No, Lenore wasn't going to come back. I always assumed they would recast.
Once Marland left, it was very unlikely Rita would come back in any form because he was the last writer who wrote for the character. Long only wrote Holly and Roger because of the unique situation where Zaslow was asked to return as Alan and he asked to return as Roger instead. She talked about how difficult that was in interviews. (I mean, look at what happened to Dinah, Alan and Amanda when they returned to writers who never wrote the characters before. Only Reva was kind of still Reva. The rest were like different characters).
They teased Rita coming back once or twice. There is a scene in 1987 where Alan and Ed are having a fight and they bring up Rita. It seemed odd that they mentioned her out of the blue like that so possibly they thought about bringing her back. I'm thinking it's possible they might have been planning to bring back her kid with the mysterious paternity. That could have been interesting and they didn't necessarily have to bring back Rita for that.
Maybe if the Dobsons had come back to GL after SB was cancelled they could have persuaded Lenore back (she was on Santa Barbara for a while when they were still EPs). But otherwise, not likely to have ever happened.
It such a shame that almost none of the period leading up to and covering Rita and Alan's affair is available. Even the German channel doesn't have it. There are only one or two episodes that take place just before Lenore leaves the show. One is where Rita was staying at a lodge where a necklace Alan gave her is stolen. Alan comes up to see her.
It's a really good scene, where he's whining to her that Hope--who found out about the affair and kicked Alan out--is spending time with Andy Norris. Rather than get upset that he's jealous of his wife being with another man, Rita's like, "A woman would be crazy to pick someone like him over YOU." They end up kissing. She really knew how to push his buttons. 😂
I don't remember the scene of her talking to Sara about her attraction to Alan, but there's one where she talks to her about the things she wants out of life, and how different it is from what Ed wants, and how she was tired of feeling guilty about it. It might be floating around on YT still.
I remember that. Was it Michael Logan? The tone of it was kind of mean, IIRC.
At this time soaps has some very young actresses playing very instense storylines. Genie Francis talked about how difficult that period of GH was for her in interviews. I know people complain about actors who are obviously not teens playing teens, but IMO that's better. It's just too much when you're that young. It's hard enough to do it when you're fully an adult. I can't blame her for finding it difficult at that time or for leaving.
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DeeVee ·
