2012: The Directors and Writers Thread

[Toups]

Yes, JG/JFP did bring BB to Y&R.

[Toups]

Inside The Writers Room: October Edition

[LondonScribe]

IIRC, reaction to Lisa Seidman's initial stint (as a Script Writer, I believe) was lukewarm. I wonder if she will be better in this role. I don't know much about her past work or how she is regarded.

[Toups]

I don't think she has any kind of reputation, good or bad. She's never talked about.

[Khan]

I don't know how I feel about Brent Boyd being Y&R's new script editor. At least his predecessor, Beth Milstein, has experience working in daytime (although not much with Y&R).

[Y&RWorldTurner]

All I can say is I was never thrilled with her 2008 stint, her few episodes stood out, and not in the best of ways - I remember them being extra mundane.

She was also involved as a story consultant and writer in seasons of Dallas and Knots Landing that are not exactly looked on with any fondness by most fans.

But after 5 years of Maria and not being a daily viewer anymore, my expectations for this show are pretty low. Her episodes will have to be extremely awful and nonsensical to be judged as being worse than the current norm for this show is.

[sheilaforever]

Seidman was total sh*t on Y&R. Her dialogue was corny and felt like stolen from AMC... And this is NOT a compliment on my part. But maybe she's better working onlong-time projections?

I am bit more wrorried by the news that a total newcomer of the show is to oversee the sound of it as a script editor. My guess is that teh result deponds on how hands on Josh Griffith is, if he wants old-school dialogue or to youthen it up.

[Khan]

Which reminds me: what the hell is Amanda L. Beall still doing at Y&R? Surely, someone would have caught onto that inglorious hack by now?

[sheilaforever]

We better count our blessings 'cause with Seidman back Thom Racina could be right around the corner. He also delievered some "glorious" dialogue on Y&R...

[Toups]

Yeah, I'm not sure about this move either. Not only Boyd is new to the show, he's new to daytime. I would've preferred they given the job to Janice, who's done the job before, and has been with the show the longest and knows the show's history.

[Wales2004]

There isn't that much about him on imdb. He says he's good so that must count for something.

I am guessing that he will do better with the soap format than an 80 episode show. There were way too many of those "look how clever" moments than follow through for me, but I think with more time there will be more completions. His favorite episode of HH was filled with those kind of dramatic made for soap scenes which make you feel like something big is happening and it's good, but then if you look at how it came about in the bigger picture then it's more like a momentary thrill. Some people love that kind of thing but I prefer better pacing so that gimmicky scenes aren't necessary.

Repeating myself here but they basically sucked up the majority of their 80 episodes on a plot where it was revealed to the audience early on that the fiancee of the hero, killed his mother and injured his father in a car accident prior to becoming romantically involved with him. The character had no depth so she just seemed to be a gold digger who had a boyfriend on the side. Except for one flashback depicting the accident, they never showed her displaying any remorse. The break up came over her cheating and they left the mother killing out there the rest of the season. It was brought up as a means of starting a new story arc which made no sense. The show ended with the killer ex fiancee being dumped by her man on the side and this was supposed to be the payoff for all those endless mentions of what she did. That works if all she did was cheat on her ex but she killed his mother and the viewers were reminded of it regularly for no apparent reason.

The main problem seems to be a result of not pacing the stories well,, and not knowing when to sacrifice a brilliant idea for the sake of better storytelling so that cramming isn't necessary. I can't imagine him doing anything that terrible on Y&R. Since soaps are "never ending," pacing should not be an issue. He'll have time for every one of those awesome moments.

[frequentsoapfan]

At least he's been researching the history of the show unlike MAB who heard of storylines that impressed people and decided to recreate them badly.

[Chris B]

Her previous Y&R work wasn't any good, but I completely disagree with you about her work on Knots Landing and Dallas. She SAVED Knots Landing when John Romano ruined it during season 13. David Jacobs brought her in to take over that season and she completely salvaged the second half and also wrote a very good final season for them. She brought back an original cast member (Claudia Lonow as Diana), did a story honoring Laura's past and also serviced the newer characters well. She also gave them a damn good series finale. On Dallas she was HW for the final season which overall was a good season. By that point the cast had been run off, but I liked most of what she did not including the series finale which probably wasn't her fault.

I wish she were a part of the nuDallas writing staff though, as daytime doesn't seem a good fit for her. Has she had one daytime stint that lasted a fair amount of time?

[Y&RWorldTurner]

Wasn't it Ann Marcus who Jacobs brought in after the Romano disaster to steer the show? Seidman seemed to be brought on by someone at Lorimar after Dallas had ended its run, though Marcus seemed to be the one calling most of the creative shots. Season 14 wasn't as bad as season 13, but it wasn't that great either, IMO. Though Knots definitely ended in better shape comparatively than other primetime soaps did.

I hated the last season of Dallas, well more like the last 6 seasons, but it was never my cup of team in the first place.

[Chris B]

I forgot about Ann Marcus! I know Ann and Lisa co-wrote the Knots Landing reunion film, but I'm not sure what Ann's role was in the season 13-14 revamp, if they were both Co-HWs or what.