Just now, Paul Raven said:

https://archives.lib.duke.edu/catalog/malonemichael

Yeah, I had a look. It's Box 49 in there.

Thanks!!

11 hours ago, EricMontreal22 said:

I'm ashamed to say I never knew she went on to have a role on ATWT which I wasn't watching... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zdkWyH7qGdE

She just showed up as a disapproving mother. You didn't miss anything.

Back at it recently with November/December '91. If you're not tired of lengthy posts about 35+ year old episodes that other people have already discussed, enjoy!

Come late November: The Eber plotline is thankfully over, and not a moment too soon. I was pleased it was briefer than people had claimed in the past (maybe a month or less), but it ended up taking up too much real estate by the end. The somewhat cartoonish finish with Luna, Tina and Jane Eber teaming up to take down Doug was silly but well-intentioned. What matters is it's over! I wasn't too sure about Jane turning up again at Cassie's very swiftly-arranged bachelorette party a week or two later, but I wonder if it's the last we see of her. I didn't spot her at Bo and Cassie's wedding.

Llanfair is already mostly remodeled in late November, with the new foyer, etc. at record speed after being reduced to something out of Threads or The Day After on Halloween night. People are already living in it again while Tina arranges the fastest wedding known to man. It's a little weird seeing the girl klatch of Megan, LB’s Cassie and Tina gabbing it up during this period, but I guess it works. Did Holly Gagnier or Ava Haddad’s visiting Cassie have a friendship with Megan or Tina? In the past I had wondered how this timeline fit together with Tina planning Bo and Cassie's wedding and remodeling the house while Cord was off dying in Jaba, but it's simple enough: Tina doesn't even know about Cord, because Blair doesn't return from Jaba alone until after the wedding crashout and the return of Sarah. I did enjoy Max and Tina reminiscing about their own not-wedding and getting up to mischief with their wayward sons during the wedding prep; James DePaiva and Karen Witter have an easy rapport, you don't see any seams from her recast. But I don't know if they ever shared scenes previously before he left in '90. I also missed the connective tissue of Little Al and C.J. when those characters were gone, as Al was aged to slightly younger than me when I first started watching in '93. It's part of why I hoped they'd bring back C.J., and why I never got over them killing Al when they should've just recast the miscast Nathaniel Marston.

Anyway: Luna asks poor straitlaced Jon Russell out again to try to get over Max. JDP does have major chemistry with Susan Batten from the jump, which again is making me wonder exactly when they settled on a Max/Luna endgame in this period. Malone was still giving interviews about having intended for Max and Blair to end up together post-Todd (probably after Batten left the show) many years later, but I don't think he'd ever have ended Max and Luna while she was alive. You can see them maneuvering quickly with Max/Luna, her unrequited love and their growing friendship as Lee Ann begins to have major doubts (for the 90th time, in fairness) about her fúckfest with Max, who unlike Joey Thrower's very earnest and almost too youngish Kevin still can't say "I love you". Not sure Lee Ann can really blame Max though, given how quickly they actually got together the instant his wife went off to prison. It's kind of insane; I think Yasmine Bleeth only came on in April or May of '91 and by August Nicholas Walker's fey Max Buchanan was howling over her, letting her take care of Al and acting like he wants to put a ring on this much younger woman for life?

Notable too that Kevin and Luna are even shown in the same two-shot together, both watching Max and Lee Ann canoodle at the wedding in early December. The contrast and messaging are crystal clear. I'm not yet to Max and Blair's famous/infamous NYE meeting dance at the very end of the month (which I have seen before) so I wonder when they recalibrated from their plans with Blair and Cord, and how serious they really were about Max/Blair during '92. Because to me this all still looks like a long, long tail to a Max/Luna endgame which we ultimately got. But that's all for down the road.

Speaking of Blair and Cord: Their confessional session and loaded chess game in Jaba City gets pretty hot and heavy in late November. I didn't know they made out quite this much, or how close they came to actually getting it on (very). It's more than a kiss or two and Loprieno and Korf are not lacking in heat. Interesting though that Blair drops a few hints to the soon to be "dead" man about her true purpose: She slips about her mother after claiming her parents are dead, and is very cagey about her true ambitions. I said last time that I can also see Jake and Blair having become a real thing if Joe Lando's career hadn't been ascending to orbit. He's onto her from the moment they meet.

Cord’s big exit (I think the week after Thanksgiving) is quite a serious water stunt, where you see JL underwater in what must be a big tank and Mia Korf diving in after him from above them both. There's the wacky Casablanca dream interlude I mentioned in my last post about this (shout-out @EricMontreal22 ) which seems a bit odd to spend only a small portion of the episode on, but it is capped by Tina's spectral vision of Cord in the storm the night before Bo/Cassie’s speedrun wedding, where he reaches out for her and vanishes. The show made the best of the situation and the crowded plot real estate they had by making sure Tina has these omens and dreams but does not know anything about Cord's fate during the more pressing wedding run-up and drama; Blair is off for several days at least as the lone survivor in Jaba City, shaken and traumatized.

As to Bo and Cassie's very fast courtship and wedding: The reveal of Alex arriving at the wedding, hidden away, is apparently a Friday show, but what surprises me is that the bigger moment - after Bo and Troy find her music box surprise, and Bo rushes back out to the terrace after the ceremony to see Sarah - is saved for the following Monday's ending tag. It would seem more appropriate for that to be the Friday cliffhanger. Maybe the odd fit had to do with a holiday preemption or breaking news prior? Anyway, it's just a quibble.

Elaine Princi's Dorian gets a great Barbara Stanwyck in Stella Dallas moment at the terrace window, watching Bo and Cassie's ceremony. (Though when Cassie sees her and goes out to talk, Malone has Dorian directly reference it being Dickensian, his favorite author, and mock herself about being ‘nose against the glass’) Cassie’s attitude towards Dorian has been awful for weeks, but it’s hard to blame her too much considering what Dorian ends up putting Cassie through during her early marriage to Andrew just a few years from now. Still, their talk on the terrace and reconciliation did get me emotional; Laura and Princi play it very, very well, and the writing is there in that Cassie is just exhausted at being angry with her and wants her mother back. (And in fairness, she does fully apologize to Dorian when Alex arrives and Cassie learns the truth.) Also touching was Dorian’s spike of bravado right after as Cassie invites her inside to the wedding, followed by her admitting to her frazzled nerves and fear of public judgment with Herb. Elaine Princi deserves a lot of credit for channeling the best of Robin Strasser's poignancy in these kind of scenes.

