15 minutes ago, Soaplovers said:

I think having Joey Thrower playing Kevin was effective because he was basically 18/19 and in love with an older woman Lee Ann.. who was using him unintentionally due to relationship issues she was having with Max.

I don't recall if the writers understood that Lee Ann was doing to Kevin what Max had done to her (i.e. an older person taking advantage of the naivete of a younger person)... but looking back at that era, the similarities are striking.

I always wondered how old they were playing Lee Ann as at this point. I assume at least 2-5 years older. I haven't watched her intro but IIRC she came in around April or May '91? It was a lot quicker a whirlwind tour than I realized, given that the outgoing regime was hammering away at her and skeevy Nicholas Walker Max being 'true love' in the summer.

I do think Yasmine Bleeth had real chemistry with Mark Brettschneider and that it was a shame they didn't get a HEA together - I liked Lee Ann with Jason later on. I didn't know until recently that they apparently floated recasting her with Sydney Penny when Bleeth exited, but decided against it for whatever reason (and SP went to AMC and was a hit as Julia Santos). Hiring Penny would've radically changed the face of OLTL's youth canvas IMO, whereas by the time Lee Ann was out (along with Mia Korf's Blair) it pretty much became Susan Haskell and co.'s show (and then Roger Howarth's) in that age range.

I can't really imagine OLTL '93-onward with Lee Ann Demerest still around - ultimately she was a kind of a blip of a character in the larger scheme of things, yet she was integral in the first year to 18 months of Gottlieb/Malone for some very strong story that I think YB, etc. all did well with. (I also always thought it was a mistake to not recast Lee Ann in the 2000s and bring her on to make trouble for Kevin and Kelly for a brief stint, but I digress.)

Edited August 4Aug 4 by Vee

5 minutes ago, j swift said:

In the second draft, they corrected the errors by giving Blair and Max some chemistry.  Blair being a Cramer Woman was ten times better that Lee Ann and Du Ann.  And, somehow, even though both characters made awful choices, Blair seems more sympathetic than Lee Ann, to me.

Well, Blair was a first draft of Blair. Lee Ann was created by the previous Rauch regime.

10 hours ago, Vee said:

 But the show is much more sexually charged since Malone came on, something I talked about months back. There's a heat and intensity most soaps (other than possibly DAYS or BTG, and a handful of recent bits on GH) shy away from today. @EricMontreal22 I hope you'll dive back in too! Stay tuned for more 35+ years late thoughts!

Thanks!  Love reading these thoughts.  And yes, for all the acclaim OLTL at the time got for social relevancy, I think you're spot on about it being sexually charged (something I'm sure Gottlieb played a part in)  I mean love it or hate it, she's spelling that out with the new opening and what a different vibe it gives to the previous one.

Edited August 5Aug 5 by EricMontreal22

9 hours ago, Vee said:

Scoring a mawkish Bo/Cassie 'memories' (of... the last 6 months they started dating and rapidly moved in together and got engaged, less than a year after his wife's death?) montage to a saccharine Barbara Cook song is such a boomer coastal thing to do with someone who was predominantly a Broadway name lol.

 

Wait wha?  As a huge Cook fan (to no one's surprise) what song??

Just now, EricMontreal22 said:

Wait wha?  As a huge Cook fan (to no one's surprise) what song??

"Ain't Love Easy," I believe. Embarrassing! It was the October 6th '91 episode.

5 minutes ago, Vee said:

"Ain't Love Easy," I believe. Embarrassing! It was the October 6th '91 episode.

OK not a song I even know but... yeah sounds like a terrible fit.

"I am not one of your conquests, Gaius Cordius! You will never be able to possess me!"

I've finally reached the 'Luna and Tina explore Cord and Tina's past lives' episodes (starting with 10/8/91). Hoo boy. Clint Ritchie and Bob Woods deserve hazard pay for having to dress up as Roman centurions in helmets and togas serving General Cord.

John Loprieno playing an effete Roman and making a wild meal of it proves just how versatile he always was - anyone who remembers his guest turn as a time-traveling war criminal on Star Trek: Voyager (the two-parter "Year of Hell") knows he could play so much more than folksy hunk Cord. I wish the show had done better by him, though they did try to lean into much darker, thornier stuff with him when he came back in '93. I wonder what would've really happened if he'd stayed on to do more with Mia Korf's Blair, but I'll get to that. Loprieno was quoted from this period by someone on here as saying he figured it'd be the same old cycle with Cord, Tina and yet another interloper and that's why he left, but with this new regime I'm not so sure. (Especially since they may have intended for Cord and KDP's Blair to be endgame in '94, before Todd became a thing.) Malone II had even more OTT special episodes and fantasy interludes like these, but the budget crunch and tonal whiplash in the early 2000s made them far more cringe than a lot of these ones I remember from the early '90s. This Tina stuff is silly but harmless so far.

