I didn't find that apartment that awful. Looked pretty spacious actually.

Seemed to be a bit of ad libbing b/w Leslie and Laura. Gloria allowed that.

'Hospltal'intrlgue behlnd-the-scenes by Gary Deeb.

COURIER-EXPRESS WEEK OF OCT. 18 to OCT. 24 1981

Patricia Falken Smith  is mad as hell, and she intends to take it out on her former bosses - the producer of "General Hospital" and the ABC daytime program executives who preside over that enormously popular soap opera.

As reported here recently, Falken Smith was the head writer for "General Hospital" for 2 1/2 years through last month. But in the wake of a series of disagreements with "GH" producer Gloria Monty, Falken Smith and her entire writing staff have departed that program and now are toiling on the storyline for the rival NBC soap .'"Days of Our Lives."

Monty's office said Falken Smith was fired; Falken Smith, however, insists that she got tired of working for Monty and simply quit on her own. In fact, Falken Smith is so upset by what she believes is a deliberate attempt by Monty and ABC daytime vice president Jacqueline Smith to embarrass her that she's making noises about suing them unless they both publicly declare that her leaving "General Hospital" was a genuine resignation rather than a firing.

"I won't be maligned by these two crummy broads," Falken smith told this column fired. I made this ----- show No. 1, but they've done nothing but scheme to keep me and my staff from getting the credit we deserve. We took those corny, awful plots that Gloria and Jackie dreamed up and we turned the show around.

'But now, because their stupid science-fiction storyline was such a drag all summer, they're trying to blame it on me. Well, that . .. (bad) writing all summer wasn't mine. It was created by the scab writers who worked last spring during the writers' strike, which I honored. I'm a very strong union person. I refuse to scab during a strike. And that's what got me in trouble with those two insecure broads. When I came back to the show on July 15 after the strike, they dumped all over me and made life miserable for me. ''So I quit - and then they put out the word that I got fired.

All I know is I'm now the head writer on 'Days of Our Lives'; my entire staff of writers came over here with me; and I look forward to and watching 'General Hospital sink into oblivion." And folks, that's the sort of anger, skullduggery and personal intrigue that frequently makes life behind the scenes on a soap opera infinitely more electrifying than what winds up on the screen itself.

 

Thanks @Paul Raven Pat was certainly a colorful character. She wasn't entirely far off, as the show fell apart without her and they were lucky they had enough excess viewers to cushion the blow until things turned around. Yet she never seemed very easy to work with. 

I wonder what stories Pat would have told if she'd stayed. 

Is the strike period seen as being bad for GH (in quality, not ratings)? I suppose we can blame the Ice Princess for lots of trash to follow, but my guess is that was coming from some soap, strike or no strike.

15 hours ago, Paul Raven said:

I didn't find that apartment that awful. Looked pretty spacious actually.

Seemed to be a bit of ad libbing b/w Leslie and Laura. Gloria allowed that.

Spacious? Sure. But it’s pretty rough around the edges. No gas, and that sticking door was a recurring issue from stuff I have seen. It’s not awful though. But it doesn’t seem as nice as the apartments above Kelly’s, and that for a long time has been the classic poor person lodging in PC.

Courier Express, 26 April 1982

Writer says Malpractice Harms General Hospital by Gary Deeb

John William Corrington is a respected novelist and scholar. He's also one of television's best writers of daytime soap opera. Partnered with his wife Joyce, Corrington was the creator and headwriter of "Texas" and the head writer of "Search for Tomorrow."

And until this week, the Corringtons were the newly installed head writers of ''General Hospital" (3 p.m. Monday through Friday, Chs. 7 and 11 in the Buffalo area). The overheated and trouble plagued ABC soap has been losing viewers by the ton for the last few months, and the husband and wife team had hired to pump some spirit into serial that had lost most of its energy. But after only three months at the writing helm of ''General Hospital," the Corringtons have called it quits.

In Chicago for a speaking engagement at Roosevelt University, Corrington said he's frustrated by the constant meddling of ABC bureaucrats and fed up with "having to be an administrator instead of a writer." So as the Corringtons wrap it up and head home to New Orleans, they join the long parade of writers who have shuffled in and out of "GH" since last summer.