However bizarre this sped-up romance is I did like Viki and Clint's dual advice to Bo and Cassie on the eve of their wedding. It was especially wild seeing Pat Ashley and I think the Medinas in Viki and Tina's respective wedding flashbacks. These days you expect folks to get blurred or cropped out!

Like many of us I’ve seen my share of the big Sarah reveal at this wedding before, from the large clips that have floated around on YT for many years, but it’s different seeing the full context of the show over weeks, days and months. So far I’m still very impressed with Grace Phillips, as I always have been. I’ll admit my feelings are likely colored by a longtime disinterest in Jensen Buchanan, and having only seen certain stretches of her popular OLTL run. There’s no denying Buchanan was an audience favorite and AW made her a star, and we know Phillips had BTS issues with Gottlieb which led to her exit in under a year; IIRC she all but vanishes from the show come summer '92, only returning to get offed in November. I have no idea if the audience ever took to Phillips at all and I know her stories were not well-received. But this introductory clutch of episodes still really impresses me, especially Alex’s last heartbroken look as she delivers Sarah to Bo on the terrace and then flees into the woods amidst the soaring music; it has a kind of serene joy representing Sarah's presence which is a great contrast to everyone involved being either shocked, horrified or well, Alex. I've also always been partial to Sarah's whole flashback narrative about her year in captivity, and her strange, almost romantic relationship with her melancholy jailer Conrad. They really flesh that whole story out in just a few well-done scenes, and Phillips and this dude are very good together. They also provide a very clear and explicit explanation for how they faked her death, which we rarely get today. I know Conrad actually does return somehow in '92 but not yet how; the byzantine Scarecrow, Carlo, Julia, etc. plotline (and why Sarah was taken alive in the first place) are things I have yet to piece together. I actually don't know when Julia Medina or Linda Thorson were last seen; not since July or August '91 at least. Is Julia even still supposed to be in town, and how was she involved with Carlo in the Rauch era? I know they had some involvement in '90 or '91.

For once Laura Bonarrigo's recent histrionics are well-tuned to the moment throughout this stretch of shows. First there's her escalating nerves, juxtaposed along with great, delirious handheld camera work, immediately following the ceremony where Cassie keeps getting waylaid for pictures while trying to follow Bo out to see Alex's "present" at the front door, minutes before Sarah's reappearance. Then there's her big confrontation with Alex upstairs (even if it's implausible that Bo, Cassie, Sarah and Alex keep losing sight of each other around the house) where Tonja Walker is at her most hair-rising and Laura succeeds in being appropriately terrified but not as pathetic and mewling as some of her last outings. I've always liked LB and I still do, and I think she often got saddled with either boring or truly gutwrenching material during her time on the show. I just think she got a particular rough ride in her first year, both before and after the immediate creative turnover. Nonetheless she and Walker go at it here and she fills the role she's given well, not buckling under to Tonja who at her best was always an unstoppable force. I don't know if she was this good on GH in the '80s but boy did they lose something. The end of the December 3rd episode has the bravura finish with Alex's total psychotic break as she's finally perpwalked out of the Llanfair drawing room, believing Andrew to be Bo and begging for his forgiveness, and even after being so scary upstairs she is genuinely kind of heartbreaking here, especially as Andrew (ever noble) kindly humors her despite her unease. Absolutely spine-tingling stuff you should see if you haven't.

All this and Cord's "death" waiting to be revealed to his loved ones is a lot to pile on the audience on top of Megan's recent lupus reveal, but at this point Megan's condition still seems benign and manageable. I know Gottlieb said in spring '92 she had begged Jessica Tuck to stay and I wonder how long that process went on. I think it's the December '91 mags of this period that began claiming Gerald Anthony would soon return as Marco as part of Megan's health crisis, which of course he did not; he only turned up on GH later the following year. Wonder what happened there as well.

One more note: Phil Carey has benefited heavily from the writing change. He is alternately gleeful & genuinely scary at times, dancing a jig down his stairs before coolly and quietly drilling Renee on what she knows re: Wingate Holden’s will. I actually don't know if Max ever sees a payout from this drama and if that leads to Serenity Springs, as I haven't ever seen this period leading to '93 in its whole before. Either way, the show is really picking up big time with the Eber interlude over.

Edited May 3May 3 by Vee

Speaking of "Jane Eber":

https://scholar.lib.vt.edu/VA-news/ROA-Times/issues/1997/rt9704/970418/04180088.htm

Edited Sunday at 01:46 PM5 days by Khan

1 hour ago, DRW50 said:

She just showed up as a disapproving mother. You didn't miss anything.

Wow what a waste! Even though maybe being in her 40s by soap standards at the time she was seen as old, she was still very hot (besides being a great actress...) I was hoping she had been brought on as a hot nightclub singer or something.

On 5/2/2026 at 1:58 AM, Paul Raven said:

https://archives.lib.duke.edu/catalog/malonemichael

Thanks! Wow it looks like he even sent to the archives his massive collection of musical theatre playbills?? I mean I fully approve, but...

Wow @Vee thanks for that--and I went back and read several of your earlier recaps I missed. You know I was NOT watching OLTL until pretty close to the beginning of Billy Douglas (I would often see the OLTL pre-credits sequence as I was finishing my lunches (which at the time I went home for) and getting ready to go back to school and obviously it made me realize I needed to start watching.)

BUT I really remember some of these details including the Casablanca sequence with Tina as Hoagy... I wonder if I just saw clips later or if I happened to be home sick and was watching it or something...

