GH: RIP Leslie Charleson

[DRW50]

@Franko Wow. I love that. Never seen it. Tony thotting out.

Edited January 19 by DRW50

[Franko]

Ha! Turning to other Leslie projects from this era, maybe one of the retro-rare-obscure YouTube channels will turn up either of her failed sitcom pilots. 

Another April, for CBS from 1974, where she was a divorced liberal mother moving back in with conservative parents Barnard Hughes and Elizabeth Wilson. Featuring a pre-fame Howard Hesseman.

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, for ABC in 1975, in the Katharine Houghton role. Bill Overton played Sidney Poitier's role, followed by Richard Dysart and Eleanor Powell in the Tracy & Hepburn roles, Madge Sinclair & Lee Weaver in Beah Richards and Roy Glenn's roles, and Rosetta LeNoire in Isabel Sanford's role.

[Khan]

Interesting how Barnard Hughes and Elizabeth Wilson played LC's parents in the first pilot.  A year later, I think, the two would co-star - again, as husband and wife - in "Doc," also on CBS.

[Franko]

I initially thought Barnard and Elizabeth acted together in Neil Simon's The Good Doctor, but that was Frances Sternhagen.

ETA: I wrote too soon. Barnard and Elizabeth acted together in Sheep on the Runway, Uncle Vanya, and decades later in Waiting in the Wings.

Edited January 19 by Franko

[Vee]

It's obscene that it was posted here in the first place.

[dc11786]

This is hard to read. 

As some know, I have been making my way through early 1990s "General Hospital" and am up to mid 1993. Riche is a gift to so many of the GH legends, particularly the women like Leslie Charleson. Monica is a fully developed character who is a brilliant surgeon, a mother who never feels she is doing enough, a wife who loves her husband but doesn't always like him, and a friend to her colleagues like Bobbie Jones. And Leslie plays each layer of the character with a quiet strength that makes you feel each individual slight from Alan and her boys AJ and Jason. Her rapport with Stuart Damon is remarkable as well as her ability to go toe to toe with Jane Elliot's Tracy. In the pre-Labine Riche era, Tracy and Monica are still at odds, but come together at times to support one another. In the GH thread, there is talk of Tracy's 1993 goobye, but one scene that isn't included in the video is from an episode or two earlier where Tracy and Monica have their last scene together and Monica is very optimistic and encouraging Tracy to not count herself out. It's a really tender moment for a prickly relationship. 

In Charleson's honor, I watched all the clips of the David Langton trial from about May 30, 1992-June 15, 1992. Charleson is great, per usual. I didn't realize that they hadn't dropped the bomb that David was Dawn's father to the boys by this point and the courtroom revelation shocks Jason to his core cause a deep rift in his relationship with Monica. It's a heartbreaking ripple of this trial. Additionally, another courtroom bombshell from Monica's diary reveals that David made Monica feel a way no other man, including Alan, ever had. This leads to a bitter confrontation in the manse between Alan and Monica where Alan's pride gets the best of him and Monica remains humble, but never the victim. 

I am sorry Charleson never got to appear under Mulcahey this last year. I hope her farewell episode is as memorable as Bobbie's. 

[titan1978]

She was so comfortable with Riche that she pitched the idea of Monica having breast cancer, and Riche and Labine loved the idea and they all told the story beautifully. That scene with Monica and Alan where she shows her scars to him and asks if he still wants to sleep with her and he says he would love to was so poignant and memorable. Stuart Damon also got to do wonderful work in that story.

[janea4old]

Stephanie Sloane interviews Wally Kurth about Leslie Charleson
https://www.remindmagazine.com/article/24684/general-hospital-wally-kurth-leslie-charlson-monica-quartermaine/

[Contessa Donatella]

Thank you for this entire post. It means a great deal to me. Reflective of great love for Leslie, Wendy Riche & Claire Labine, all at GH during a time I loved so. 

[titan1978]

Thank you for posting, such a lovely tribute.

[Contessa Donatella]

This to me is a rare find.

https://www.instagram.com/p/DFH1XglxYlF/

Please register in order to view this content

Within the text is a Leslie quote:

In 1994, Leslie reflected on the progress of TV over the years.

"When I first started on soaps -- ages ago -- we were restricted. You couldn't say words like 'abortion'. You couldn't be political. You couldn't be topical. You couldn't cause any kind of controversy. I always thought that was a mistake. We're seen in people's living rooms, kitchens and bedrooms, five days a week. We have a responsibility to tackle real issues."

Now, put that together with the circumstances of LOVE IS A MANY SPLENDORED THING.

Life, soaps, history, CBS, Irna Phillips ... 

 

Edited January 30 by Contessa Donatella
include quote

[dragonflies]

Why would you post the is or believe it given the thumbnail has Donald Trump and Joe Biden on it??? 

[dragonflies]

Cause of death

Update (2/13): The Los Angeles County Coroner’s Office has reported the cause of death as sequelae (or, the longterm impact) of blunt head trauma. The report also notes that Charleson lived with asthma, arthritis, atrial fibrillation and normal pressure hydrocephalus (in which excess cerebrospinal fluid builds up in the ventricles).

#GeneralHospital icon Leslie Charleson's cause of death has been determined.https://t.co/RGOlF8cWlE