Love Is a Many Splendored Thing

[Khan]

Same. Damn, but I wish LIAMST had been preserved on videotape. I don't know if I would have enjoyed its entire run, but that last storyline that saynotoursoap has described sounds like good, gripping drama.

[DRW50]

I just imagine myself in soap heaven watching Leslie, Donna, and Beverlee...

[Matt]

LIAMST is one of those soaps I just WISH there were detailed storyline synopses for the entire series available. Ditto for Where the Heart Is. I'd love to "read" the entire series from start to finish. Maybe in novel form like those old Soaps & Serials books from the 1980s.

[saynotoursoap]

Love is a Many Splendored Thing was shafted. Their bugging plot preceded Another World's and was actually more relevant to Watergate, as it was a political intrigue story. To what extent it might have helped the ratings I cannot be sure. There were other problems which probably influenced the drop in viewers. For one thing, there were too many recasts at a critical time. Veleka Gray and Michael Hawkins had been playing Laura and Mark right before the storyline commenced. They had just survived the Maria of the Lourdes story with Maria setting fire to the garage with Mark locked inside and causing Laura to tumble down the stairs and miscarry her baby. The audience was no doubt feeling sympathetic toward Gray and Hawkins as a couple. In November 1971, Hawkins was replaced by actor Vince Cannon, and Cannon was dropped two months later for Tom Fuccello. Veleka Gray left and was replaced by Barbara Stanger. As I recall, Fuccello and Stanger actually debuted in the same episode, which must have been a first. Mark raped Iris a couple of weeks later, the week of Valentine's Day 1972. I felt it too soon to throw new actors into such a heavy storyline when the audience had not developed a connection to the actors yet. Of course it was a plot necessity. The point of the story was a blackmail plot to derail Spence's senatorial election in November, so it was necessary for Iris to conceive in February regardless of who played the parts.

The rape itself was another problem. Mark was supposed to be a hero of sorts, or at least the character that audiences were meant to root for. He had done some bad things before, but raping his sister-in-law was a bit hard to swallow. To make matters worse, Ann Marcus attempted to soften it all by absolving Mark's actions as "accidental" (he raped Iris believing her to be his wife Laura), and by downplaying the whole assault angle. I do not remember any characters referring to it as a rape. Mark and Iris constantly talked about "that awful night" and "the terrible mistake" Mark made because he was drunk. The criminal aspect was secondary to the blackmail over Iris' pregnancy, and she never appeared to anguish over being raped, rather, she was more upset about having to pass off her pregnancy as her husband's child. I had friends who were quite disapproving of the rather cavalier treatment of such a serious issue.

[DRW50]

That sounds unfortunate. Marcus seemed to have a knack for distasteful rape-and-pregnancy stories.

[danfling]

Who were Alex, Jennifer, and Amada Spaulding?

[saynotoursoap]

Are they mentioned somewhere in this thread? They should not have been. Alex and Amanda Spaulding are the sisters to Alan Spaulding on Guiding Light. Alan once thought Amanda was his daughter until an unfortunate plot twist insulted the audience's intelligence and changed her to his father's illegitimate child. Jennifer was not a Spaulding. She was Jennifer Richards, but that was an alias. Her real name was Jane Marie Stafford, a young girl who had slept with Alan and became pregnant with his child, the aforementioned Amanda. Though, once again, this was retconned to Janie Marie becoming pregnant by Alan's father Brandon Spaulding.

[saynotoursoap]

Yes. I read this was one reason Bill Bell wrote Chris Brooks' and later Peggy Brooks' rapes as being so brutal and ugly on Young and Restless. It was a very different presentation of rape than the romantic fantasy rapes of Mark/Iris on Love is a Many Splendored Thing and Bill/Laura on Days of our Lives, the storyline that Marcus obviously attempted to copy on LIAMST.

One thing I can say for Marcus, she utilized it well given the history of the characters. Laura and Iris had vied for Mark's attentions in the past, so this plotline only fueled Laura's jealousies and insecurities, particularly since Laura's single purpose over the run of the series had been to have a child. In this plot, Laura's sister now had the baby that rightfully should have been Laura's and was fathered by Laura's husband, who had once been in love with her sister.

There was a great scene after Laura discovered what had happened the previous February. She confronted Iris and suggested that she had not been raped at all. Iris and Mark had been lovers five years before. Perhaps Iris took advantage of his inebriation and seduced him. After all, Spence was so busy with his senatorial campaign, he had ignored her. She was feeling lonely and rejected. She needed a man. So, she turned to the old standby, Mark Elliott. She got him drunk and tricked him into making love to her. Iris' anger boiled over. She slapped Laura hard across the face. "Now, you wait just a damn minute, little sister!" she hissed. Iris admonished Laura for even entertaining the thought that she would lie about being raped. The scenes between Besch and Stanger were electric.

[danfling]

I liked the rape storyline. Mark was shown as a real human man who may or may not have kept some secret feeling for Iris. Laura was shown as a real human woman who was unsure of her decision to leave the protection of the church and to build a life with a man who had wanted a life with her sister.

Iris was my favorite character, and I saw her as a victim and heroine.

It was a very good triangle for a show which needed its viewers to stay with them and to identify with the past storylines.

[DRW50]

I wish I could see that Laura/Iris scene.

Do you think the characters remained true to who they'd been when Donna and Leslie were in the roles?

[saynotoursoap]

I do not know if this question is directed toward danfling or me. Personally, I did think the writers and performers remained true to one another. I agree with danfling regarding the relationship between the two sisters. Squabbling sisters was nothing new in soap opera, but Iris and Laura were always written with such humanity and even frailties. They were not really the good sister/bad sister archetype of say Van and Meg on Love of Life. Iris and Laura were very complex characters with a complex relationship.

I loved Love is a Many Splendored Thing. Of all the shorter run soaps, it is probably my favorite and the one I miss the most.

[DRW50]

Either one of you.

Thanks.

[danfling]

I think that Love Is a Many Splendored Thing had daytime television's best villioness, Jane Manning as Jean Hurley Garrison.

[vetsoapfan]

 

 

I know this is a LIAMST thread, but since the atrocious Amanda-is-now-Alan's-sister mess was brought up, I must say...VOMIT! It was yet another insulting, unnecessary and idiotic mistake made by TGL in its later, crippled years.

[DRW50]

May 1969 Afternoon TV