GH In The News: The PC Press Club

[Harmony233]

Honestly I was so confused about them making lucy having hullcantations about port  Charles.I didn't know what was real and fake lol.

[Francie]

Honestly I was so confused about them making lucy having hullcantations about port  Charles.I didn't know what was real and fake lol.

That's okay. The writers didn't know either.

[dubbel zout]

That was such a clusterfuck.

[TeeVee329]

And it totally just petered out at the end.

[Tiger]

The best part of that story was Allison living life on the run with perfect hair and a french-tip manicure.

I had stopped watching "Port Charles" before all the vampire stuff started, and I actually enjoyed the story on GH.

On a separate note, why does Robinson Porter Warrens have at least four candles on his bathroom counter?!?

[Francie]

As an Anna fan, the vampire story was painful to me. Painful. They made her look like idiot, with wackadoodle Lucy pulling a gun on her and a 16-year-old girl breaking people out of the jail.  And nothing happened to them. That's when I knew Ron was a poser as a writer. A cheap Reilly imitation.

 

That entire "story" was about Sam's breasts and ME not bathing.

 

HATED it. I may have hated that storyline more than jsbt hates Britt.

[jsbt]

I actually really liked parts of that story, excluding ME's hilariously awful attempt to recreate Caleb and the very poor casting and writing for Rafe. If you're going to finally deal with Port Charles you have to go big or go home, and they went for it. The problem is that unlike a lot of RC wacky continuity band-aid stories of that ilk before then, he failed to put a real bow on it; he was unable to craft a real explanation for why Lucy remembered all this shit and no one else did, so he just ignored it and everyone moved on. He didn't really answer it either way, although I think the subliminal implication (barely given onscreen) was that it all really happened and that the magic ring from the final arc of PC had warped reality and caused everyone in town to forget/ignore it and write off 'crazy guy' as the official story. The ring also made it so no one realized Stephen/Caleb apparently escaped the morgue at the end of the GH storyline.

 

I was fine with the idea of that wild explanation since this is a show where Nikolas and Emily went to a magic grove, Luke had X-Men powers and a space alien lived in Robin's house, but they didn't actually give that explanation. And that's around the time RC often stopped bothering with any explanations for his retcons at all. Months prior he had done a very in-depth reveal on A.J., right down to flashbacks.

Edited February 4, 2016 by jsbt

[Tiger]

When did Nik & Emily go to a magic grove? When did Luke have x-men powers?

[ulkis]

When did Nik & Emily go to a magic grove? When did Luke have x-men powers?

 

Around 2004. They went to some garden that started sprouting flowers magically. Luke had X-Men powers during Fluke. I think.

[jsbt]

Around 2004. They went to some garden that started sprouting flowers magically. Luke had X-Men powers during Fluke. I think.

 

Wrong. Don't doubt the Sword of Malkuth

 

[ulkis]

Who would have thought all those rapid, nonsensical contortions would have resulted in back problems 30 years later?

Edited February 5, 2016 by ulkis

[jsbt]

I'm leaving that one on the table.

[jsbt]

Daytime Confidential deserves a little credit: They nailed both this headline and picture.

[TeeVee329]

The quotation marks around "exciting" are so delightfully bitchy.

[yowsah1]

The quotation marks around "exciting" are so delightfully bitchy.

 

Jamey Giddens must be beside himself with schadenfreude-y glee.  He loudly maintained when RC was fired that the OLTL 3 wasn't Ron's fault, that was all Frank's doing.  Now Frank plays right into this argument.

[TeeVee329]

So whose call was it to axe Silas in place of Ric in that murder mystery story in the first place?  Not Frank's clearly.  But could Ron overrule him on that?  Or did someone at the network do that?

[jsbt]

I suspect it was the network. Supposedly the rationale was that fans had been too up in arms about vets being wasted/offed, and someone felt ME had been given more than enough time to hit it off with Ava (which, yes, thank God) and I guess that had been their initial big plan for his having re-signed which immediately went by the wayside because it sucked so hard.

Edited February 5, 2016 by jsbt

[Francie]

Wrong. Don't doubt the Sword of Malkuth

 

Gloria done gone lost it. 

