Favorite Head Writer

[EnglishTea]

My convo was after the announcement of AMC impending cancellation, so he was a little more free with BTS, but I really only had time for a quick quiz. A few more tidbits that I can remember. He seemed disappointed with the results of Maria's return, noting his love of JB and EL - his no comment comment on JC spoke volumes. He couldn't believe how domestic Tad/Dixie had become, and Vanessa was the linchpin he used to try and tie up the mess he walked into, and while I do think there were a lot of dropped/loose end story also created during that time - his attempt to fix the show was still better than what we had been watching under Passante. Unfortunately, just as his stories were finally firing on all cylinders, he was let go.

[EricMontreal22]

Interesting, thanks!~ I definitely agree with your take on his stories.

[cassadine1991]

It's kind a shame all of his tenures as HW only lasted several months to about a year.

[KMan101]

Excellent post.

I agree about Avila in terms of RH, I do often forget it but he was just as much a part of it.

I've never hated Brown & Esensten, I just don't think they've ever been all that terribly exciting. I didn't mind their GL, though I really didn't like 1998 all that much. I liked what I saw of their Loving, for the most part.

That's true about the Frons interference with Malone. Like I've said, it'd be nice to see some of these writers without the so called interference.

Pretty close to how I feel. I love and appreciate his style but it sometimes doesn't always grab me. A storyline will. Characters will. I did like Kay Alden's time at Y&R and was a fan, though not a daily watcher. Jack Smith kind of drove me away though I can't remember exactly what it was between 03-05 to make me not really all that interested anymore.

I also don't mind Brad Bell, though he makes some horrific choices, he isn't afraid to be um ... daring? LOL. I think he's awful with balancing a canvas and he gets a bug up his butt for someone and six months later, if not sooner, he loses interest. He's just all over the place but when B&B is working, it WORKS and there were several periods when I was a fan. It's just hard to invest in watching with his storyline ADD.

And I thought Carlivati had potential back in the day but I have no idea what happened to him. What a god awful mess he's become. He got me back into OLTL in 2007-2008. It quickly went downhill after the strike. I haven't liked much of what he's done at all since. He had a few brief storylines at GH where I saw glimpses (Faison, AJ) but he's just way too messy and all over the place. I can't with his 600 new characters and piss poor focus.

But yeah, Nixon is prety much it for me. And Loving intrigues the hell out of me. I wish I could see good chunks of it and not just some clips and if we're lucky, a full episode. I just love the formats of how she sets up her soaps.

EDIT:

I also liked Donna Swajeski's AW. I guess it was pretty basic but to me the show just really gelled. It featured the right cast, IMO, and everything pretty much worked. Was it riveting and totally amazing? Not really but I thought it was good soap, when I watched the SoapNet reruns and then the episodes that were posted online.

[JackPeyton]

With every HW i have parts I loved and hated. I would say that donna swajeski's AW, claire l's GH and JER's first DAYS run would be my top three soaps under specific HWs though. In that order.

[jfung79]

EnglishTea, I am jealous that you got to speak to Richard Culliton! What was the occasion -- can I ask?

EricMontreal22, I liked Proteus as a framework for characters to interact with each other. I don't think it was planned out to the end ahead of time, but I don't think it needed to be to serve its purpose either. I didn't think it was that confusing; they just kept adding more to it. And they expected you to keep up with the changes -- miss a day, miss a lot -- a bit like the PP soaps. They didn't devote time to repetition for people who were fast forwarding or skipping days.

KMan101, the drug story on GH was more of a social issue story, while Proteus was more of a fun (though grim at points too) adventure and a catalyst to explore characters' conflicts and relationships in the Hayward/Stone/duPres family. I think it's just coincidence the stories both involved drugs. I believe Passanante had already started something about drugs when she left.

Thanks to the people who commented that they read and liked my long post. I've loved reading everyone's soap writer insights too!

[NothinButAttitude]

I'm a Manny fan but not as hardcore as some of them were. Again, I only preferred Manny 1.0. Version 2.0 was still good but I wouldn't consider myself a stan for them.

[y&r_fan]

Y&R: Bill Bell, Kay Alden, Jack Smith and Josh Griffith

B&B: Brad Bell with Jack Smith as story consultant

[teplin]

Harding Lemay stands head and shoulders above the rest for me. What he did with AW has never been duplicated on any other soap -- literate, sophisticated, heartfelt and never condescending to the audience. I watch some snippets of his Mac and Rachel on YouTube occasionally and I still marvel at the realness and the rawness of that relationship, especially when they're at odds. And I've never enjoyed a character as much as I have the Lemay-McKinsey version of Iris. Even the few weeks he came back as AW headwriter in 1988 were magical, even if just for the scenes in which Rachel and Sharlene clashed.

Henry Slesar comes closest to Lemay -- his work has never been duplicated on daytime, either. Just masterful plotting intertwined with wonderful character work. I really liked the Dobsons' work on Santa Barbara (after the show's initial growing pains), Pam Long's writing on Texas and GL, Claire Labine's Ryan's Hope and GH, and Pat Falken Smith's Days of our Lives. I loved Bill Bell's Days and admired, but didn't much like, his Y&R. I loved much of Malone's initial OLTL stint but was crushingly disappointed by his AW (though I blame much of that on TPTB).

[EricMontreal22]

For anyone interested, I just posted a bunch of older articles I had saved from a (now gone?) Malone website--reprinting various soap and legit press reviews and interviews about Malone's work on OLTL in the 90s and, briefly, his year run at AW. It's in the OLTL Canceled Soaps thread

[cassadine1991]

Awesome I'll take a look at those

[Vee]

I thought a lot of Malone's run in the '90s post-Griffith was still very good - the DID stuff, Todd/Blair and Patrick/Marty, Antonio and Andy, etc. There were excesses, but I still loved a great deal of it. It helped that there was a strong EP at the time, though ultimately both Horgan and Malone lost their footing and took the fall at the new post-Disney ABC.

I think the new AMC has a lot of Agnes in it still, as she's still apparently very involved. I can see a lot of her themes and recurring ideas in that material especially - Billy Clyde, the Cortlandts, Celia, the young lovers, A.J. and Miranda - not entirely unlike something like Loving. There have been indications from the OLTL cast that she had also re-involved herself there at that show for the first time in many years, but I don't know where to look for it beyond perhaps some of the stuff with Danielle and Matthew and their families, but that's just a guess. Curious.

I loved Richard Culliton's run at AMC, though it was a bit of a mess. It was the last time the show was truly any good until it left ABC, IMO, beyond a few brief spurts here and there in the ensuing years and then some of the final months on ABC.

I'd heard somewhere that May Merisi the cigarette girl on GL was supposed to have been Quint and Nola's daughter Stacey. Okay.

[DRW50]

It was. Supposedly Lisa Brown was asked to return as Nola, and (understandably IMO) refused.

[Pine Charles]

Wisner Washam

[full hearts]

Bill Bell and Kay Alden.