I was not expecting Joe Lando to have even more block-taped stuff in this period, as he gets several segments being detained and imprisoned by cartoonish Middle Eastern baddies (with turbans and everything) at an international airport after working security for a shady Japanese businessman. He's on for at least several days and gets pawed by a kinky German dominatrix torturer (named "Ilsa"!!) with a riding crop. Hey, why not?

A random sidenote: It's interesting to flash-forward to August '94 for Jason Webb's exit early in that month, and his very tender exit scenes with Robin's Dorian as he announces he's closing Wanda's Place (a fixture in the earlier '90s) down. Robin was very good with him, at least as good as Princi; I'd forgotten that, as I hadn't revisited a lot of this summer '94 period with the silly virus story and Susan Gibney's evil hospital administrator since it first aired I was a kid. I do wish they'd done a bit more of Robin paired with Mark Brettschneider. In a lot of ways I increasingly feel Jason was this team's first draft of what Todd Manning became, albeit a much more benevolent character at core. Once Todd was ascendant Jason was sadly an also-ran.

It is nice to see everyone throw him a Goodbye Jason party.

Edited August 6Aug 6 by Vee

7 hours ago, Vee said:

A random sidenote: It's interesting to flash-forward to August '94 for Jason Webb's exit early in that month, and his very tender exit scenes with Robin's Dorian as he announces he's closing Wanda's Place (a fixture in the earlier '90s) down. Robin was very good with him, at least as good as Princi; I'd forgotten that, as I hadn't revisited a lot of this summer '94 period with the silly virus story and Susan Gibney's evil hospital administrator since it first aired I was a kid. I do wish they'd done a bit more of Robin paired with Mark Brettschneider. In a lot of ways I increasingly feel Jason was this team's first draft of what Todd Manning became, albeit a much more benevolent character at core. Once Todd was ascendant Jason was sadly an also-ran.

It is nice to see everyone throw him a Goodbye Jason party.

His friendship with Marty could also play into that transition.

I guess it may be more down to Jason being written into a corner and most of those close to him being gone or moved into new plots (they were not going to get anything out of Dorian/Jason compared to what they got with Dorian's schemes to win Joey), but Malone preferring the oh-so-noble serial rapist is a dividing line for so many mistakes.

Darlene Vogel, aka Dr. Melanie McIver, Lindsay Rappaort's sister and ex-wife of Colin McIver, has gotten a fair share of bad press recently over her controversial, viral, remarks at a recent Santa Monica City Council Meeting.  She was opposing the construction of a government-assisted public housing project being built in Santa Monica.  Part of her argument was that when she worked on OLTL, she didn't make enough salary to live in Manhattan, and could only afford a rat-infested apartment in Queens.  BUT, she proudly tells the council, that she never asked for government assistance while under contract at One Life to Live.  🙄

Understandably, Ms. Vogel's tone-deaf remarks have gotten some push back (and most of those people didn't even have to sit through the whole McIver family mishagoss on OLTL)

 

Edited August 7Aug 7 by j swift

4 minutes ago, j swift said:

Darlene Vogel, aka Dr. Melanie McIver, Lindsay Rappaort's sister and ex-wife of Colin McIver, has gotten a fair share of bad press recently over her controversial, viral, remarks at a recent Santa Monica City Council Meeting.  She was opposing the construction of a government-assisted public housing project being built in Santa Monica.  Part of her argument was that when she worked on OLTL, she didn't make enough salary to live in Manhattan, and could only afford a rat-infested apartment in Queens.  BUT, she proudly tells the council, that she never asked for government assistance while under contract at One Life to Live.  

I can see where this probably wasn't suited for where are they now...

I hadn't thought of her in a long time. That period in the early '00s where OLTL seemed to be casting actors who would be best suited to softcore.

(not to disparage Pacific Blue)

I wonder if she or Paige was a more unpopular Bo love interest.                                             

42 minutes ago, DRW50 said:

I wonder if she or Paige was a more unpopular Bo love interest.                                             

That's a real turn on the gun on myself moment. I would argue Paige by a nose.

4 minutes ago, Vee said:

I would argue Paige by a nose.

Must we specify which Paige; either by actress, or sudden character turn?

The character changed motives more often than she changed faces. 🙄

Edited August 7Aug 7 by j swift

25 minutes ago, j swift said:

Must we specify which Paige; either by actress, or sudden character turn?

The closest that came to sticking IMO was Cady Huffman's Paige, who the show breathlessly touted as 'Broadway star Cady Huffman' while trying to play her heavily as a screwball, fun Blonde Nora as HBS/Nora lingered in a long contract coma that very nearly got her killed off before she intervened via the network. Those were grim times.

Alexandra Neil lasted the longest but she was a dishrag and was never going to be a hit.

Talk about three completely different actresses being cast to play Paige Miller.

I recall seeing Kimberlin playing Paige in one or two episodes.. and her take on the character was more intense and tortured... and I heard that Cady was vastly different..

It's sad that Alexandra Neil never really found a role as interesting and fun as her part on Texas (such a shame really)... but it didn't help that she played her last three roles (Rose, Dawn, and Paige) as insipid instead of trying to infuse those characters with a bit of spunk/edge