Once among the most spectacular moneymakers in TV history, 'General Hospital" now is in very deep trouble. As reported here in recent weeks, the show is creatively bankrupt and has lost a staggering 3.5 million viewers since Christmastime. That represents nearly 25 per- ' cent of the program's former viewership, and many observers believe it's only a matter of months before "GH" gets bumped off its four-year joyride atop the daytime audience ratings.

As a result, ABC executives are panicking. Corrington describes them as "frothing with madness" at the prospect that the $150 million a year in net profits generated by "GH" may be in jeopardy. ''You can't imagine how desperate things are," Corrington said. "'For the last three months, the writing has been the worst crap in the world, and the show is totally out of control."

That candid admission should come as no surprise to anybody who has tried to follow "GH" since last fall, when actress Genie Francis - who played the part of Laura Spencer -- announced that she was leaving the soap to work for CBS. Suddenly, producer Gloria Monty had to dream up a way to get rid of the pivotal character of Laura, whose storybook romance with Luke Spencer, played by Tony Geary, had been the key to catapulting "CH" to dizzying heights of popularity and media hype. The trouble was, nobody could agree on how Laura should be done away with.

So to buy time, the program "vamped" for months, forcing the writers and actors to dance around the unexplained disappearance of the lead female character. First, Luke and Laura were hexed by a vague "curse" (delivered by Elizabeth Taylor in a foolish cameo role); later a mysterious stranger with hypnotic powers arrived on the scene, and Laura disappeared; and then a lookalike for Laura (also named Laura) popped up to confuse things even further.

During this time, the show's writers were ordered to churn out daily scripts and to keep everything up in the air until Monty and ABC could get their act together and agree on a coherent storyline. When Corrington proposed his own plausible scenario to explain Laura's demise, he said he was shot down without explanation. As things now stand, Corrington said, Laura's death will be explained away simply as "an unfortunate accident,"" totally ignoring all those red herrings "GH" has been dishing out for months.

Even Jackie Smith, ABC's vice president for daytime programs, is enraged at the idea of such a cop-out and finds it creatively unacceptable. But the bungling of the Laura story is only one of the many problems Corrington encountered during his three-month stint on "GH." Most of the scriptwriters who worked under him, he said, are "incompetent hacks who aren't worthy of writing on used toilet paper." Because producer Monty was out of action for several weeks because of surgery, "production of the whole show fell frantically behind schedule and has never recovered."

Thanks @Paul Raven

I wonder if anything the Corringtons did there stuck. 

Did that "unfortunate accident" excuse actually make it to air? 

Interesting to see Liz Taylor's cameo derided as I think time has looked back on it kindly. I guess it didn't help that so much around then involved silly press speculation about Liz and Tony Geary being a couple.

Doug Marland, Pat Falken Smith and John Corrington have all spoken against Gloria Monty. Seems she didn't accommodate writers too well. At least not those who wanted more autonomy.

Jackie Smith also seemed difficult at times.

That story where Doug Marland went into a meeting with Agnes Nixon..

I remember meeting Agnes Nixon downstairs at the  elevator  because Agnes was a consultant for all the shows on ABC and it was the week General Hospital hit number one solid-- wiped everything else out.  The fact that this once  pathetic show was the solid number show was like victory--this was the first story meeting I haven't dreaded.

Agnes said, “Don't be too sure.” I said "What can they say,  we're number one?” Jackie Smith came in , she's a half-hour late, and her opening remarks were, "We're in terrible trouble.”  I that couldn't believe it. Her maid that morning had said that the Laura, Bobbie, Scotty thing was boring, she didn't like it --all our eggs are in that basket. I said, "It was the basket that brought us here.” She said, I “Yes, now we have to find ways to stay there."

"I said the story isn't even over yet." I couldn't believe it. Agnes was totally right.  She winked at me from across the room. There is an incredible instinct to panic. I have not found that at all with P & G."

 

Thanks @Paul Ravenfor those gems. I love hearing about Gloria Monty. I remember several cast members saying that she always wore high heels that made lots of noise when she walked (she was on the short side) and they could hear her coming a mile away and when she came out of the booth onto the studio floor with her heels clicking very fast, they knew someone was gonna get yelled at. lol

Monty was at heart at director in a writer’s medium. She knew so well how to get the performance she wanted that it didn’t matter how strong the writing was during that time. I know that is a terrible way to make a soap. I think her show was at its strongest when she had talented writers- Marland and especially Pat Falken Smith, who returned to the show under Monty and created Anna, Robin, Duke, Lucy Coe, etc.