I knew Larry Pine returned as Roger Gordon during this period but it was a surprise to see him turn up at Megan and Sarah's door very quickly in December. I've seen a fair portion of Pine in many other things including his first run on OLTL during the Eterna saga (an endless campy hoot populated by very hardworking, mostly strong actors) where he and Dennis Parlato especially have a lot of soul and gravitas to lend to a ridiculous story, as well as his hysterically fun 180 turn as a Donald Trump proxy during the final days of Tad Channing on Doug Marland's classic ATWT in '86. He's always a welcome presence to me and apparently still working on stage and screen.

What's really harrowing here though is watching Roger full of joy at being back with his daughters and knowing that in less than two months he'll be back (in I think his final appearance) burying one, while the other won't even last a year. I assume Roger gets a few mentions when Sarah dies for good, but the poor man.

Another moment of unintentional foreshadowing:

Viki: Boy, you really have a way with words. No wonder women fall all over you.

Roger: You know, if I didn't know how much you loved Clint you wouldn't be safe around me for one second. You do still love Clint?

Viki: I'll let you know the moment it's over.

Roger: Just whistle. I'll come running.

There is some typical Malonian florid fantasy as Wingate's Star Wars force ghost appears to Max in a dream a la Hamlet's dad telling him to beware traitors. Ah, Malone.

Edited Monday at 10:34 AM5 days by Vee

I know @soapfave06 commented on this stuff recently but I am also blitzing through December '91 pretty quickly. Megan's very quick spiral into hedonism (the prototype for Marty's ongoing saga, which I'll get to more later) and renewed dalliance with Cain/Humberto/Heinrich/Hudson, doing a scorching tango while Andrew looks on, makes me again suspect that Gottlieb and Malone might've been aiming for a Cain/Megan/Andrew triangle had Jessica Tuck decided to renew her contract.

But I'll get into that and the John Loprieno variable of it all when I dig into these episodes further (and at nauseating length!) very soon.

Edited Wednesday at 11:28 AM2 days by Vee

Dorian: Now Cassie, you'd know this: What is 'Vanilla Ice?'

Timing is always so interesting to observe and contextualize during this transitional period in OLTL 1991. So on 12/10/91, a day after Tina learns Cord is ‘dead’ in Jaba, there’s Christopher Cousins back again as Cain (out of costume) in the Sweetwater courtroom of all places for Max v. Asa! By my count Cousins has been gone since late October when his seduction/scam of Megan as Heinrich Kaiser derailed, but they clearly had plans for him even then and held him in reserve for now. I was wondering when he’d be back. Cain gets no lines, just watches the proceedings, and I still suspect I know why in terms of what I think may be his uncannily Xeroxed backstory. Later we see him fleeing a dinner theater production with goons on his trail. Sure, okay.

Max serving as his own lawyer in his land feud with Asa leads to some minor comedy gold as he begins ranting about 'the money kings who run this country' before finally being interrupted by a country judge who I would swear is AMC and GL's Gil Rogers, but it's not in his IMDB credits so maybe not. Clearly Max was a prophet for our times. I like to think he and his kids would be soaking Elon Musk for all he's worth today.

Force Ghost Wingate is at it again, telling Max to search for “serenity”. Serenity Springs this soon? Max takes it as a sign to drop his feud with Asa, which as we all know should last about 18 hours tops. Max and Asa would continue their love/hate dance almost to the end of JDP’s run (including tediously repeating Nicholas Walker's 1990-91 "Max Buchanan" storyline a second time for no good reason), and Max did come back a final time for the old man’s funeral; they never really let go of each other, and did have periods of true affection despite their feud. It's funny to see how far back it stretches. Luna naturally uses Joe Hawk’s divining rod to a horse named "Serenity" which in turns leads to a fun high-stakes poker caper I enjoyed, but I'll get to that next time.

I should note that Max takes Carlo’s ‘haunted’ digs where the crime boss recently got shot - whatever. He's also a bit too chipper for having just lost Cord, though he does go to Llanfair to try the offer the absent Tina his condolences. Lee Ann meanwhile is back to the same tedious, whipsawing 180 behavior she was in for much of the transition between Rauch/Craig Carlson/whoever to Malone before Nicholas Walker left, where depending on the moment or general direction of the nearby winds she is either gushing over Max or vowing never to speak to him again based on the littlest slight. Here Lee Ann is very clearly desperate to get wifed up and/or move in with him but continues to fume and throw tantrums when Max doesn't offer either or say "I love you". This is not Yasmine Bleeth's best look but it is consistent with who Lee Ann has (annoyingly) been established as being around Max, and Bleeth is working very hard. The Kevin/Lee Ann stuff is very innocent and sweet even if he will never be what she wants; you can see her weakening to it more and more given his sincere adoration. It makes sense, even if I find Lee Ann demanding a firm commitment from Max on the heels of Gabrielle going off to the big house (like Cassie demanding more from Bo on the heels of his wife's return from the dead and his nephew's apparent demise) unfair and immature.

Chris McKenna's Joey gets a great moment with Viki breaking down over Cord on the Llanfair stairs, inhaler and all, but for much of this early fallout everyone else in the family (other than Tina) seems a bit like they’re just running through the customary emotions as they all gather at Llanfair. The loss is given proper weight but it still feels kind of dashed off vs. more integral pumping storylines (Max/Lee Ann/Kevin, the return of Sarah, Megan's rising illness, etc). Viki quoting Romeo & Juliet to Clint ('cut him out into little stars,' etc) is a bit much during this, Malone.

It is nice though to have Grace Phillips' NuSarah remember her Rauch-era bonds with Cord and Clint and have them put to use during the family mourning period; I'd argue she plays way better as a friend to Clint than opposite some others, including possibly Bob Woods. Cassie is not sold on Bo having 'chosen' her and I don’t blame her! She's still wildly immature, openly sulking after seeing Sarah in her element with the Bukes on the day they've learned Cord has 'died' and acting out with Bo despite his nephew's death. It's again not doing LB many favors. Phillips meanwhile gives a very realistic portrayal of Sarah's trauma and PTSD, if unrelenting and a bit exhausting. Again, she does better as the talk-to and sounding board for Viki, Clint, Megan, etc. because it's not just scene after scene of Sarah in anguish and terror over her ruined life, which has made up many of her scenes so far.