 

Second-hand embarrassment doesn't even begin to cover my feelings toward that.

[Francie]

So whose call was it to axe Silas in place of Ric in that murder mystery story in the first place?  Not Frank's clearly.  But could Ron overrule him on that?  Or did someone at the network do that?

This is the $64,000 question I'm curious about. I doubt Ron could. And if Ron couldn't, then either it was a budgetary thing and Frank picked his greatest love, staying within budget, over his second greatest, populating GH with OLTL actors. Or did someone at the network wake up long enough to say 'off with his head?'

[Sake614]

Daytime Confidential deserves a little credit: They nailed both this headline and picture.

 

OMG I'm dying here. DYING! LOL!

[TeeVee329]

I suspect it was the network. Supposedly the rationale was that fans had been too up in arms about vets being wasted/offed, and someone felt ME had been given more than enough time to hit it off with Ava (which, yes, thank God) and I guess that had been their initial big plan for his having re-signed which immediately went by the wayside because it sucked so hard.

 

And what's weird was, when they siloed Ava and Silas together during the cancer/assisted suicide story, I figured they were setting up to make a big push on them.  But it just went nowhere, they were off-screen a lot, and then Denise happened *shudder*.

[SlovakPrincess]

Gloria done gone lost it.

Second-hand embarrassment doesn't even begin to cover my feelings toward that.

Although, I will say, that story only ate half of 1982, and there were other things going on that kept the entire show from sucking. The second half of '82, with the Oil Scam story and the lead up to Susan marrying Scott and eventually getting murdered, worked a lot better. And 1983 was a pretty solid year.

I feel like the current regime just will not do the things that are necessary to change course ... perhaps because their story arcs have no clear end, they just meander on into something else (like the Jason story that never seems to end, it just wanders off into another shitty direction).

[ulkis]

Gloria done gone lost it. 

 

Second-hand embarrassment doesn't even begin to cover my feelings toward that.

 

Does attraction towards Luke's gleaming chest enter anywhere into the equation. Just admit it!

[Francie]

Does attraction towards Luke's gleaming chest enter anywhere into the equation. Just admit it!

On Gloria's part? That would explain a lot.

 

On mine? If so, it's hidden so, so, so, so, so deep down that I can't even find it. Like it's in South America deep down down. Or, maybe even the South Pole.

 

Speaking of attraction:  Unpopular opinion, but I'm too lazy to go to that board. I kinda liked Robert and Jackie. She was spunky. And  a reporter. I eventually when to journalism school. Not saying she had anything to do with it though.

[SlovakPrincess]

Speaking of Jackie, does anyone know if the writers had it in for Demi Moore? She came on as a heroine, but by the end of Jackie's tenure, she was horrible to everyone and everyone loathed her.

She was written as never getting over the breakup with Robert and was outright vindictive toward him. At one point, she's indirectly responsible for Bobbie and Ruby's whore past being publicized!

Did something happen in '83 to make the entire show turn on Demi? Because ... wow.

[jsbt]

All I know about Demi's tenure beyond a few old episodes is that infamous BTS video at some cast party where Demi was falling-down drunk - we're talking giving Maura West and Kelly at last year's Emmys a run for their money - and started making out with the 13-year-old boy playing geeky Jeremy whatshisname, the kid Anne Logan adopted (I think).

 

I am surprised she didn't work on the show because she had such grit and spunk even then and she seemed game to play with Tony Geary from what I saw. But there was obviously no replacing Laura, and she was clearly no match for Emma Samms/Holly in terms of a chemistry test with Tristan Rogers. Also she made out with a little boy while dead drunk.

Edited February 5, 2016 by jsbt

[Francie]

Demi Moore had outs for movies, and took them. That wreaked havoc with the schedule, and her character bore the brunt of it. I don't think her, ahem, mind was on her work all the time, either.

 

Dialogue writers for that time have said that they loved writing for her. They loved her deep voice and hearing their dialogue come out of it. By late 1983, she was already on a come and go schedule and it was easy to write her as the heavy.

 

Here's Philip Tanzini's 15th birthday party where a 19-year-old Demi drunkenly makes out with him (caution -- still creepy and gross):

 

https://youtu.be/pjl8pK7x24w

 

Still gross. But not a 13-year-old.

