Y&R: RIP Kristoff St John

[ReddFoxx]

The only reason those networks even lasted as long as they did is because of the black audience giving them a strong boost. Every secondary network had a black night. WB was Sunday, UPN was Monday and FOX was Thursday. FOX had some popular content that wasn't primarily black that helped them stay afloat, but WB and UPN really relied on black viewers to keep on the air initially.

[Faulkner]

From Chrishell (Stause) Hartley:

 

 

[DeeeDee]

 

[AmandainNC28655]

My heart just breaks for his family.  I hope he is finally at peace

[ChitHappens]

 

Wiki and IMDB waste no time with updates.

[DramatistDreamer]

 

  

On IMDB with some actors, I've noticed that they are years behind with updates, especially actors who are seen as lower-tiered.

 

 

The Times' piece seemed like more of a personal account of one writer's experience watching Y&R and CBS soaps growing up and recognition of KSJ & Neil's cultural importance. 

I don't think the author took account of any BTS chicanery.  I hope that one day someone will, and perhaps fold it into a larger context of how most daytime soaps dealt with their black characters and the actors who portrayed those characters.  It's an important story to tell but from the tone of this piece, I had no expectations of those issues being explored.

 

(*Slightly OT but in terms of the NYT piece was something I've noticed about writers who grew up watching primarily CBS daytime soaps, and I include myself in this-- most of us tend to prefer the P&G soaps, As The World Turns & Guiding Light being at the top.  I think it was something about the dramatic action that was inherent in the writing that really grabbed me/us. It was so strange to see it all but totally confirmed in print.*)

 

 

I saw that snippet meant for the end of today's episode (Feb. 8, 2019) and would it have killed Sony/Y&R to include Victoria Rowell and Tonya Lee Williams???

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  I didn't see Drucilla, Olivia or even Yolanda-- the erasure of black women from Neil's narrative is actually insulting.  I'm glad I cut ties with this show.

[Darn]

Can everyone stop posting in that Neil recast thread? It's distasteful and giving the original poster exactly the attention they wanted.

[DramatistDreamer]

^^Once I registered my initial disgust, I have not ventured back to that thread.  I'm surprised that it's still so active.  Some of those comments could've been made in other threads, like the Y&R thread.

[Faulkner]

She mentioned she stopped watching Y&R at a certain point, and I think she abandoned Y&R before the stories of Neil’s alcoholism and turn to the dark side (kidnapping and torturing Hilary, setting Devon up to be raped, etc) began. Which is good. It preserves a better image of Neil in her mind. 

 

GL was right up there with Y&R for me as a kid.

[Darn]

 

What?!

[Faulkner]

Remember Neil working with Colin to have Devon drugged and in bed with a prostitute? Maybe “setting him up to be raped” is strong but it was terrible.

[DramatistDreamer]

 

Don't get me wrong, I loved Y&R, it was a high quality soap, especially visually but if I were to not watch but just listen to a soap, or just read the script, the golden years of ATWT (not the trash) and GL just appeals to my writer's senses because the dialogue and descriptions jump off the page. 

ATWT has dialogue so fluid that I remember decades' later and as a playwright, the very way 1980s ATWT was set up, it had the sensibility of a three act play on a stage.  

[Darn]

 

I wasn't watching then, I quit about a year or so before Dru died. In my mind I imagined Neil getting Devon sent to jail and having him raped a la Franco and Michael on GH.

[Faulkner]

I wished I’d watched more ATWT when it was actually good and not during the Broderick and Sheffer runs. It was my mom’s soap (she loved the Marland years), and I thought Gottlieb’s OLTL was younger and cooler at the time. Y&R was just old school Hollywood grandeur and so captivating.

 

Oh ok. You too missed the worst of Neil Winters thankfully.

[Khan]

 

I, too, have compared Y&R to "old Hollywood," particularly the Ross Hunter/Douglas Sirk films of the 1950s.