Widowed Tina wants to get out of town with the kids and heads up to Viki's cabin, which is probably a good way to start to jog through more of the grieving process given all the insane upheaval beginning to overtake the show at large. At first I was thinking Clint’s taking the lost of his firstborn a bit too well lol, but then they gave CR another touching scene with Joey Thrower’s manchild Kevin, where he again revisits the topic of fatherhood (as he did early in Malone's run with some beautiful scenes up at the cabin with Kevin, Clint and Asa in September/October) and raising Kevin and Joey as his own, and how his love for Cord is different but not less or more. Kirk Geiger was the right recast for Kevin, but (like Rory Gibson on GH today) he was much more of a man than a boy; Thrower is in between boy and manhood in all his interactions, and while he's wet behind the ears and a bit too golly-gosh earnest at times, he is very affecting in this stuff and much of his ongoing infatuation with Lee Ann. That said did I mind seeing him with his shirt off in Kevin's jungle fantasies about Lee Ann? Nope!

Not really sure Schubert(?) is the right choice for a limited Cord and (recast) Tina farewell montage, but okay, Linda Gottlieb. Maybe spring for a classic power ballad. I'm thinking Phil Collins.

I did like that Viki still calls Larry 'my best friend' when he brings her the news about Megan's funky kidney. OTOH Viki makes the fatal mistake to not tell Megan immediately, and you can see in both her and Clint's eyes when they uneasily agree to wait (against Larry's advice) that it's the wrong choice. I have to assume that absolutely tormented her later, and I wonder if it comes up again after Megan's death given the events that unfold very shortly after this. The angst between Erika and Michael Storm was hard to watch; these characters have both been doing this for so long, care deeply for each other and Larry delivered Megan. Larry really needed a better role in this era, though they did use him more with Marty down the road.

Malone once talked about the show unwisely discarding the Woleks for the Buchanans, but I will dig up that magazine quote for next time. It's something that should've been rectified years ago before the show ended, and it should have begun with Dr. Larry who was always Llanview's quiet, long-suffering unsung hero IMO, however square he could look next to folks like Karen or Marco.

Dorian, leathered up: So what does one wear to go cruising?

Both quotable lines in this post come from Dorian grasping for Jason's favor; blasting pop music in the penthouse and then, after getting her turn to style him as her ideal suited dandy (with his hair down like Roger Howarth), her getting dressed up in turn as a biker chick to hit the dive bars with him. You haven't lived until you've seen Elaine Princi in Mark Brettschneider's arms to the dulcet tones of both Extreme and Nine Inch Nails! This leads to their unexpected rendezvous with crashout Megan, which I'll discuss in more detail in my next post.

We get some more great Andrew/Megan stuff with their birdwatching before her latest lupus incident. I could've watched them watching birds or hanging in the park for hours tbh, it's a great relationship. The show gets even more explicit about his feelings for her when she teases him about being smitten with her at the hospital. "Me?" Andrew jokes. "Smitten?" But of course he is, and that will lead to events during Megan's spiral which make me all the more convinced they had planned for something with Cain, Megan and Andrew had Jessica Tuck decided to stay. I'll discuss that next time with those episodes.

Wow: Both Carlo and (surprise!) Stephanie are seen again on December 11th as Carlo freaks out over the news that Sarah Buchanan is back in play. Was not expecting to see Robyn Griggs again until certain events in '92. She wants to go back to Llanview too! I dunno if she will, but maybe it was a three strikes program BTS with Griggs lol. Despite previous interesting angles they left on the table in September-November for Stephanie, I can't imagine what place is left for the character with Bleeth and Mia Korf well situated and Susan Haskell weeks away.

4 hours ago, Vee said:

Timing is always so interesting to observe and contextualize during this transitional period in OLTL 1991. So on 12/10/91, a day after Tina learns Cord is ‘dead’ in Jaba, there’s Christopher Cousins back again as Cain (out of costume) in the Sweetwater courtroom of all places for Max v. Asa! By my count Cousins has been gone since late October when his seduction/scam of Megan as Heinrich Kaiser derailed, but they clearly had plans for him even then and held him in reserve for now. I was wondering when he’d be back. Cain gets no lines, just watches the proceedings, and I still suspect I know why in terms of what I think may be his uncannily Xeroxed backstory. Later we see him fleeing a dinner theater production with goons on his trail. Sure, okay.

Max serving as his own lawyer in his land feud with Asa leads to some minor comedy gold as he begins ranting about 'the money kings who run this country' before finally being interrupted by a country judge who I would swear is AMC and GL's Gil Rogers, but it's not in his IMDB credits so maybe not. Clearly Max was a prophet for our times. I like to think he and his kids would be soaking Elon Musk for all he's worth today.

Force Ghost Wingate is at it again, telling Max to search for “serenity”. Serenity Springs this soon? Max takes it as a sign to drop his feud with Asa, which as we all know should last about 18 hours tops. Max and Asa would continue their love/hate dance almost to the end of JDP’s run (including tediously repeating Nicholas Walker's 1990-91 "Max Buchanan" storyline a second time for no good reason), and Max did come back a final time for the old man’s funeral; they never really let go of each other, and did have periods of true affection despite their feud. It's funny to see how far back it stretches. Luna naturally uses Joe Hawk’s divining rod to a horse named "Serenity" which in turns leads to a fun high-stakes poker caper I enjoyed, but I'll get to that next time.

I should note that Max takes Carlo’s ‘haunted’ digs where the crime boss recently got shot - whatever. He's also a bit too chipper for having just lost Cord, though he does go to Llanfair to try the offer the absent Tina his condolences. Lee Ann meanwhile is back to the same tedious, whipsawing 180 behavior she was in for much of the transition between Rauch/Craig Carlson/whoever to Malone before Nicholas Walker left, where depending on the moment or general direction of the nearby winds she is either gushing over Max or vowing never to speak to him again based on the littlest slight. Here Lee Ann is very clearly desperate to get wifed up and/or move in with him but continues to fume and throw tantrums when Max doesn't offer either or say "I love you". This is not Yasmine Bleeth's best look but it is consistent with who Lee Ann has (annoyingly) been established as being around Max, and Bleeth is working very hard. The Kevin/Lee Ann stuff is very innocent and sweet even if he will never be what she wants; you can see her weakening to it more and more given his sincere adoration. It makes sense, even if I find Lee Ann demanding a firm commitment from Max on the heels of Gabrielle going off to the big house (like Cassie demanding more from Bo on the heels of his wife's return from the dead and his nephew's apparent demise) unfair and immature.