The performers and how she put the show together, especially casting, kept it at the top of the ratings even during bad writing. The whole DVX/WSB story with the original Grant Putnam story was a horrible mess. But people loved Celia Quartermaine and Jimmy Lee, so they watched. Holly kept Luke afloat before Laura returned, and was incredibly popular with Robert. The less said about David Grey the better. In hindsight, from the moment Laura disappeared on the docks until the climax of the David Grey story the show was a mess. How they stayed at number one during that truly shocks me, especially back then when the competition was so strong. GH is lucky Y&R hadn’t gelled into its hour long groove yet.

She wanted to change soaps, at least her corner of them, but she did come to that from a history of directing soaps for a long time before she got to GH. She knew the medium, and she pushed GH to the edges of the medium. JFP learned the behaviors working for her, especially about her instincts and ignoring writers, but she lacked the skill and taste to still make it something the greater audience wanted to watch. She was there for Monty 1.0, but her work from Guiding Light on was more in line with Monty 2.0

1 hour ago, TEdgeofNight said:

Thanks @Paul Ravenfor those gems. I love hearing about Gloria Monty. I remember several cast members saying that she always wore high heels that made lots of noise when she walked (she was on the short side) and they could hear her coming a mile away and when she came out of the booth onto the studio floor with her heels clicking very fast, they knew someone was gonna get yelled at. lol

Many of them have PTSD from the sound of her heels coming down the stairs and onto the stage floor!

Thanks @Paul Ravenfor posting these articles! I love reading anything about that era. And while they eventually recovered (although not to the heights of Luke and Laura mania), I like the mention that losing Laura was such a destabilizer. So maybe Luke wasn’t the whole show? I say that with sarcasm firmly in place. They have always made that mistake with Genie since that time IMO.

Pat Falken Smith was credited as the "story editor" on the first 13 episodes of Bonanza in 1959-1960. That show was run by a particularly strong minded producer too. Maybe that's one of the reasons why she lasted only 13 episodes with that show?

Is it the consensus that creatively GH was a mess in 1981 and 1982, but by 1983 it was back to being very watchable, with 1983 being their best year quality-wise since 1980? 

Edited October 26Oct 26 by Jdee43

8 hours ago, Jdee43 said:

Pat Falken Smith was credited as the "story editor" on the first 13 episodes of Bonanza in 1959-1960. That show was run by a particularly strong minded producer too. Maybe that's one of the reasons why she lasted only 13 episodes with that show?

She was Bill Bell’s protege at DAYS, for a long time before he left for Y&R. He isn’t exactly know for being weak minded. I think she is a very complex person, and what happened to her at DAYS after he was gone probably made her very angry. And that’s before she starts battling with Monty.

As far as when they recovered storywise, by 1983 they had Holly firmly in place and her story with falling in love with Robert while Luke was presumed dead, that year had who killed Susan Moore, Bobbie with DL Brock, Jimmy Lee Holt and Celia’s arrival. The DVX storyline was described as convoluted so they were not out of the woods yet. But other than the spy stuff, the show backed away from the more outlandish plots like cursed swords and freezing the world. And the year ends with Laura’s return and Luke leaving with her.

For me, the show may still be very watchable, but the stories don’t get good again until Pat Falken Smith returned in 1985. She created Anna, her backstory with Robert, Robin, and the show has actual stories again.

On 10/24/2025 at 12:49 AM, Paul Raven said:

"I won't be maligned by these two crummy broads," Falken smith

Her writing may have been convoluted, but her quotes are sublime.

Also, you have to laugh thinking of the poor Corringtons being hired. Then, production points to Brian Patrick Clarke, and instruct them to write a story where he is a Russian spy.

But, I guess they created David Grey, the blue-eyed guy who kidnapped Laura.  And wasn't he mentioned within the past few years during the Martin/Cyrus storyline?  [note] - went to go search it, Martin/Cyrus are related to Gordon Grey, not David.

Edited October 26Oct 26 by j swift

Another favorite Monty/Falken Smith real life story is that when the writers strike of ‘81 happened, Monty met with Thom Racina to write the show and allegedly Monty told him that “the bitch (Falken Smith) won’t tell me what the Ice Princess is”. I love it! Who knows if that is true because that is suggesting that the writer had power over the story and didn’t get approval first.