As The World Turns Discussion Thread

[Vee]

I'm surprised it took that long. Were they hoping Runyeon would come back? When was Betsy moved on to other men?

There's definitely Duncan here talking to Brian about 'the ruins of an old castle on an island' in Oakdale in May '86 (5/19, to be exact). Brian says he owns it, and Duncan says he wants to build his ancestor's castle on the site instead. No clue what it is supposed to be originally.

Good lord! No.

[amybrickwallace]

If that's not a 1980s cover, I don't know what is!!

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[Vee]

Talk about trying to make her emulate the last actress. I did not recognize Frost.

[John]

I think the fact that Emily at that time, Colleen McDermott was super green and replaced the following year by Melanie Smith played a factor in the Holden pairing ending.

[Nicholas Blair]

I believe that Gregg Marx and his partner are now living in Palm Springs. A friend has worked with Gregg in music and has only nice things to say about him.

[Soapsuds]

Did you catch his interview with HBS and SB?

[amybrickwallace]

How long did the show keep that up before Frost could look like herself?

[DRW50]

She starts to adopt her own style around early-mid 1985.

@Vee I was wondering if you had any thoughts  on Casey and his early stuff with Frannie...I always enjoy seeing Casey but I guess you can kind of see why the show moved on from that pairing (at least they always kept up their friendship).

[Vee]

I like Casey, and I do like him with Frannie, but it was evident immediately upon his introduction how much chemistry he had with Ann Sward. I wonder when they decided to pull the trigger on that instead. I think Seth and Frannie are immediately more appealing.

[Nicholas Blair]

No, I'd like to see that.

[Soapsuds]

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[DRW50]

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I think this is December 1995 material. 

Edited October 6, 2021 by DRW50

[DramatistDreamer]

Haha, I remember a few those 84 episodes where they attempted and flopped at trying to make Frost a Meg Ryan clone, lol.

Yeah, ruins of a castle could have meant anything, but Brian definitely owned the land. That sounds willfully convoluted to prep the offbeat idea of moving a huge @ss castle all the way from Edinburgh to Oakdale.

It often occurs to me that Marland was leaving open the possibility of having the character and/or actor to return. He did this with Marx, he offered this to Hillary Bailey Smith until the Execs wanted her role recast and couldn't wait, and he likely did it for a few other actors, he was well liked by so many of the actors for a reason.

Betsy was sort of seeing Rod in a quasi-platonic way when Steve finally served her with divorce papers sometime in autumn 87, probably close to the time his dream house in Ruxton Hills went up in flames.

The dream house caught fire courtesy of James Stenbeck and his flunky Nick Castello (portrayed by Rick Giolito, Frost's husband IRL).

Edited October 6, 2021 by DramatistDreamer

[DramatistDreamer]

We may be in the minority on this board for liking the pairing of Casey and Lyla. Many don't seem to like Lyla much (or perhaps Sward's portrayal of the character). It seems they may have pulled the trigger fairly early because Casey and Frannie didn't really progress past the "friend zone", which seemed to frustrate Casey a little bit at times before he and Lyla eventually became intimately involved. I do wonder what we'd have seen if the writing had taken Frannie and Casey a bit more seriously as a pairing before having a break up and then putting them each with other romantic prospects, but I guess Seth and Lyla beckoned and sometimes you've got to strike while the iron is hot or the story trajectories risk becoming muddled, and Maryland had so many irons in the fire in 86 and 87, he probably didn't want to risk prolonging the inevitable for fear the chemistry might cool.

It's easy to see why Moore was brought back to the show (should have been for a decent story arc, even a brief one). She was a bonified mega-star by then and the execs could tout her appearance as a veritable feather in their collective caps. They should have tried to also get Rosemary Prinz to reprise her Penny Hughes role, but I doubt they really tried because only the long-time fans would have really recognized her and they couldn't generate the buzz they got over years for Moore's appearance (they still brag about it). Prinz was on the show before Din Hastings' arrival, no? It felt wrong not to have Penny Hughes, one have of daytime drama's first big romantic couple not make an appearance to mark the serial's ending.

[DRW50]

The sad thing is Goutman did bring Rosemary Prinz back for Christmas 2000. I guess by the end of ATWT he just didn't give a damn about the show. 

I was always a fan of Lyla, and I enjoy her with Casey, but, as you said, most don't. I just go along with it because it's not worth arguing about...there's enough toxic arguments on here lately.