Aw, somebody did some editing because their facts of Life weren't correct.

Bump! For the love of God!

Wow, all this time I thought I started watching GL full-time in February 1997 because of the riveting Reva/Josh/Annie triangle, but I was wrong! I actually started watching because I knew of Ehlers' impending arrival in May 1997. I had a premonition that our Springfield savior was on her way back, so I started watching 3 months early to familiarize myself with all those other nonsense characters. And clearly I wasn't the only one awaiting Ehlers' return! Remember when GL spiked up in June to a 4.6 rating? It had nothing to do with that pesky lil' trial where Annie broke down on the witness stand. No, it was because Harley was back in town, helping out at the diner, grilling Jenna about her so-called marriage to Jeffrey Morgan! Captivating material indeed.

Bless you, my child.

Well Mitch, I suggest you go back and look at all the episode counts and number of scenes and lengths of scenes and you'll find out that Ehlers did not have the airtime you claim. You are right about Zimmer though. Zimmer had to be front-burner all the time. Zimmer had to have the #1 story line at all times or she would go to the magazines and complain that she wasn't on. God forbid if Zimmer was on less than 4 episodes for even one week or we'd see the blaring headlines on magazine covers saying she wasn't being written for. Zimmer always loved her storylines, no matter how ridiculous they were, until the fan backlash. Then, she would trash the writers. She trashed all the writers. You are forgetting how easy it was for Curlee/Demorest. They didn't have to deal with Zimmer after Zimmer left in mid-1990. Zimmer didn't return until 1995 when she failed to boost GL's anemic, all-time low ratings. Actually, GL was cancelled in 1995 or 1996 but P&G threatened to never advertise on CBS again if they didn't change their mind. So GL lasted another 13-14 more years than it should have. By the way, who did you watch GL for, since you practically named most of the cast you weren't a crazed fan of?

I watched for the whole show and how the "community," and families delt with their problems. I did not watch for any particular "couple." I liked a lot of the characters, including Harley, by themselves and in couples, but I was never wed to the idea that they could not break up any couple. Hell, if soaps had that mindset years ago ATWT would have gone out with Bob and Lisa together!

As I said, I liked Harley, with Phillip (and actually liked her with Rick...she was always more calm with him and he stopped acting as goofy with her) the original Mallet, and I liked part of Gus, until they had to twist themselves to make him a Spaulding (he worked better as a total outsider.) Harley as the tough survivor and then the everyday kind of person who didnt have the best of luck worked great, as soon as she became THE romantic heroine of the show that no one could resist.

And I dont have the time or the energy (or the inclination) to go through tapes and to time how much airtime the actresses got. I agree, Zimmer was on way too long and way past her expiration date. At this point and time Reva should have been acting as support, not THE star.

My point is that the show went from an ensemble show to a show about the latest supercouple and the evil inflicted on them from others, (for Gush it was Phllip, Alex and Alan) which GL and the P & G shows were never about. Whomever that couple was, be it Jeva, Gush, Manny or Rassie, we saw too much of them, they turned into cartoons (or in Harley's case, an unpleasent shrew) and just got boring.

we saw too much of them, they turned into cartoons (or in Harley's case, an unpleasent shrew) and just got boring.

She also turned into a superhero!

Leave TV4Me alone, she knows what she's talking about! However, one quibble. Because she was so young looking and beautiful Beth was originally hired to play the dual roles of Liza and Colby. It fell through because AMC didn't have the budget for all the makeup it would take to make Beth look like she was 40 to be believable in the Liza role.

:lol:

Leave TV4Me alone, she knows what she's talking about! However, one quibble. Because she was so young looking and beautiful Beth was originally hired to play the dual roles of Liza and Colby. It fell through because AMC didn't have the budget for all the makeup it would take to make Beth look like she was 40 to be believable in the Liza role.

LMFAO.

Lmao at the entire last 3 pages of this thread.

I still say the queen of daytime should do quadruple duty and star on Y&R, B&B, DAYS, and GH at the same time. We need a soap savior, and the female half of the Most Irresistable Combination Emmy Award winner is just the person to do that! Who needs Linda Dano to soap hop? La Lucci who? No, it's definitely Harley super-duper-pooper-sCooper that will save this dying genre. Praise be to Beth, Ehlered be thy name.

Zimmer even stated she took pay cuts. She just baled having to do so in the middle of an existing deal. Dont see anything wrong with that

I still say the queen of daytime should do quadruple duty and star on Y&R, B&B, DAYS, and GH at the same time. We need a soap savior, and the female half of the Most Irresistable Combination Emmy Award winner is just the person to do that! Who needs Linda Dano to soap hop? La Lucci who? No, it's definitely Harley super-duper-pooper-sCooper that will save this dying genre. Praise be to Beth, Ehlered be thy name.

We shall bow down to the one, true thespian. The goddess of dramatic acting... the woman who humbly and effortlessly brought Shakespeare to Daytime Television -- while the others were "doing something else."

BE had tons of airtime in her second stint on GL. From her return in January 1997 to her departure in June 2008, she appeared in 1540 episodes. Only the Shayne sisters, Reva (1647) and Cassie (1579), were on more than Harley.

Once RPG came along in 2001, only Cassie (at 1055) had more airdates than Harley (1026), who had 27 more than Reva (999). Reva had almost 50 more than Harley in 2001, BE was on maternity leave that year, but after she returned, she had more episodes than KZ for five of the next six years. She had 150 or more airdates during three of those years and 148 during a fourth year. 150 appearances a year isn't high on an ABC soap where having a few characters appearing over 200 times a year is the norm but 150 appearances by a few characters (like Harley, Gus, Cassie, or Jonathan) on a P&G soap throws the whole show completely off-balance.

The years where Harley had 150+ appearances included her romance with Gus, her shooting and it's aftermath, Gus's paternity, her non-wedding to Gus, her plot against the Spauldings, her murder trial, and her escape from prison and life on the run, so she was very much frontburner from 2002-2005. She was rarely on "for five minutes" during those years. If there are actual stats to show otherwise, I'd love to see them because I was watching and she seemed pretty ubiquitous.

BE did have a dual roll, Ruth Karlof. She wore a fat suit, prosthetic nose, bad wig and everything.

Edited February 24, 201213 yr by RoseVioletDaisy

What's the count for 2002? That's the year the show's numbers sank from the 3.0's into the 2.0's....

Maybe we should blame Joan Collins.

Oh Lawd, do you remember when Harley pretended to be Alexandra Spaulding? That was painful.

LOL...on that pic. Kreizman's great idea for a storyline, have Harley go undercover at Spaulding working directly for Phillip who was no dummy! Except it had been done before, with that exact same makeup with Brent/Marion!!!

Wait, when and how did Harley try to impersonate Alex????

Rauch hated Ehlers didnt he? How did she get so much airtime?

Still say her best role was as sharp, shrewd, shrewish and unpleasant Irna Phillips!!!

Edited February 24, 201213 yr by Mitch