

 

(someone also told a story about Marland's home, during parties, having a photo of someone Marland disliked placed in the toilet seat...)

 

For me Marland has a second wind at ATWT for 91-92, with some really interesting, layered, albeit dark stories. He did not properly balance the show by his last year, which left them in a bad place, unfortunately, but I prefer that period to a fair amount of 88-90. '90 in particular has some odd lows, like the Frannie/Sean stuff with Sean in a nonstop rage that had all the nuance of a porn film. The only real downside for '92 in my opinion (even though I get why people hated the Carolyn story) is dull as hell Rosanna. 

 

That's interesting. I wonder if plans changed because Mary Ellen Stuart told them she was leaving? I did like Larry a lot, but I was fine with him being with Susan rather than Frannie. That relationship never felt very serious. 

 

Darryl was certainly presented as a very selfish and weak man. Rex Smith's charm and good looks and the heavy POV we are given from him early on may mask the more villainous nature - I guess that was the idea. By the time of the ski lift scenes I feel like he could have easily pivoted into a very dark place, if Marland had followed through. 

[Vee]

Marland's work always reads very queer to me onscreen. From what I've seen over the years it's consistently populated by imperious and/or neurotic, layered women struggling with secrets or deeper passionate needs, and gorgeous yet very vulnerable or tempestuous young men. (And Doug Cummings, played by his longtme favorite JWS, is basically a deranged theater queen) If you go by the scuttlebutt you can project that Marland was infatuated with the men and embodied in many of the women, like Iva or Lily. But I suppose that's reductive stereotyping too.

[DRW50]

 

Now that you mention it, the Sean Baxter character, the rageaholic, also reads as very repressed queer to me, especially in performance. I was surprised to learn Burke Moses was straight, to be honest, after seeing him on there and on OLTL. Seth was another character who for me was very gay-coded - I felt it at the time when I was too young to get what it was, and I still do now (sensitive, distant from the 'normal' family life, a dreamer who moved to the big city, etc.). 

[EricMontreal22]

You make him sound like Tennessee Williams! 

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I always thought the Doug Cummings story was based on The Fan (a terrible movie, but...)

[Soapsuds]

Sean read gay to me as well. I always felt Frannie was his beard/fh friend. I never cared for Sean until Burke left the role and Mark Lewis took over but he was totally wasted just like he was on GL as Kurt Corday.

[Vee]

 

I don't know how anyone can watch some of that '86 stuff with Holden and Lily, the stables, the horses and the storm and not know this is a gay man enraptured with one of several very specific types of men and ingenues he revisited again and again.

[Soapsuds]

The 86 episode I posted has a chisled shirtless hot pecs Robert Tyler and Jon Hensley hairy chested hot body with white undies in a pond. 

[EricMontreal22]

Oh undeniably.  Certainly it's a different vibe than say when Bill Bell would write his scenes for studs...

[DramatistDreamer]

 

The sharing between family members in the Montgomery family certainly didn't start with Craig.  The storyline where Lyla was into Frank, who was secretly seeing Maggie...what year that did storyline take place, was it '83 or '84? 

And you just know that if given the opportunity, TPTB probably would've tried it again between an adult Katie and Lyla  had Lyla returned to Oakdale in the show's final years.  The only reason why it didn't happen between Margo and Katie is likely because Tom looked too advanced in age for Katie, who was written as chronically immature until she married Brad Snyder.

One of the reasons why I'd guess the show decided to write Tom as having an affair with Emily.

[Soapsuds]

 

[DRW50]

 

I think it was '83 or early '84...

 

I missed Lyla but I'm glad I never had to see her even further trashed to prop up Goutman pet Katie, after that nonsense FMB and Broderick did with her being the stage mother from hell, forcing Katie into kiddie beauty pageants. 

[chrisml]

Thank you so much for the background. It makes so much sense now. I appreciate you and others who are so kind when I ask questions about ATWT or GL. In reading about ATWT, I've been fascinated by the 1990-1993 period because my mother's old soap magazines have so many viewers letters/critical pieces about what was wrong during this period. I was born in 1986, and I have no memory of the Angel character except I remembered reading the Soap Opera Weekly preferring GL's episode submissions. He said ATWT would most likely win because of the subject matter. 

 

I also remember the backlash against Glynnis O'Connor as Margo. Was it me or did a lot of the backlash stem from O'Connor playing Margo as a closeted lesbian? Some of the criticism seems to hint that Connor was playing her as too "mannish."

[Khan]

 

Well, Douglas Marland WAS a fan of "A Streetcar Named Desire." 

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[Mitch]

This really explains to me why I never really liked Marland's work after the first year or so.  In a totally more sophisticated way it comes of similar to that of JER..a man of a certain age who has some issues with his sexuality or is at least closeted to most of the world...(I remember him bringing the Marsha actress to the reclaimed Emmy ceremony and the mags saying she was Marland's "girlfriend") Uptight, pretentious, cold, sex scenes very clinical and "remote" and of course his fetish of beefy guys in jeans..(never understood why he made Holden a business guy..why not just have him take over the farm and ship boring Emma off to Kansas or someplace...) Its odd that a show so based on family had really cold families at the forefront...(say what you want about GL, and its dismantling of its core but what was left of the Bauer family, and the Lewis, etc, I always felt were like "real" familes and they dysfuntional Spaulding still felt like their were strong emotions involved...(watch BevAlex and anyone in her family..at her bitchiness you can see love and warmth and a stuggle to dominate for her family's own good..) 

 

At least, like any gay man, he wrote for the older divas Lisa and Lucinda !

[Bill Bauer]

 

 

Is Marland responsible for Rosanna, the Kasnoffs, Connor and Linc? Because all of that seemed VERY different from the rest of his writing back in the 80s. In my opinion, it's like a bunch of one dimensional, boring characters that had no real connection to the rest of the characters invaded Oakdale and that sort of would have Marland breaking all of his "rules". I know everybody has different taste but I, personally, couldn't stand most of the characters that the early to mid 90s brought. Even Carly who everyone seemed to love. I couldn't stand her.