Frontburner to Footnote

[Darn]

I was thinking about those long gone characters that at the time completely or nearly monopolized a show, or at least had consistent frontburner story lines but are now essentially forgotten or footnotes in a show's history. Whether that's due to actor exits or regime changes.

For example Courtney Matthews on GH, for a time she, Jason, Sonny and Carly were seemingly the only characters with stories on the show. They WERE the show, no other characters could claim star status because almost everything revolved around them and the things that didn't felt like filler until we got back to them. Now Jason, Sonny and Carly are still around but you'd be hard pressed to find a viewer that remembers Courtney fondly. I know that her ghost or whatever was brought back but the three characters closest to her rarely discussed her once she was out of their sphere and certainly not much once she died.

Another example I can think of is Amber from B&B, at one point she rivaled Brooke as the show's leading lady, but a new viewer might be surprised that Rick was married before Maya.

And if this topic already exists, my bad.

[Vee]

JFP tried to do this with Roy DiLucca and Melissa for over a year on GH. Now no one knows who they are.

To a lesser extent, Téa on OLTL certainly had a substantial role before getting completely backburnered and then disappeared under JFP, then, amazingly, reversed the cycle almost ten years later.

These are lame examples, I don't know why I'm not thinking bigger right now. Babe on AMC? No, they remembered her. Katherine Bell on GH!

[Michael]

Days has quite a few of these.

A recent one is Sarah Brown's Madison, who was frontburner for the entire year she was on, but aside from passing references to how Brady has lost women he loved, she hasn't been mentioned by name in at least two years. Her company, Mad World, is still around as the counterpoint to Countess W, but no one ever talks about who founded it or brought it to Salem.

I'm sure Jordan "Tammy Sue" Ridgeway will wind up the same way. She was around for over a year and a half, thrust into what was supposed to be a hot romance with Rafe, and even though she's only been gone a few months and her brother, stepfather, and two ex-boyfriends are still on the show, she's already almost forgotten.

[Cruising Soaps]

Jill Foster Fenmore Abbott Atkinson

[Darn]

If only we could forget f*ucking Babe. And while I appreciated what JFP was trying to do by giving Bobbie a frontburner story rooted in history...that was not it. All I remember about Melissa is that she wore a lot of white and that they built a nice new apartment set for her (that I believe was later used for someone else). Oh and she played Angle of Death at the hospital in her exit story.

It's kind of crazy that they wrote out the character that they brought other characters on to prop. Days devoted a lot of time to Hope's slampiece after Bo like 10 years ago? I remember the guy went from the coffee guy at Y&R to Hope's boytoy on Days. It was not a good fit.

Yeah I'm thinking more of characters that ultimately mean nothing to the history of the show, their time spent didn't impact the show in any meaningful way but when they were on they were on. Every day. All the time.

[SoapDope]

On Y&R 1973-1982 the Fosters/Brooks. The vast majority of current Y&R viewers have no knowledge and could care less about those characters or pretty much anything pre 1990's.

[Vee]

That was not her plan. She wanted to ship Bobbie off to Ferncliff and coronate Melissa as the new heroine of the show alongside Roy (and did, for months). Tony Geary intervened to save JZ.

[Darn]

Bill Bell masterfully got rid of half his show's history and acted like it never existed. Bow.

Oh...that's gross. And weird.

[SFK]

Ceara Connor

[Bright Eyes]

DAYS: Susan Hunter Martin Peters. Denise Alexander's version only.

[DRW50]

About 4 years ago on Coronation Street, then-producer Phil Collinson brought in a friend of his, Michelle Collins, who had done a lot of primetime and a big Eastenders role but had become something of a backnumber. Her character, Stella, became the show's central force, making her the long-lost mother of a longtime character, having her buy the show's pub, and having every character come to her for advice (if a woman had been raped, she'd also been raped; if a woman had been beaten, she'd also been beaten). The nadir was when Betty Turpin, a barmaid who'd been on the show for over 40 years, died, and her funeral became about Stella's tears over how close they were...even though they never even met oncamera, as the actress had passed away before Stella arrived.

Some fans changed the name of the show to "Stellanation Street" and wrote mocking "Stella Week" posts detailing a special week of episodes that would be all about Stella reacting to any and every incident on the Street.

After Collinson left, the next producer almost immediately took the Rovers from her and significantly backburnered her until her contract was up, and she left, with Collins making some very annoyed comments to the press as she went.

Her two daughters are still on the show, so she is sometimes mentioned, but otherwise it's as if she never existed.

[Soapsuds]

Connor Walsh Felicia Behr version….she became a non existent business woman….weak and total wimp of a character…didn't even resemble the character…

[titan1978]

We are talking drove story hard for one or two contracts then hardly mentioned since?

GH-

Terri Brock

Blackie Parrish

Anne Logan

Diana Taylor (I don't think Heather ever mentioned her)

Celia Quartermain

Jimmy Lee

Hannah

Angel

Whatever Alexis' sisters name was

Matt

These are just off the top of my head!

[DaytimeFan]

I had to laugh hard at that because it was true! Whatever happened to anyone on Corrie had already happened to Stella. I do like Michelle Collins and when Stella confronted Sinitta it was fun to watch - but the character was a dismal placeholder for Liz McDonald.

[DRW50]

I don't mind Michelle either (although they should have let her use her natural accent), but it just wasn't a good fit.

I don't know if they've already been mentioned, but I'd also have to mention some of the younger GL and ATWT heroines of the '60s or '70s, like Carol on ATWT and Peggy on GL. Peggy was the teenage face of the show in the '60s and then became more known as Roger's wife before slowly fading out by 1979. Carol was probably one of the few popular ingenues ATWT had after Penny Hughes, but had a quiet exit around 1982 after her husband Steve had become heavy in story with the current popular ingenue, Betsy Stewart.