OLTL Tribute Thread

[soapfave06]

Her look caught my attention the most, I liked the more darker hair, giving her similarities to JL and the facial features resembled AE. 
 

That’s a shame they gave up on the character, and SW seemed a bit older than needed for the part but it seemed a good fit when compared to JB. 
 

As a big fan of Tina/Max/Gabrielle/Cord, it’s a shame how they decimated the Al/Sarah/CJ group, particularly with how essential they were even as children from 87-96 or so, in a way it almost writes itself. 
 

I had no idea about the Nathan Purdee scandal, wow. 

[Vee]

It really wasn't that serious, but tongues wagged for a hot minute at the time. It was some sort of goth-themed, BDSM-tinged artsy collection but it wasn't hardcore pornography. I felt bad for Purdee and the actors tbh.

I felt the same about SW's look. I remember they had her little sister(?) play little Sarah in an unnecessary flashback to the Al/C.J. well caper of '93, IIRC.

Oh, I hate what happened to Al, etc. I've always hated it. I felt NM was miscast from the beginning, but they didn't have to kill him off despite his BTS issues. That being said, Al and Marcie worked.

The C.J. mystery of that era is one for the ages. Flash's stated reason for being back in town was to find her brother; she never did (the Buchanans later said he was stationed in the Indian Ocean). A couple months later, Brock Cuchna's sexually vague ex-military man Paul Cramer initially came to town also looking for C.J., who he had a murky and mysterious past with on the job; he never found him. Much was made in exposition of Flash/Sarah and C.J. running away from home and Tina in Baltimore, who seemed primed to be the homophobic parent in some sort of hinted-at gay storyline with her son. That would've been a tacky, lazy choice by Michael Malone on par with what he'd attempted with Becky Lee Abbott in 1996 (he'd wanted Becky Lee to be a racist against her son Drew dating Rachel Gannon), but it would've been nice to have them all back. But the show was heavily interfered with during Malone's second run in the 2000s, and when it wasn't he still did pretty bad work.

Edited July 9, 2023 by Vee

[DRW50]

I'm sorry we never got to see Cali Timmins, even though I imagine the writing would have been terrible. She could have easily gotten the many sides of Tina, as she did when she played a similar role on AW (Paulina). If only Malone had been better at writing for Tina. 

[soapfave06]

They actually mentioned CJ by name several times and hinted on air at his being gay or it was just heavily implied? 
 

I would love to see more of this era (especially interested in Al/Marcie, I’ve always liked Marcie) and would have to watch seeing it as some sort of alternate reality (Victor Lord being alive? Something about diamonds in Llanfair I’ve read about through the thread) I just hate to see all the wasted potential. 
 

I guess a bit more care into some of this could have gone far and while I don’t think we would have necessarily seen more vets, not having CJ on and having a miscast Sarah (a year into her run, they could have course corrected the casting prior to AE return in 2008) really hurt some of that potential there to build into the next generation-Al, CJ and Sarah could easily have fit into Llanview in the mid-2000s. 

Edited July 9, 2023 by soapfave06

[Vee]

They mentioned him a lot that year as part of the Flash story - she's looking for C.J., where is C.J., C.J. is a Marine stationed in the Indian Ocean, etc etc. And then he never turned up. The gay thing was the online rumor mill plus a lot of scripted implication - the kids ran away from Tina and Cain Rogan for reasons, then Paul comes to town seeming shy and secretive and looking for his old soldier buddy and not wanting to elaborate, etc. That all changed when Brock Cuchna was fired and the Babe/AMC crossover angle came in, plus they clearly abandoned the whole storyline and the initial plans to recast Tina with Cali Timmons, etc.

It was such a circular topic of discussion that it eventually became a running joke online for years that Gay C.J. would turn up anyday. The last C.J. was ever heard from onscreen though is when Tina and Cord called the kids on their phones at the chapel just before their impromptu wedding in late 2011; they all seemed on good terms and the kids apparently wished them well. Amusingly, the closest we ever got to actually seeing C.J. was when the very handsome, all grown up Tyler Noyes (who'd played him in the '90s) turned up with his sister at the Prospect Park revival premiere. His sister Amber played Matthew's annoying online girlfriend Michelle in the Hulu show.

Yes, I have written about this era many times in this thread, lol. It was completely insane and at least as bonkers to watch day to day as DAYS at the time, but with a far more pretentious bent. (It makes me think in later years that Malone would've done well at DAYS) The mystical Bahdra diamond storyline you mention with the Indiana Jones trap room Blair and Dorian got caught in beneath Llanfair was only a fraction of the madness. There were some worthwhile ideas, even the wilder ones, but so many were either mangled (Joey taking Andrew's mantle on the show, a wonderful idea poorly handled after an excellent reintroduction by leaning into the awful romance with Jen and the thing with Flash IMO) or just bad outright.

