The Holy Grail of Soap Collecting

[Khan]

I'd do just about anything to see Douglas Marland's entire run at GH, or Pat Falken Smith's first run at DAYS.

[titan1978]

I would love to see broadcast quality episodes from Marland’s run too.  I would love to see a week of episodes just prior to Marland/Monty leading into it, just so I could see the transition happen.

[Khan]

 

Same.  As bad as it probably was back then, it's probably Shakespeare compared to today's GH.

[mikelyons]

The P&G episodes from the 50s thru mid-60s fell into the public domain in the mid-60s or early-70s because P&G never filed the correct paperwork on their shows during the grace period for shows which never filed their initial copyright paperwork. Moreover, the P&G soaps were never owned by the company from the beginning. ATWT was owned by Irna Phillips, Agnes Nixon, and Ted Corday and every year P&G paid them a set fee of a total sale price until that was paid off and they acquired the show from the three owners; the same happened with AW (which was owned by Irna & Bill Bell). One can only assume the original owners filed the copyright forms and then by the time P&G became aware of it, it was too late. 

[Marco Dane]

I would love to see the first 5 years of OLTL... And the crossover of TEON from CBS to ABC

[vetsoapfan]

 

 I have never seen any other show revitalize itself, writing-wise, faster and more effectively, than when Marland took over the reigns of GH. He may not have "gotten" The Doctors as well, but he really clicked on GH and used its history and core characters brilliantly. PFS was the best writer DAYS ever had, but she followed the divine William J . Bell, so the high quality of writing was already there when she became headwriter. She just carried on and enhanced the excellent material on that show, the way she later did on GH when she took over for Marland, and on TGL, when she again succeeded Marland.

 

It was like night and day; quite astonishing. I was so relieved and thrilled because GH had became a CHORE to watch. (Why we devoted soap fans continue to watch our shows even when it is aggravating and painful to do so...is a whole other conversation!)

 

OLTL's original Carla/Clara story is now legendary and it's a crime that none of it exists except within fans' memories. 

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What I appreciated most about TEON's transition from CBS to ABC was Henry Slesar's BRILLIANT script for the first, 90-minute ABC broadcast.  While presenting established viewers with a day of exciting drama and character interaction, he also wrote the episode in such a way as to help brand-new viewers understand quickly what was going on and who the principle characters were. It was quite amazing, but at the time, I took such excellent writing for granted on daytime TV. I thought viewers would always be treated to quality material from expert scribes. Little did I know what lay ahead. 

[Marco Dane]

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[Chris B]

The one show I’ve always wanted to see is Return to Peyton Place. Obviously having seen the original series there is a curiosity, especially since the cast has some carryover. It annoys me so much when people mention having episodes of it but still nothing has surfaced but a promo!

[vetsoapfan]

 

Unfortunately, there is a lot of material being hoarded by private collectors who do not want to share their treasure. On the other hand, we are fortunate to have access to as much rare stuff as we do. Youtube has tons of vintage soap episodes that most fans would have never, ever seen before the internet made sharing possible. It's a glass half full/half empty scenario.

 

RTPP was pretty tepid at first, but the only real flaw the show had was the writing. In its final months, with the hiring of excellent scribes, the show really took off and the ratings saw a big jump upwards. I was hoping that this would save it but unfortunately, NBC's Lin Bolin was already determined to put her new baby, How to Survive a Marriage on the air, and cancelled RTPP even though its ratings were okay.

 

Ironically, HTSAM suffered the same fate as RTPP: the initial writing was dreadful and turned potential viewers off, but after several months, the divine Rick Edelstein took over and the literate, engrossing, sophisticated scripts rivalled that of Harding Lemay's (IMHO). By then it was too late, however, and even great writing could not save it. Like RTPP before it, the new show was axed as well. Two ultimately wonderful shows gone too soon.

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