Y&R: Old Articles

[YRfan23]

It's posted as a download link if u look

again. 7/29/92

 

[DeeeDee]

Thanks!

[YRfan23]

That's what I miss most about their rivalry is the bizarre dependency they had on one another, while hating each other all these years, and at the same time always having this deep mutual respect for the other....all the love is hidden behind the catty exchanges, like it was with Brooke and Stephanie, yet they had their moments of concern for each other, like the one episode where Jill is comforting Katherine over the possibility of her having breast cancer....

It really is a shame they ruined the real dynamic the last 10 years Katherine was on the show.....

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I would love to hear some of your opinions looking back on these shows DeeeDee.....I personally find the early 90's to be the golden age for the show....

[DeeeDee]

Every 5 years Y&R has a huge cast turnover & it really affects longterm storytelling. Sometimes the turnover works for the better & other times it's for the worse.

 

The early 90s were fun but the biggest issue was the Y&R quickly went from a true ensemble show to The Newmans & everyone else.

 

There's a ton of other stuff (both good & bad) affecting that particular era of the show but one of the key mistakes (losing Rex & Leanna) was a huge problem.

 

One of the best things about the writing & having Jess Walton as a recast was being able to reestablish Kay & Jill's friendship. Y&R got away from that during Brenda's second run largely because the writers & Brenda were stuck on turning Jill into Alexis Carrington.

 

But once Jeanne finished playing the initial Marge story & Jess came into her own as Jill they were (easily) one of the best things about the show.

[YRfan23]

Interesting, I wonder what things didn't work out well when it came to the turnover....I guess getting rid of Chase during the David Saga was one of those problems? it just seems like they got rid of him, after making it clear in most of the 1990 episodes before the shooting that Chase was suppose to be the hero in all this eventually winning Nina's heart......yet they dumped long before the story ended....I agree they should have kept Leanna around longer...

I admit I also can't help but have this resentment towards Victor becoming the lead around this time....I guess it stems from how OOC he's been written the last few years, but I sometimes wonder if Bill overdid it with Braeden/Victor back then?....again the writing was better, but he still did questionable things....

I agree about Jess, but I remember one scene that use to be on here, that I think was right before Brenda left in 87, where she had a heart to heart with Cricket and even gave her some decent advice....She seemed the most normal she'd been since before they turned her into Alexis, yet the irony is that I don't think Jess had too many of those same time of rare scenes....at least when she first started....

[soapfan770]

It's hard to pick a golden era for Y&R but if I had to pick an absolute golden, diamond or platinum age for Y&R it would definitely be 1986-1993 starting from Lauren being buried alive and Jill's shooting all the way up Victor's coming back from the dead. Those seven years certainly outshined Y&R 1973-1981 with a exceptions and saw Y&R reach unsubstantiated growth and so much memorable storylines are still etched in the minds of Y&R viewers to this day, even amongst with viewers who didn't get a chance to see them til later or just heard/read about them and fell in love with it.

 

 

 

 

Yeah I was watching a 1991 episode where Jill, while gloating about going out on a date with John is seriously worried that Katherine is depressed and fears she might slip back to drinking again because she's been lonely(Rex having a night out on the town with Leanna) while Katherine putting up a nasty front was actually worried that Jill was setting herself up to fail with going too fast with John and didn't want Jill to suffer heartbreak over her fantasies. Granted the exchange wasn't nice at all but it was quite clear they cared about each other.

 

I'd seen a 1984 episode where Brenda Dickson's Jill was absolutely horrified and sad to see Katherine drinking again but as Jill became a total bitch we ended up getting the classic scene of Dickson's Jill just asking as Katherine opened up the door "And what took you so long, polishing off another bottle?"

[soapfan770]

 

In actuality the play level of the rivalry was actually a lot more fair and Victor would actually lose. It started with Jack sleeping with Nikki and Victor in turn having an affair with Ashley. Jack wins by writing Ruthess. Victor wins and Jack loses when Victor does his takeover of Jabot. Jack wins when Victor loses Nikki to him. Victor wins Ashley back. Jack leaves Victor for dead. Jack loses his child. Victor loses all respect of the town and realizes everyone would rather have him stay dead. Victor but comes back and fires Jack but is eventually forced to rehire him back. The rivalry subsided as Victor was with Hope and Jack was reuniting with Luan by that point, I'd say it wasn't until the Alden years that Braeden probably voiced his ego to her since Bell had personally shut down the Braeden/Bergman feud himself. 