Chris McKenna's Joey gets a great moment with Viki breaking down over Cord on the Llanfair stairs, inhaler and all, but for much of this early fallout everyone else in the family (other than Tina) seems a bit like they’re just running through the customary emotions as they all gather at Llanfair. The loss is given proper weight but it still feels kind of dashed off vs. more integral pumping storylines (Max/Lee Ann/Kevin, the return of Sarah, Megan's rising illness, etc). Viki quoting Romeo & Juliet to Clint ('cut him out into little stars,' etc) is a bit much during this, Malone.

It is nice though to have Grace Phillips' NuSarah remember her Rauch-era bonds with Cord and Clint and have them put to use during the family mourning period; I'd argue she plays way better as a friend to Clint than opposite some others, including possibly Bob Woods. Cassie is not sold on Bo having 'chosen' her and I don’t blame her! She's still wildly immature, openly sulking after seeing Sarah in her element with the Bukes on the day they've learned Cord has 'died' and acting out with Bo despite his nephew's death. It's again not doing LB many favors. Phillips meanwhile gives a very realistic portrayal of Sarah's trauma and PTSD, if unrelenting and a bit exhausting. Again, she does better as the talk-to and sounding board for Viki, Clint, Megan, etc. because it's not just scene after scene of Sarah in anguish and terror over her ruined life, which has made up many of her scenes so far.

Widowed Tina wants to get out of town with the kids and heads up to Viki's cabin, which is probably a good way to start to jog through more of the grieving process given all the insane upheaval beginning to overtake the show at large. At first I was thinking Clint’s taking the lost of his firstborn a bit too well lol, but then they gave CR another touching scene with Joey Thrower’s manchild Kevin, where he again revisits the topic of fatherhood (as he did early in Malone's run with some beautiful scenes up at the cabin with Kevin, Clint and Asa in September/October) and raising Kevin and Joey as his own, and how his love for Cord is different but not less or more. Kirk Geiger was the right recast for Kevin, but (like Rory Gibson on GH today) he was much more of a man than a boy; Thrower is in between boy and manhood in all his interactions, and while he's wet behind the ears and a bit too golly-gosh earnest at times, he is very affecting in this stuff and much of his ongoing infatuation with Lee Ann. That said did I mind seeing him with his shirt off in Kevin's jungle fantasies about Lee Ann? Nope!

Not really sure Schubert(?) is the right choice for a limited Cord and (recast) Tina farewell montage, but okay, Linda Gottlieb. Maybe spring for a classic power ballad. I'm thinking Phil Collins.

I did like that Viki still calls Larry 'my best friend' when he brings her the news about Megan's funky kidney. OTOH Viki makes the fatal mistake to not tell Megan immediately, and you can see in both her and Clint's eyes when they uneasily agree to wait (against Larry's advice) that it's the wrong choice. I have to assume that absolutely tormented her later, and I wonder if it comes up again after Megan's death given the events that unfold very shortly after this. The angst between Erika and Michael Storm was hard to watch; these characters have both been doing this for so long, care deeply for each other and Larry delivered Megan. Larry really needed a better role in this era, though they did use him more with Marty down the road.

Malone once talked about the show unwisely discarding the Woleks for the Buchanans, but I will dig up that magazine quote for next time. It's something that should've been rectified years ago before the show ended, and it should have begun with Dr. Larry who was always Llanview's quiet, long-suffering unsung hero IMO, however square he could look next to folks like Karen or Marco.

Both quotable lines in this post come from Dorian grasping for Jason's favor; blasting pop music in the penthouse and then, after getting her turn to style him as her ideal suited dandy (with his hair down like Roger Howarth), her getting dressed up in turn as a biker chick to hit the dive bars with him. You haven't lived until you've seen Elaine Princi in Mark Brettschneider's arms to the dulcet tones of both Extreme and Nine Inch Nails! This leads to their unexpected rendezvous with crashout Megan, which I'll discuss in more detail in my next post.

We get some more great Andrew/Megan stuff with their birdwatching before her latest lupus incident. I could've watched them watching birds or hanging in the park for hours tbh, it's a great relationship. The show gets even more explicit about his feelings for her when she teases him about being smitten with her at the hospital. "Me?" Andrew jokes. "Smitten?" But of course he is, and that will lead to events during Megan's spiral which make me all the more convinced they had planned for something with Cain, Megan and Andrew had Jessica Tuck decided to stay. I'll discuss that next time with those episodes.

Wow: Both Carlo and (surprise!) Stephanie are seen again on December 11th as Carlo freaks out over the news that Sarah Buchanan is back in play. Was not expecting to see Robyn Griggs again until certain events in '92. She wants to go back to Llanview too! I dunno if she will, but maybe it was a three strikes program BTS with Griggs lol. Despite previous interesting angles they left on the table in September-November for Stephanie, I can't imagine what place is left for the character with Bleeth and Mia Korf well situated and Susan Haskell weeks away.

Judge Claude is Gil Rogers. Never caught the last name, but it is in our Hoppers Profile.

Babs Bartlett: Andrew was just telling me about the organ.

Megan: Whose organ?

Late December '91! As others have noted, Megan's crashout spiral following her kidney diagnosis is great work by Jessica Tuck, if a bit rushed. The intimacy with Andrew only ramps up from here; first she tells him 'I need you now' at the hospital, then she openly teases and tempts him during her illicit tango and drinking binge with Humberto/Cain at the Palace on/around December 17th. A lot of this hedonistic psychodrama plays out just before the Christmas shows, and it's a bit of a jolt given the holiday season but very engaging for me. I don't know how often OLTL went to Atlantic City in story before the '90s - I think Ruby Bright went there with Marco in the Rauch era - but it would become a regular fixture later, particularly in both Malone's runs on the show, first during Max's gambling addiction saga with Kassie's Blair in '94 and then when Victor/"Todd"/Walker, Natalie and John McBain get into ridiculous trouble in 2003 during Malone II. (I think Max and Roxy got married there during Live Week 2002 as well, and Roxy and Natalie both came from AC.)

