2020: The Directors and Writers Thread

[lucaslesann23]

If amanda beall is CO HW we will probbaly see her in credits in a week or two

[DaytimeFan]

 

 

Indeed, Ed Scott got DAYS looking the best it had in a decade during his year there as Co-EP. B&B remains a visually appealing show, regardless of what's going on with the writing, and it remains its high production values. The look of Y&R has fallen apart in recent years - I'd love to know what Ed Scott would do to fix that god awful Newman ranch set.

[Toups]

I don’t think she is. Nobody has reported it.  She was just listed with Griffith in the first episode because it was a recap. 
 

 

I wish Ed Scott would return to Y&R too.  

[Chris B]

What Ed Scott did at Days was amazing because he was going from a show with a budget to a show running on pennies. Imagine what he could do now! 

[titan1978]

I always wanted to see what Scott and JFP could do together. She likes that darker lighting esthetic, and they both usually produce shows that look more expensive than they are (not counting her cheap looking Y&R).  If she was a fan of melodrama at all Y&R with Scott would have worked.

 

And this is coming from someone that is not a JFP fan.

[RavenWhitney]

Nooo. Jill ruined the Y&R look; she turned it into Santa Barbara.  Awful. And Mel turned up the lighting even more. I thought Morina would bring some darker, Wisconsin Frank Lloyd Wright design back to the show (from the 1980s) but the lightening is worse than under Jill or Mal.  The sets are awful. I never thought I'd say this but with the exception of Hope Brady's recently showcased psychedelic half den on Days, Salem often looks better than Genoa City.

[titan1978]

As someone that watched her OLTL, GH, and now quite a bit of GL, she absolutely prefers moody, dark lighting.  I cannot speak to Santa Barbara, never watched it. I was shocked at how awful her Y&R looked, because she does usually produce better looking shows, and in my experience as a viewer, she uses darker lighting often.

 

However, Scott made DAYS look beautiful when he was there, even if the show was not as good as it looked.  And I agree, there are times in the last 3 or 4 years when I saw DAYS scenes and thought they looked better than Y&R and GH.

[BetterForgotten]

These shows don't have budget to look great anymore and the complications of producing a daily soap in a pandemic climate won't help with those limitations. That's why it's more important than ever to focus on the content and creative aspect - which they can't get right anyway.

 

Even B&B's production quality is not what it once was, and I can only assume that's because of recent cuts to its licensing fees. 

[sheilaforever]

+1 

B&B lost a lot of visual appeal since last September or so. I also attribute it to budget cuts

[Chris B]

I noticed that B&B has joined the others with the shrunken sets. I wonder how GH is able to avoid this. They still have so many sets and all of their sets are a good size. It’s refreshing watching and seeing movement. So many different locations, offices, parks, public areas, homes etc. With great writing it would be the gold standard. 

[lucaslesann23]

They are owned by disney thats how lol

[sheilaforever]

Nah, maybe their stage is just bigger???

[Chris B]

But what happened to Y&R and B&B’s studio? Did they lose space or something? Y&R now features less sets and the ones you have are smaller. B&B still uses most of its sets but everything has been shrunken down. 

[Paul Raven]

It's my understanding that to save money, the shows are having more permanent sets.Therefore to fit as many as possible into the established studio space the sets have been reduced in size.

The money savings come from sets not having to be erected/ torn down when needed and stored elsewhere.

Previously there were a few sets that would remain say GCAC, Crimson Lights and Jabot set. The rest of the space would be used for whatever the writing demanded eg Newman Ranch, Sharon's cottage. hotel rooms etc.

Writers were directed to write to a more limited number of sets.

[sheilaforever]

THIS started on B&B circa 2017... Katie’s new house (aka apartment) was the first super TINY set which could not fit more 3 persons in a scene. 

Then they remodeled the Forrester guest house by killing the first room and reducing it by half. Brookes bedroom which once was a proper set lost half it’s size, too. The most apparent changes happened when they got rid of liams and Wyatts offices at Spencer Publications. There used to be three independent Spencer sets. Now: it’s all Bills Office with different furniture and some not so subtle background changes. It works somehow, but it is telling. The Forrester Mansion and Forrester Creations are the only big sets they still use. The stage is rather small - They used to Change the sets on stage for each week. This is no longer happening to save money. B&B compensated a lot of this set shrinkage by filming outdoors on the roof: Il Giardino, the FC gym set etc - Or actually on location at the Cliff House. for more than a year they haven’t done this either. My guess is that was also too costly in the long run.