ALL: Bad Moves by Well Regarded Soap Writers/EPs

[YRfan23]

I believe she and Massimo did have an affair while she was seeing Eric. The details are a little swirly. 

[Antoyne]

It’s so weird because I never see anyone say how wildly odd and problematic that was. It’s not like he created and named Mamie in the 60’s either. 

[j swift]

And they kept calling her that in 2024.

I mean, on a show where Cricket has been known as Christine for decades now, a wealthy black woman is still being called Mamie by the children of her former employer.  And she never corrected them and asked to be referenced by her actual name.

[Broderick]

It would've been awfully easy to establish that the character's name was "Margaret" or "Mary" or "Marguerite" (which was actually the first actress's name, for heaven's sake!), and that Mamie was just a childhood nickname that she slowly abandoned as an adult.  

[Faulkner]

Wait, is Mamie Johnson not her real name? There are lots of Black (and white) women, even members of my family, of that generation and older named “Mamie.” I do understand the sentiment that naming a Black domestic worker “Mamie” isn’t the best move.

I do wish Y&R were bold enough to address the elephant in the room about Mamie’s role in the Abbott family. The way Jill treated and continues to treat her is very disrespectful (and not without its own racial dynamics). Obviously, not all Black folk are raised the same, but I never see Lily, Devon, and Nate tell Jill to chill with her abuse toward Mamie. Very few Black people would allow an elder matriarch be spoken to that way.

[allmc2008]

I asked Kay about Mamie. She said Bill based her after his housekeeper. That was her name.

[NothinButAttitude]

Yes, but I don't think she but her "foot in it" like she did with AMC. 

I feel like Loving had the variables to be successful but didn't always get the love and nurturing it deserved. 

[Maxim]

I believe that Eric wanted to be with Beth Logan - Brooke's mother. He gave some sort of a cold shoulder to Stephanie (I remember Stephanie talking about this through the years)... and that's why she had that 1 time with Massimo... In a way... she was single for this period when she and Eric were kind of broken up... I think it was on a BOAT where Massimo and Stephanie conceived Ridge. But when Stephanie got pregnant... she thought it definitely had to be Eric and she... pressured him using the baby - Ridge... to choose her and not Beth Logan. In a way... Stephanie was making a very Brooke-move. Which is so iconic. Brooke even said that to Stephanie the first time Stephanie slapped her - You had to get pregnant to take him away from my mother!

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Then in 2001 when Ridge was badly hurt... and blood transfusion had to be made... The doctors told Stephanie that there is no way Eric can be his father based on the blood types.

Someone correct anything I remembered wrong... but I do think I'm right. 

 

[Khan]

When it came to RH, I think ABC made big mistakes in not allowing Claire Labine and Paul Avila Mayer to have Frank Ryan die after the first 13 weeks (as Labine and Mayer had planned) or to kill off Mary after Kate Mulgrew had departed the show.

[soapfan770]

Mamie so far as I know has always been her real name just like First Lady Mamie Eisenhower (The Golden Girls once made a joke about this regarding the uncomfortable closeness to the other word when Blanche’s own nanny came to visit.

Jill’s relationship to Mamie was on a basis of classism, similar to Jill’s views of Esther. At first glance you’d think there would be racial undertones but it was never explored at all except for a upstairs vs downstairs basis.

I mentioned it a while back in another thread recently regarding the presumedly AA character Keisha Monroe being played by not one but two actresses who were not of AA descent. Despite some grimaces and rumblings most viewers seem to not even bat an eye and Keisha’s actual race was never mentioned. 

[Broderick]

(I believe Mamie Eisenhower's name was actually Mary Geneva Doud Eisenhower, and 'Mamie' was just a cutesy nickname she had.)  

[yrfan1983]

Jill (both Deborah Adair and Brenda Dickson versions) would refer to Mamie as a servant.

Interesting bc I'm sure she never would wanted her mother Liz to be referred to as a servant, even though Liz did domestic work for both Kay Chancellor and Stuart Brooks.

[Vee]

I'll agree with DRW. Agnes repeatedly went back to Loving and kept trying to rework it, remold it and build on it better, all the way to almost the very end. Her stamp is all over a lot of that '90s stuff in a fascinating way - the show is really a test bed/lab for her reinventing old ideas or trying out new ones IMO. By contrast she never took much of an interest in OLTL after handing it off to Gordon Russell, AFAIK.

All I'll say re: the Y&R thing is it took real chutzpah to name a Black character "Mamie" even in the '80s. I did a double take when I first learned the Abbott maid was called that and I've never recovered.

Edited November 18, 2024 by Vee

[BetterForgotten]

Mamie tested very highly with black women in the South as an fyi. A lot of black women wrote into the show about the character. However, a lot of them felt she wasn’t entirely reflective of who they were, so Bell created Drucilla and Olivia as a response. 

[j swift]

I'm surprised by those trying to justify this decision, I assume you get @Antoyne's point and there is no need to dispute it. I'm not trying to start an argument, but it feels strange that people are straining credulity to support this lame choice.

Edited November 18, 2024 by j swift