I like that Megan instantly recognizes "Humberto" as Heinrich and has absolutely no time for Cain pretending otherwise. It's taken just about six months and at least two writing teams, but it's Megan who nails him to the wall, playfully needling him about his many identities and varied occupations until he goes mask off, even if she refuses to hear his real name during her East Coast rampage (complete with a lot of Gottlieb handheld camera work as they hit the dive bar and run into Dorian and Jason). Tuck and Cousins clearly enjoy each other's company and are good together; her sharp intellect and tongue are not as fluffy as Karen Witter's screwball energy, which makes Megan a different dynamic partner with Cain. "You're sexy and mysterious," Megan says. "That's all I want from you." She also has a great line for Dorian when she finds her tricked out with Jason: "Quite an outfit. Early dominatrix?"

What I like even more is how explicit and daring the show is willing to be with fulfilling the promise of the Megan/Cain tease back in October, as well as playing out what I strongly suspect was a pitched love triangle (if Tuck had re-signed) with Cain/Megan/Andrew during their run-in at the Palace, all presented here in a sort of hyper-truncated form over about a week of shows starting around 12/16-12/17. Megan's all over both her would-be suitors, making out heavily with Cain and crawling over Andrew on the dance floor, and it's not even subtle; Jake does not come up until it's far too late. There's some great pop music usage as Megan melts down in AC (after reuniting with Jake's old buddy Lucky and yes, a cameo from Ivana Trump) to the tune of Londonbeat's classic "I've Been Thinking About You." The following Monday she almost goes to bed with Cain, woozily attempting to seduce the increasingly uneasy con man to Blind Faith's "Can't Find My Way Home" - a bit on the nose but the usage is amazing onscreen in the dark hotel suite, as Megan's night of debauchery ends up with her stripping off her garters down to her lingerie, crawling and writhing on the floor and bed before passing out in Cain's arms.

As soapfave noted though, this all wraps pretty damn quick lol. Cain and Andrew call for a doctor and get Megan airlifted back to Llanview between commercials, where she swiftly apologizes to Larry and Viki over getting her stomach pumped. It's a very fast recovery and reset for Megan during the Christmas week just in time for the holiday, almost as though the whole meltdown never happened - also IMO, as though Malone and Gottlieb (and now Griffith) wanted to play out a miniature version of possible would-be love triangle with Megan and their two new male leads before it was too late.

How might a triangle have worked out had things gone differently BTS, you ask? Well, for one thing if John Loprieno hadn't left they obviously intended Blair for Cord, which would more likely leave KW's Tina otherwise engaged in a triangle there and not definitely with Cain. Joe Lando was not coming back on contract, which would leave Megan (had JT stayed) in play for Cain and Andrew. This too would dictate that Max would most likely be for wallflower Luna, which I now suspect was an endgame much earlier than anyone realized before they pivoted to Max/Blair with Loprieno out. But I could be very wrong! This is where Malone’s story notes & papers from Duke University dating back to his OLTL days (and we know they're in those records, they're listed as such) might come in handy.

To cap it all off, Jake returns for more scenes with Ilsa, She Wolf of the S.S. in Jaba on the 22nd! "There is no Christmas in Jaba!" Ilsa crows, and I am pretty sure this is a NuIlsa different from the previous one. She looks awfully familiar to me and is a bit too New York theater lol. I went poking around but had no joy; any idea who it could be? Anyway, Jake cons Ilsa with the promise of sex to make a call to Megan on Christmas Day, and Mrs. Harrison tactfully makes no mention of her Atlantic City jaunt where she almost fúcked a con artist after trying to get under a priest's collar. Smart choice!

What fall 1991 and the Andrew/Megan/Cain mini-drama makes clear is that the party girl or fallen woman/holy man archetypes and romance path are a Malone staple he will return to again and again, much like his other favorite types, fantasy interludes, etc. They’re as much a part of him as Agnes Nixon’s own fixations (young love, poor little rich boys, broad humor or carnie folk, gothic mystery) or Doug Marland's (working-class/homespun families, incest/familial abuse, therapy). Malone of course iterates on what he was aiming for with Megan in full with Marty Saybrooke, who shares a very similar and more explicit relationship with Andrew while being tempted by much more dangerous men (Todd Manning) and became one of the show's last legendary heroines.

Later Malone was in a rock and a hard place during his second run in 2003, likely due to Fronsian micromanagement re: the youth set, when he poorly tried to remold Jessica Morris' Jen Rappaport in the same Marty mold; Jen ends up playing out the same story as Megan and Marty in a triangle with Joey's curate priest (Andrew) and hedonistic partner in crime Rex (Cain/Todd). Even Malone's take on Natalie (a much more natural fiery successor to Marty and Megan - and Tina and Karen Wolek IMO - than Jen) has elements of this; when John McBain rejects Natalie due to his past trauma in 2004, Natalie lashes out by unwisely getting involved with another iteration on Cain/Rex in Paul Cramer, a con man who relates to her darker side. In the end these are all variations on a theme for Malone. Some work, some really don't lol. It's just fun to dissect. But it's not the only iteration we'll see again.

Viki mouthing Jessica’s lines at the Christmas pageant at St. James is a great, very real touch. Andrew's sermon is beautiful but what's even better is kind of the capper to the mini-triangle, where Megan and Andrew have a chaste yet very intimate sleepover at the rectory on Christmas Eve. Megan/Andrew scenes are clearly a labor of love for Malone, and I don't think it ever played quite the same with the younger Susan Haskell and unstable Marty, even if she and Robert Krimmer definitely had serious chemistry. The week of Christmas ends with a seemingly recovered Megan predicting her own death and Andrew kissing her hand intimately (then apologizing, to which she says it warmed her up) as they sit together on a snowy park bench. That's consummation in and of itself, even if I suspect they never actually kiss.