Edited July 9, 2023 by Vee

[soapfave06]

As a big AE fan, I’m rather glad they did not recast Tina. I really appreciated the little call Tina/Cord had with CJ/Sarah over the phone at the end and forever grateful they reunited, I think RC did them very well at the end. 
 

Did you think Joey worked as a minister? Where did they go wrong with he and Jenn or was it her as a character? 
 

I hope to find full 2003 episodes, I went through a Natalie/Christian playlist and caught some things, I really have to see all this manic story direction. 
 

Thank you, as always, for sharing your memories and thoughts! 

[soapfave06]

August 1989:

Issues:

-It’s a shame what they did with Daniel and Larry Wolek, and they truly never did the casting justice on Daniel. Brenda’s involvement in the baby switch story works, but Larry comes off like an ass and Daniel just moved his hair supporting Brenda. 

-They really hyper-focused on Viki/Clint/Tina/Cord/Max/Gabrielle that other characters struggled to take off but there is also a lack of romantic chemistry with Mari-Lynn and this fellow actor (forgot his name), ditto with Brenda and the Woleks, there is a beautiful and talented actress playing Kelly who runs Max’s Place but they don’t do much with her either. Blade, an escaped convict who I think once beat Audrey, actually shows some potential with some edge. 

-There is a major lacking of long-term story direction: the Crown Jewels plot, the baby switch plot, Ruby Bright is all temporary, though most of it builds from one fun story beat into another. 

THE BEST:

-The Statesville Prison Break, complete with wonderful stock footage is absolute end of summer fun: Llanview’s reactions, luring Tina to Seaside Arena, Ursula debuting as AMAZONIA to win Jamie back, Cord flying on a rope to Tina’s rescue then facing a trident-yielding Titan threatening Cord, before Cord is forced to wrestle Titan for their freedom, complete with Tina coming to Cord’s aid and putting Ursula in a headlock with Cord’s “I’m going to Disneyland!”

NOTE: I know most would see the wrestling arena arc as beyond stupid but I rather enjoy the quick flight of fancy and it doesn’t take up much screen time, I love this show for its varied social and diverse offerings, with a balance of flight of fancy on and off. 

-The unfolding of the baby switch is also fun to watch with Brenda turning to Max who then enacts a baby switch scene on Fraternity Row to taunt Gabrielle into the truth, Megan/Max/Gabrielle triangle, even though Gabrielle is with Michael, Megan facing Ruby Bright alter ego, etc 

 

October 1990:

-I’m doubting he was popular at the time, so they didn’t learn their lesson, but Daniel is in almost every episode in a lackluster romance with Laura Jean…Brenda is on the back burner alongside Larry, but they aren’t together. 

-Viki and her stroke is the singular strong story, I love the family drama and ES is killing it, she really did her research here and I love the use of Niki Smith as Viki battles to regain her strength. 

-BEST POTENTIAL: VP as Sheila is a great infusion, she has such a warm presence in a plot driven mess of a show (compared to the fun of August 1989) I wish she had better chemistry with Troy. I’m seeing Rika Price for the first time and I almost wish they had Rika more of a schemer wanting to take advantage to Sheila’s ties to the Lords, maybe Sheila stays at Llanfair and Rika manipulates her way into becoming a houseguest. 

-Jake and Megan are actually rather boring, I’ll blame Charlotte. It’s a shame they lost JB as Sarah, they completely had no one to refocus the show with going into the 90s and it’s a long while before they reset. 

-I don’t think they have found their ground with KW story wise as Tina yet, and Johnny Dee triangle with Cord is blah. 

 

2003:

-I watched random playlists here and it seems they refocused the show to be more serious after 2003. 

-I’ve never seen Natalie and Christian together and WOW, the chemistry is amazing. 

-The family scenes between Jess/Viki/Nat are actually quite nice, it actually seems like a mother with her daughters, with natural conflict (granted, the conflict was Viki having to choose whose heart goes to Victor) it made me realize how it became so wooden in later years. 

-The Victor Lord alive reveal was wasted since he died so soon, never should have came back, but I enjoyed it for what it was and just pretend it didn’t happen. 

-I would say pairing Jess with Antonio and Nat with John aged both characters about 10 years.

-Al/Marcie, the little I got to see, I love. I actually enjoy Antonio/Carlotta/Christian Vega family scenes. RJ has ties to multiple characters and serves. 

-I’m not mad at Keri being a little schemer but this triangle with Jess and going under the bus is a no. 
 

Sorry for the long post, just miss this show. 

[Vee]

I loved Joey as a curate/minister. At his best he'd always been a very soulful character with some deep roots in Andrew's early storylines with Billy Douglas, etc. in the Chris McKenna era. His very effective, atmospheric re-introduction during the storm storyline in February '03 had him a mysterious young man wandering about town in the snow, meeting people, etc. and then they did the reveal with his arrival at Llanfair, and his interactions with Viki and Jessica were like a warm hug - Bruce Michael Hall was a green actor but was at his best with that stuff, with the family, with his mother and with his siblings. He had a Luke Skywalker/Mark Hamill quality; noble, serene, and non-judgmental including with his arrogant brother who'd stolen his teen sweetheart, a fact that often bubbled under the surface of their interactions. (They also brought Hall back in spring/summer '04 after his initial exit for the heart transplant story with Viki, and he was a rock there too.) For the first time since at least Nathan Fillion's early tenure, they seemed to have a clear concept of who Joey was vs. other male leads and a vision for who he could be, and it was a unique take.

