Sally Sussman Morina Interview

[AbcNbc247]

>“It’s an opinion show”

>gets mad when people who listened offer their opinions

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[Soapsuds]

Well said!

[dragonflies]

That Casey Hutch person and Tiggz have people blocked cause they can't handled "constructive criticism" yet we're supposed to believe a word he says 

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[Forever8]

I couldn't say it better myself. 

I'm tired of how Josh or CBS thinks we're only interested in the musical chairs of who is in and out as CEO. 

There's a lot that can be done within the confines of Jabot or Newman to get characters to interact and tell a decent business storyline; perhaps they can rip from the headlines with stories about how certain hair relaxers cause uterine cancer and kidney disease. Maybe Safra or Tuvia products cause this for customers, and they're faced with several lawsuits having characters that work at these companies plot to stop the fallout. 

 

[Soaplovers]

I do remember Sussman had tried to showcase some of these elements with Lauren's department store struggles..and joining in with Jabot as a way to save the company..with Phyllis helping with social media/web page updates for Fenmores.  As always..story was dropped.

 

[Faulkner]

Those are excellent ideas, but I bet CBS would be so scared of those types of stories.

I wonder how the interference plays out on B&B. Brad obviously doesn’t just get carte blanche to do whatever he wants; even HBO showrunners get their ideas nixed by network executives, and Patrick Mulcahey spoke at length about stories and even dialogue that got killed at the network notes stage. B&B has more “excitement” than Y&R—he leans on cheeseball soap clichés that the network seems to like—but there are also long stretches where things just don’t go anywhere and we’re seeing the same sets (Steffy’s office at FC, the Forrester mansion, Hope and Liam’s cottage) and hearing the same cut-and-paste dialogue. Then, all of sudden, there’s a flurry of activity where it feels like he’s saved up enough money to do something bigger. B&B is a small show and is known for those kinds of patterns, but it feels particularly pronounced now.

Edited January 20, 2023 by Faulkner

[TEdgeofNight]

Thanks for summarizing the interview upthread. I tried to listen to The Chat once and commented to the hosts about how bad that podcast is and got blocked. Those hosts cannot take criticism. (Despite what they say). That said, I'm not surprised that Sally Sussman is a 'friend' to The Chat. As stated upthread, Sally Sussman has never had a successful stint as headwriter. She rode Bill Bell's coat tails for years and her own show flopped and Days' ratings dropped when she headwrote the show. Her last stint at Y&R was terrible and of course it was someone else's fault. Surely The Chat kissed her ass and didn't ask about her husband and it was so disgusting to read that they dissed Brad Bell to Sally Sussman. They would never do that to Brad's face. Sally's delusional if she thinks that her failed show Generations can be rebooted. A low rated soap opera from 30 years ago. Really Sally? I guess she needed to say something to still sound relevant. 

[Broderick]

She talked a great deal about utilizing today's news.  She said back in the 1980s, when soaps were more "cutting edge", they weren't afraid to take a news story, incorporate it into a storyline, and examine it from all different angles, from the standpoint of how the various characters would react to the situation.  She indicated CBS is afraid of that now, and they'd rather stick with the evil twins, back-from-the-dead, and doppelganger type stories. 

She laughed about the 1985 storyline when Tyrone Jackson wore "whiteface" as Robert Tyrone; she said, "You couldn't do a story like that on network TV anymore."  She's right about that.  

Edited January 20, 2023 by Broderick

[TEdgeofNight]

True. They block anyone who says a negative thing about their amateur podcast. 

[SheenaSoaper]

Hugely unprofessional interview! Not surprising from people trying to bring back radio soaps!!!

Sally brought back Dina in 2017. That was cool.

[DramatistDreamer]

The idea of a radio soap is kind of cool but unless it’s of a much higher standard than what’s currently out there, I am not sure how it would work.

Podcast dramas are looking as if they may start to catch on though.

It seemed like SSM tried but I found much of her execution of writing the stories to be somewhat dry.

Thank goodness for that. That storyline was a mess!

[RavenWhitney]

Sally seems talented as a consultant and collaborator, contributing to a show with a solid structure. Generations was a bore but in hindsight was gold compared to the crap that ensued on the shows through to today.  No one could have successfully succeeded James Reilly on Days; he had ruined the show's narrative structure and its veterans, and the only outcome was to copy him which is why Broderick didn't make it and Langan wrote and controlled the show for so long.  Langan was a producer giving the honchos an updated version of Reilly.  Sally would have been good on Y&R if she had joined a powerhouse head writing team ala Nancy Curlee and Stephen Demorest. If CBS had been smart that's the show the Demorests should have been added to for the longterm under Alden/Smith etc.  That is, if the execs wanted to keep character and story intertwined and melodramatic. 

[Paul Raven]

I know Sally was thrown in at the deep end and had network interference but she had months to implement changes and a lot of what she offered was pretty mundane.

Jack and Nikki rekindling their affair for 5 minutes.

Scott Grainger.

SORASING Charlie and Mattie.

Sally said she liked GC Buzz which would have been the first thing that should have been dropped.

Victor v Nick

And so on...

Edited January 21, 2023 by Paul Raven

[Liberty City]

I often what could have happened if Kay Alden had been head writer and Sally Sussman had been storyline consultant, and if that would have faired better.

[DaytimeFan]

Nothing will ever top Alden's The Takeover storyline from 1999. So many characters involved with consequences that lasted for years:

 

That really is a crippling thing to deal with. However, when you watch old episodes from the 90s and early 00s it isn't that there were that many extra sets, but they were much larger and between Newman, Jabot, the Abbott house, Chancellor mansion, Victor's ranch, Crimson Lights, and Gina's restaurant, they could write an effective show.

Jabot is the only business venue that 1) makes sense and 2) connects to the audience.