This is all already a lot, so I'll save my stuff about the rest of the Christmas period for another post later. I will say though that I loved how Clint’s quiet grief finally breaks open a bit more when he and Viki get a Christmas tree & then don't want to bring it in after revisiting happy memories of Christmases past with Cord. They then run a vintage ’86 flashback with Cord and Clint discussing their discovery that they're father and son and it's a great little grace note. I also loved this bit of dialogue at the tree.

Joey: What’s so nice about feeling bad?

Viki: It means we care. It means we won’t forget.

Edited 9 hours ago9 hr by Vee

So as I close out 1991, this is apparently from a ’94 magazine interview with Michael Malone, which shows what was still on his mind then to his credit, and points to the future: 

“[The Buchanans] came to town and corralled everyone else in. There are no old, stuffy Lords to oppose the nouveau-riche Buchanans, no working class Woleks left in significant number. [...] "We don’t have as many Black characters on the show as I’d like there to be. The world that Jason, and formerly Wanda and Lee Ann, represent isn’t as strong as I’d like. One of the problems with OLTL is that there’s a lack of strong, rival families."

Gottlieb and Malone did bring the class system and struggle back to OLTL from almost their very first days, beginning with creating Jason Webb in August ’91 (a character Malone clearly did have affinity for, whether he was a Gottlieb edict and a Malone creation before his name was officially on the show or whether the interim writers did his introduction - I am leaning towards Malone). Then they lensed deeply in both their early fall period and December into class commentary with a variety of have-nots. It begins with Jason and Lee Ann, who Gottlieb had David Nichtern create a whole musical theme for, indicating that early investment. Lee Ann, starstruck when she’s invited to the Buchanan Christmas party, gets showered with gifts by rich heir Kevin to fulfill all her dreams of coming up in the world. Meanwhile pauper Jason sells Cord’s camera and his last dime just to afford buying her a pearl necklace (ahem), which Lee Ann then mistakes for a gift from Max. This throughline continues to crop up with the great Blair/Cassie scenes at the Banner late at night that soapfave mentioned, where Quincey (notably a Black reporter) chimes in about the rich vs. the working schlubs of Llanview, and how he and Blair will never be able to afford the tony country club circuit with horse & rider.

It had been set aside for awhile but Malone reintroduces the nearly subliminal Jason/Lee Ann romance thread beneath all their dramas with Dorian, Kevin, Max, etc. in December. Jason thinks he can never be enough for Lee Ann while both poor strivers are seduced by wealth and power from suitors from the high steppes (Kevin and Dorian). When Kevin proposes at Wanda's, a sullen Jason drowns his sorrows by planting one on Dorian in the background of the shot before exiting stage left. They knew what they were doing from the jump.

Meanwhile, leathered-up Dorian and Jason cruise around on his bike and ponder the class struggle on Llantano Mountain(?), looking down on the whole town and wanting to 'step on' Llanview as they play with these familiar Malone beats. Jason also talks his abusive stepfather and wanting to become a cop, a career path they did not fulfill for him AFAIK but did years later with Antonio (who I preferred becoming a lawyer, as he was off to law school when Kamar de los Reyes left in ’97, but anyway). Then there's more Malone sadomasochism a la Jason and Stephanie, as Dorian pushes him to express his anger sexually (‘break me in two!').

I think she gives good heroine in several ways but as I've said before, I can't really feel for Lee Ann's delusional fixation on Max. She goes a step too far openly suggesting that she could be Al's new mommy, which makes Max bristle hard and inform her in no uncertain terms that no one will ever be replacing Gabrielle. A few days later he's playing the See Other People card on the phone with her just before NYE. I can't really blame him at all, even if Nicholas Walker's Max was singing a totally different (and very creepy) tune with Lee Ann under the prior writers during the summer.

Blair and Cassie at the Banner has been mentioned but is worthwhile stuff. Mia Korf is still beautiful today, she's spellbinding on the show and it just makes me wish for other things that could or should've been to honor her time with OLTL. Blair urging Cassie to fight for Bo using sex is a key window into Blair's truly driven mindset. Cassie says love can't be worked for, but Blair fundamentally disagrees. "You have to work for love just like anything else. Why be ambitious only at the office?" Asa and Blair meet again on the 22nd during this Banner pow-wow after only a brief greeting in the past, he's clearly taken with her, and Blair instantly hooks into the old cowboy as a prime opportunity. Again, this creative team has already begun adjusting on Blair very quickly and it's no secret even without hindsight where this angle is going. (Blair also meets Dorian again at Wanda's on the 26th and is still quite flustered - Cassie really rolls with inadvertently meeting the mute Addie on the 22nd, who Blair passes off as a distant relative she's been hiding away in Cassie's condo. Uh, sure!)

Blair’s homemade jewelry is such a key component of the character; she gifts the entire Buchanan clan with homemade pieces after dazzling Asa and Renee with her work, then, another striving character born to poverty, makes her own gown for the NYE Buchanan bash. While I really liked Blair as a journalist as well it does me good to know Melador is still going strong for her today from her GH appearance a couple years ago, as it's such a foundational part of the character. (I just assume she also still owns the Sun from Todd.) Blair was always very close to Malone’s heart, though I’d hope he talked up Mia Korf in some press as much as he did KDP, who he gushed about in later years and said it was shameful she hadn't won Emmys for her work (true). I've never found clippings where he's talked about MK and it would be nice to see. Kassie said only Malone really understood Blair and I do think she was probably right. It's the same character in '94 and '95 (and even 2003, alone up against Mitch Laurence), just in a different key. When Blair psyches herself up to go to the party and make her life change, she's not far removed from Jason or Lee Ann and the classic core themes from '68 that Malone and Gottlieb are playing with across the whole show.

Going back to the quote at the top: In the end, Malone did deliver on more families and more working class families. In 1995 he creates Angel Square and the Vegas, all of which became central to the show for the remainder of its run. In their way Antonio, Cristian, Carlotta, etc. are the inheritors to white (or in Blair's case, Asian... for a while) working class characters depicted in '91 like Lee Ann, Jason, Wanda, even Max and Luna. Malone's thematic concerns didn't vanish but they did transmute.