Many people hated Joey the priest, and we never got a clear answer for what happened with him and the church when he returned in 2010 doing photography again (there's a good story there). But photography had remained his sideline even while he was a curate. I blame the storyline, not the concept - the romance with Jen, the show's weakest performer next to a very green newcomer, the horrid stuff with him caught between her and Flash. It was basically trying to xerox some of Andrew's old stories with Marty, Megan, etc. told with some of the worst possible replacements. There's something to be said for legacy stories and roles like the one Joey filled after Andrew (who was his mentor in this period), but not when your Marty stand-in is the unbelievably wooden Jessica Morris. The attempts with Joey and post-Joey to try to retrofit her into a wild child heroine never worked for me, because she was just terrible. And Joey's story was doomed when that was the focus. I know @DRW50 was a fan of some of this Joey's stuff too, I think we're the only two people.

There used to be a lot of it spread out all over YT, there might still be. I know there was a lot of Mitch material and Walker/Todd TSJ stuff from that year.

Ironically, Natalie and Cris had very little to do for most of 2003. They were the breakout summer couple of 2002 and were all over the place, very popular with the audience, then in early '03 they hit the backburner hard for most of the year while the new regime prioritized the Jessica recast (with Jessica losing most of her IQ and character integrity before and after romancing Antonio) in story. MA/Natalie didn't get big story again until David Fumero's exit in the fall with Easton's introduction.

The Victor resurrection should never have happened and was fortunately mostly retconned by RC.

Edited July 9, 2023 by Vee

[soapfave06]

I’ll keep searching for more 2003, that’s a shame they squandered their story potential as most of what I’ve seen of the early-2000s isn’t exactly driven by chemistry oriented couples. I did catch their wedding episode and it was quite nice and I must say David and Kamar still looked quite good in 2003. 
 

So BMH Joey was similar to TD Joey, where they did well in family scenes but were just kind of…there? I hope to see more of him. 
 

It’s interesting how quickly they disposed of what wasn’t working (Flash, Joey) in correlation to the core families, yet there’s a laundry list of performers consuming screen time for years outside of core families (Jessica Rappaport among them) 

 

[dc11786]

Wow. This unlocked a memory. The Nathan Purdee photos were different than the homoerotic photos of Bruce Michael Hall and his twin brother right? In my head, they were different, but now I am wondering if they aren't one in the same. That was a very odd time for erotic photography and daytime actors. You also have the Marty West oil wrestling videos in there somewhere. 

[Vee]

Yes, those are very different.

[John]

In 2003 Frons was seriously looking at both Cali Timmins (Who I would have chosen) & Sarah Buxton as Tina

 

Then I believe he almost brought Tina back later somewhere in 2006-07 and wanted Cynthia Preston as Tina

[Vee]

The difference is that for the bulk of his time onscreen (about a year) BMH's Joey was a central male lead and there was a clear investment in him by that creative regime, just with all the wrong pairings and choices. He had an actual identity as a curate and a priest in training, and I cared about that aspect of his personality and that new role he had on the show. Tom Degnan's Joey was always simply a plot device and afterthought for the show, a B or C-story for Gina Tognoni's Kelly after the chemistry tests with ME and TSJ had failed to catch fire. Even after he arrived, she was finally given a hot and heavy affair plotline with ME for several months. Clueless Joey was only there to be duped by his fiance Aubrey (Terri Conn) and Cutter while Kelly pined, he was there to service the story of actors and characters they actually had interest in.

Everything about Malone's second run is either squandered potential or deranged avant-garde camp, or both.

We don't know exactly when Sarah Buxton was in the mix. IIRC Gary Tomlin considered that a year before, and Tomlin largely predated Frons who ousted him.

Edited July 10, 2023 by Vee

[John]

Correct Vee

Buxton was when Tomlin was EP

Timmins was in 2003

Im not sure when Preston was being thought of but I think it was before Evans' 2008 stint as Tina

[DRW50]

@Vee You're right about BMH. He had a very soulful quality when given the chance, which is what Joey should have been. Instead we often just got Joey as a loser, a cuck, over "edgy" Tim Gibbs Kevin, or Todd, or whoever else. Tom Degnan was fine enough but clearly never there for any real reason. It was painful seeing the show try to throw Gina Tognoni at various men when Gina did what she did best at OLTL - have no chemistry with them. She and Degnan were adequate together, and that's the best to hope for in this situation. 

Didn't they even have Jen drive through a plate glass window like Marty?

Any time I think of Bree Williamson as Jess I shudder.