AMC: Monday, November 1, 2010

[EricMontreal22]

Still like this Colby the best--well since she was a baby.

I do agree with you about Nouri/Caleb. They've done some things right--they did a great job of introducing him to the various characters and the community--something AMC hadn't done well in ages with new characters. But I mean--I dunno can't they even bring back Petey or *someone*? Shouldn't Pete be about at the right age now to care about what's happening to his father's company?(I don't think David was exactly *pushed* off the show, but it is anticlimactic--it's totally unlikely but even if they could get him back for a month to tie some of this up...)

[Vee]

Oh, he was pushed. Part of this "genius" L.A. move was designed to dump some vets, specifically Canary from what I've heard.

But yes, Petey should be back, and I'd like to see Bobby, and Nina even, if only recurring. Didn't Nina and Cliff have another kid too?

And of course Dixie should be back. There's just no point in doing anything else with Tad.

I will add that I think Caleb and Erica is a lead balloon. Enough. Just leave her with Jack. Nouri does have excellent chemistry with Bobbie Eakes despite how impossible Krystal is.

[Clear Drama]

Canary was never pushed out the door, the show had to move b/c the NYC space to shoot AMC was getting too expensive, the sets were limited and small, and so were the clothes. The actors that went to LA were given a 6 mth. notice to relocate. All in all AMC had to move or it was not going to continue production. Parks in LA are easier and flexible to shoot, the sets in LA are more bigger, wardrobe more accesible and in style to date, thier head ops. are in LA, ABC in general. David Canary lives in Conn. was already contemplating retirement. This is a tough business 5AM in the morning to 6 PM at night are the usual work hours for these soap actors, travel time, family time is cut short, you have to look good, stay in shape etc. so no Canary was not pushed out the door. Get the facts first.

[Vee]

Yes, and they continued to waste money on moving sets once arriving in L.A.

Don't you mean one park?

I suggest you look at the facts. David Canary promptly quit as soon as the move happened and Susan Lucci was banished to limbo for an age this summer. They knew what they were doing and it doesn't work.

[Clear Drama]

And if they were to do it in NY there would be no AMC, that's why OLTL was hanging there, the expenses in NYC for ABC was too much. Soon all the shows will move to LA.

No park space in general. You see how many outdoors scenes AMC is shooting since the move, they couldn't do that in NY. Space cost money, production is limited. And there are more stronger regulations against it.

They moved, AMC production moved because NY was draining thier productions costs. LA was a better place for them, they assumed DC/SL and all would have no problems but DC had second thoughts, they offered him vacation time like WW, SL and DC declined, he didn't want to do the coast to coast thing, hence Adam's exit SL w/ JB's Brooke. They are hoping to bring him in guest stints atleast for the holidays.

[SFK]

I wouldn't say that Canary was *pushed* out the door either, but if my mother hates Palm Springs and I book our summer vacation for... Palm Springs, what am I getting at here? I can see how some not-sobright execs may have convinced themselves that the L.A. move would be a new day, a new dawn for the show and the loss of some of the unenthused more expensive talent may be "a good thing."[/Martha] There are people out there who believe that J.R. can fill Adam's shoes. No comment on those people. How ever you look at it, tptb knew the risks and they were willing to take them, whether that was losing actors completely or only in some capacity. The show is doing okay without DC, they just have curiously decided to center so much of the action around him and another dearly departed vet, James Mitchell. An odd mix of honoring our beloved vets and rubbing salt into our nostalgic wounds.

[Clear Drama]

JR, nor the remaining Chandlers are the problem on this show. Ryan and Greenlee, Kendall, Frankie and Randi and Jake and Amanda, that's the problem, the SLs around the Chandlers and Nu-Cortlandts.

[SFK]

And this isn't really directed at you Clear Drama, but why is taping in the park even that important though?

I realize that it mixes things up a bit visually, but how much action in any of our natural lives happens on a park bench?

: Shut up Blanche.