 

Hence why when I think of the 1994-early 1998 period of Y&R I think Danny, Phyllis, Christine, Paul, Neil, Dru, Malcolm, Olivia, Ryan, Nina, Cole, Victoria, Nick and Sharon as being the leaders of that time period as opposed to the usual stalwarts of Y&R reduced to supporting( Victor, Nikki, Jack, Jill) non-existent(Katherine, Lauren, John) or still leading just stuck with some bad stories/bad recast(Ashley). 

Edited November 21, 2016 by soapfan770

[YRfan23]

Yeah, Y&R is the rarity where it comes to being a consistently good soap for over 30 years despite the mild duds, and weird plot turns Bill Bell did create....I personally feel the rise to number 1 in late 1988 onwards created the more glory years till at least 2005ish for me....I agree hearing about all of the old stories prompted me to want to see all the episodes I collected....



 

I kind of like to look to it that way in regards to Victor vs Jack, where it was this back and worth of trying to outsmart each other with one or the other winning.........We should add that Victor almost tricking Jack with the signed agreement to return Jabot if he dumps Nikki, but it being a voided deal, and Jack staying with her anyways as an even Victory as well....either way It was better written and not tired and washed out now, with Victor being the undefeatable cartoon he's become.......I think you maybe right about Alden, though I think she viewed Victor as the anti-hero which helped matters and Victor was still written in character....

I always thought those characters dominated those years as well......as you saw them front and center most of those days.....hence why Jeanne called it "The Young and the Rest of Us" LOL

 

[DRW50]

Vernee Watson and Beverly Archer are both in this Lysol ad that starts around 5 minutes in. It jumped out at me as they were both in the Katherine/Jill mansion story...although I think they missed each other onscreen by about 6 months...

 

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[YRBB]

 

Thanks. How amusing! They were both on the show at the same time for a couple of months but Shirley left before Birdie came to the mansion. I can only imagine Birdie's reactions to Shirley -- it would have been gold.

[vetsoapfan]

For my money, Y&R's golden era was 1973-77. It was almost consistently mesmerizing day in, day out.

[YRfan23]

I feel like if I saw all of 1973-1983 I would probably start to think that was Y&Rs best era, even better then the 90s...

[vetsoapfan]

 

The 1970s were a golden period for many of the soaps. Not only Y&R, but Another World (1971-75, particularly), Days of our Lives (1970 to 1976, particularly), The Edge of Night (1970 to 1978, particularly), One Life to Live (1975 to 1979, particularly), etc. 

 

On Y&R, nothing could beat the excellent writing and solid acting we were treated to in those early years. With Chris Brooks' rape, Leslie Brooks' nervous breakdown on stage in Detroit, the beginning of the Jill/Katherine feud, Jennifer Brooks' battle with breast cancer, Bill Foster's return after abandoning his family, all the great great romances and romantic triangles, the show was amazing on all fronts.

 

It's soooo frustrating to know that all those early episodes have been preserved, but are not being made available for public enjoyment. Why let the videotapes sit there collecting dust in storage? The studio should make the show available on a cable station, from the beginning. 

[YRfan23]

I know... Y&R isn't an ABC/P&G situation where they erased over 10 years of early footage, yet more 70's or even early 80's episodes haven't made their way on here....I'm thankful for the few that surfaced (and of course are long gone now) but the more I hear, the more I want to see more.....I'm just thankful whenever a new clip from that time surfaces but it just isn't enough....

I would settle for at least some audio recordings from that era, and some have surfaced from time to time.....I think there are still  some 1979 audios floating around when they all thought Katherine was dead, and they had Jill/Derek/Suzanne/Liz and Katherine was haunting Suzanne....those scenes sounded fantastic and I always wanted to see the actual clips/episodes....

I like that more early AMC/OLTL 70's audio clips seem to be surfacing, though they are more of a tragic case that their early stuff will probably be never seen again...

 

Edited November 28, 2016 by YRfan23

[vetsoapfan]

 

 

Occasionally, surprising vintage episodes do get discovered, like the second episode of The Edge of Night from 1956, or the very first episode of Search for Tomorrow from 1951, or all the wonderful 1960s eps of The Doctors currently being broadcast on cable, so we are lucky about that. I have lots of audio recordings of Y&R, Another World, One Life to Live, and other soaps from the 1960s and '70s (I only got my first VCR in 1976), but alas, I have no way of dubbing them or uploading them to the internet.