Sarah’s evil Santa dreams and her fears of being covered in feathers or petals or something (or whatever this cryptic stuff is supposed to represent) are only escalating! Bo and Sarah have some occasionally good bonding scenes but despite some slogging, repetitive material her PTSD Is actually quite well-rendered for the era, frightened of Christmas crowds, noise, etc. The first mention of psychiatrist Michael Jonas by Andrew comes on December 30, which leads to what I know was an unpopular storyline and a character who (if they intended more) never really came together.

Max and Luna live it up in Atlantic City after their run-in with Megan and Cain, winning and losing a small fortune over “Serenity” the horse; Luna’s preternatural senses are right but Max doesn’t trust them vs. the house odds. I have actually really enjoyed Max and Luna’s early hijinks, including joining the high-stakes poker game at the Palace with “Humberto”. It’s more loose-limbed and fun than some of the more labored or self-important stuff they often got once they were fully coupled up, though I do still find them far more winning than some fans do later in ’93; I rewatched the 25th anniversary eps recently and that stuff really holds up for me, including their material. Anyway, JDP and Susan Batten are clearly having a blast together here in the early days. I don’t think DePaiva had a problem with Luna so much as he did Max becoming a wholly tamed Mr. Mom near the very end of that romance (Luna gives birth maybe three months before being shot and killed IIRC) and into ’96, once Luna was dead and Max was just toting twins around indefinitely.

It’s still very interesting how OLTL now has both Cain and Max onscreen, with Cain appearing to be an obvious successor character for Max, but instead they’ve repeatedly been pitted against each other, first during the Palace poker game and then again in AC with Megan. Kevin once again references Asa’s first love “Rose Smith” right after Christmas, first mentioned in late September or October (admittedly she is likely Asa’s fifth or sixth ‘first love’ in show history) and I’m fairly sure I’m right about the Cain connection here, which at first glance would be a near-total Xerox of Max’s backstory re: Asa with Wingate and Patricia Holden. Megan also hones in on how Cain’s various schemes and identities all go back to investigating Asa. This Max/Cain mirroring culminates right before New Year’s, on what is labeled the 12/30 episode*; after Max and Luna finally discover the land that will become Serenity Springs (much sooner than I thought story-wise), they do a hard match cut in the edit from Max’s cowboy boots in the mud to Cain’s identical boots at the Palace, where he finally gives his real name to the concierge before charming and pickpocketing Asa in Texas cattle drag. Speaking of Serenity Springs, IIRC it lasted on OLTL til just about the end of the run; I could swear I remember hunks still going there to work out in the last 5-10 years (did Max or the Moodys still own it?). More recently, Nina on GH is still vacationing to Serenity Springs for spa trips to this day! 

(* - I still have a hard time believing they ran new episodes on both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, but that’s the online labeling for you)

Anyway: Cain watches Tina and Viki meet Babs Bartlett, then charms her into getting him an invitation to Asa's New Year’s bash (which Max crashes with Luna). I was wondering when Cain and Tina would reconnect and sure enough she clocks him at the NYE bash with Babs. It initially seems kind of insane Cain that came to this event where Tina, Megan and Viki all spot and confront him (and Megan shares one more surprisingly chill dance with him) but as it turns out he has set it up for a confrontation with Tina, Viki and Asa at the stroke of midnight.

NYE 1991 culminates well across the board. I have always found it essential for soaps to make Christmas and New Year's count with a bang at the end of the year, and some shows still do it sometimes. First there's the Cain unmasking, then there's more angsty drama with Andrew and Megan. Before Asa's party Andrew again wants to apologize to Megan for kissing her hand the other day. "I don’t think that was the right thing," he begins before she cuts him off: "Yes it was. Really, it made me feel good." Okay.

Andrew seeks counsel from his bishop and confesses his love for Megan. The bishop tells him 'a man in love is a man closer to God’ but says he can't let his emotions overtake him. In crisis, Andrew writes requesting a transfer only to be confronted by Megan just before midnight. When he tells her what he's doing (but not why - she must know) she begs him not to go, and they share a tentative, halting embrace at 12:00. He almost goes in for a kiss then settles for her cheek as they hug. So close!!

But then we come to the moment people really remember: Max and Blair's first scenes together (ever) where they are supernaturally drawn to each other - the stage lights even darken around them in the middle of the Palace ballroom - and dance at midnight to Roberta Flack's "Set the Night to Music". It's super OTT and campy but also pretty great and beautifully done tbh. To be clear, by my reckoning there is zero foreshadowing of Max and Blair together or hints towards this pairing whatsoever before this moment, which is pretty unusual for Malone/Gottlieb. They were never in close enough proximity, there's never any parallel editing or thematic rhyme like other characters and stories. It was never even hinted at, and then suddenly they're there together like a solar flare. And yeah, they do really have it at least in that moment. Max and Luna are adorable, but the Max that tango's with Mia Korf's Blair is the one Gabrielle would remember. It's quite an introduction for a hard, sudden shift, but it worked for me and is the setpiece the show closes on to end 1991, out of nowhere. What a way to go.

A few final notes:

• Not for the first time IIRC, Malone hits the note of Princi's Dorian dredging up her decades-long feud over Victor with Viki as she gripes to Herb about being Victor’s widow and the rightful mistress of the house of Lord. I’m not sure they knew anything about their future plans this far back, but who knows.

• Clint randomly returning from Jaba City bruised and bandaged around his face and eyes (blaming Jaba thugs) makes me think this directly relates to Linda Gottlieb’s oral history story about Clint Ritchie returning from a break having had major face work done around his eyes and her saying ‘WTF?’ I’m willing to bet money that these scenes are the end result.

I'm going to take a bit of a break from spewing away about the show and a breather after blitzing through the end of '91 in a matter of days. I hope you find something worthwhile and not too repetitious about my blather, and I'll start in on '92 sometime soon.

Edited 45 minutes ago45 min by Vee