But seriously, it's like they're just trying to show off the fact that they're in California which has completely effed with my mind anyway as I've on more than one occasion had to remind myself that we were still in Pine Valley, PA. All throughout the building of Erica's apartment, I kept thinking this was her new L.A. pad. OLTL has done even more outside stuff than AMC lately, you know, showing out like a middle child. But location shoots mean squat to me if we're outside just for the sake of being outside.

[Vee]

Make no mistake: If it had been a question of OLTL being overbudget, OLTL would have been cancelled, not moved to L.A. OLTL was underbudget, and AMC was bleeding money, and this is still the status quo. The only way to save AMC from itself was to move it, so they did. OLTL's not going to L.A. and it remains effective budget-wise, story quality aside, despite that NY facility. It's not in the dire straits AMC is, back on the cancellation bubble apparently.

In moving to L.A. ABC hoped to shed some dollars from AMC, including David Canary's. They knew his circumstances. They knew Lucci was very unhappy about the move. They figured they could trim a lot of their money from both of those two. They let David Canary walk, and I won't be surprised if Lucci quietly goes to some sort of new contract deal. Frons is just stupid enough to try to cut her airtime down to nothing.

I think the show has improved mildly but Ryan and Greenlee is never going to work, Erica is an afterthought and at least 50% of the show is [!@#$%^&*]. Meanwhile it's bleeding cash and everyone goes to that one park.

[Clear Drama]

They prbly wanted to add that. It's not needed but it makes it easier for actors, instead of envisioning being in the outdoors shooting a scene, they actually are.

La Kane can't live in poor digs, she ain't a Slater it adds a soap element, I think they have more sets, they are just moving it in gradually. OLTL is on a tight budget from everything being said, those shots that they get are from somewhere in Jersey, it's very limited and now w/ winter coming kiss that goodbye.

[Vee]

OLTL's options may be limited but with a few recent exceptions (the Llanview U and Llantano Mountain stuff from this past summer, though the mountain stuff worked), their shoots don't look like they're all in the same goddamn park. AMC shoots in that park whether people are supposed to be out in public or in the Wildwind garden.

[EricMontreal22]

I suppose it's fitting that both DC and JM are still in the never updated opening credits

David Canary was rumoured to want to leave before even the rumour of the move surfaced, though. It sounds like he stuck around longer than he did to allow a real exit (that said there's little doubt that if they had stayed in the East it would be much easier for him to make the occasional visit). Remember too the alst few times he played Stuart he really didn't seem, I hate to say, up for the challenge, or as into it. Add to that the stupid gossip Branco was spreading about how sick he was, etc (again which started before rumours of a move started), and I thinkhe would have been gone by now no matter if they had moved or not.

[EricMontreal22]

I think OLTL's regular location shots have recently looked pretty great actually. (I am sick of them shotting random scenes in their studio stairwell though--but I suppose that's just me being picky...). But yeah for a while all those Llanview U shots seemed to be taken in the same parking lot next to some park or something. (I do think that AMC park is overused--then again before in NY they simply used a tiny ienditcal set for all those similar scenes, which wasn't really any better, except maybe cheaper?)

[EricMontreal22]

I think the move is more complicatted than many want us to think, but I'm pretty sure Canary woulda been out anyway (at least int he almost daily capacity he had been on the show the past year he was on--he made it beyond obvious in every interview he was almost relieved to go). But I respect your opinion

I do agree that Nouri has great chemisty with Bobbie--and has actually made me kinda liek Krystal more. I like Tad when he's more of a minor character and worried more about "dad" things than David vengeance bla bla--I dunno, I've been burned by the last few Dixie appearances,and actually liked her ghost/fantasy final farewell with tad that I think there's no real point yet again. I like Tad being on the show but I guess my point is I don't mind him being made a B character and don't need him in a major romance, etc. (and yeah I'm all for Nina, Bobby etc back... Is Nina still meant to be married to Cliff off camera? I can't even remember)

[EricMontreal22]

I agree the David Canary thing is more complicated, though I know we disagree, but come on. Susan had a slightly longer vacation than she always gets, was paid for it, and if anything it was done as an incentive to keep her around. They're not trying to get rid of her. (It wasn't even much longer than some of Erika Slezak's vacations--though hers wasn't too long this year).