Edited February 6, 2016 by Francie

[backhometome]

Yuck! thats so creepy. I knew I should not have watched it. 

[Ambrosefolly]

I thought Emma Samms had acting talent. Not the greatest, not the worst. I preferred Robert/Holly to Robert/Anna. 

 

Speaking about actresses with debatable acting talents and past talk about making dads look like dead beats when the actor leaves for whatever reason, I always hated they made Felicia look like a bad mother because JFP/Guza decided to first to dump her weirdly around the time they aged Georgie and Maxie and then wrote her as a dead beat (after the recast didn't work out) because Kristina Wagner dared to ask for a six month contract.

Edited February 6, 2016 by Ambrosefolly

[Tiger]

Yuck! thats so creepy. I knew I should not have watched it.

I fully admit this is a colossal double standard, but if it was a 19 year old male making out with a 15 year old girl, I'd join the throngs of villagers with pitchforks and fire. But a 15 year old guy getting to make out with a 19 year old girl? I would have been high-giving him!

[Tiger]

I thought Emma Samms had acting talent. Not the greatest, not the worst. I preferred Robert/Holly to Robert/Anna.

Speaking about actresses with debatable acting talents and past talk about making dads look like dead beats when the actor leaves for whatever reason, I always hated they made Felicia look like a bad mother because JFP/Guza decided to first to dump her weirdly around the time they aged Georgie and Maxie and then wrote her as a dead beat (after the recast didn't work out) because Kristina Wagner dared to ask for a six month contract.

Wait, Kristina asked for a 6-month contract? I remember she either chose to leave or was fired at some point in '03, came back briefly for the hotel fire and then again for that seriel killer story that aired opposite the Olympics in '04, then was played by Sandra Ferguson for a bit in '05, and at point after she stopped appearing Felicia left town off-screen. But up until then Felicia was in town even when not on screen.

Regardless, Felicia as a deadbeat mom was the epitome of real mother fucking bullshit.

Of all the carp Ron did, him bringing Felicia back, repairing the relationships with Mac and Maxie, and giving at least some plasuible explanation for her abdandoning her girls, was really good.

[UYI]

Demi Moore had outs for movies, and took them. That wreaked havoc with the schedule, and her character bore the brunt of it. I don't think her, ahem, mind was on her work all the time, either.

 

 

Demi Moore had a cocaine addiction in the early 80's. She finally kicked her habit when the director of St. Elmo's Fire threatened to fire her. 

[UYI]

I fully admit this is a colossal double standard, but if it was a 19 year old male making out with a 15 year old girl, I'd join the throngs of villagers with pitchforks and fire. But a 15 year old guy getting to make out with a 19 year old girl? I would have been high-giving him!

 

Knowing it was only a four year age difference makes seem a little less worse to me than if she had been older (I'm four years older than my ex and we were in our early/mid 20's when we were together), but I still don't think I can watch it based on how smashed I've heard she was there.

[Ambrosefolly]

When Kristina returned after the hotel fire ( I think), the show wanted to write for her more, but she had gone back to school at that time (I believe that was reported) and the only way she would be available for the show is if they gave her at least a six month contract, which to me, sounded pretty reasonable to want some job security when one is putting off school. That is the thing with this show and I hate saying this, but it goes back to the Monty years: some actors, usually the men, can demand leather jackets and can rewrite their scripts, but the women can't get even a little bit of job security. 

[jsbt]

I didn't realize she was that young at the time. But 15 or not that kid is tiny. I'm sure he was thrilled, though. Maybe.

 

I found out about that video when either ET (above) or TMZ or something unearthed it a few years ago. GH in the '80s was a wild-ass place BTS and people allegedly got up to all sorts of shit, so I don't think Demi Moore was some predator or any worse than any number of the male stars (Tony Geary). Still, oof.

Edited February 6, 2016 by jsbt

[UYI]

When Kristina returned after the hotel fire ( I think), the show wanted to write for her more, but she had gone back to school at that time (I believe that was reported) and the only way she would be available for the show is if they gave her at least a six month contract, which to me, sounded pretty reasonable to want some job security when one is putting off school. That is the thing with this show and I hate saying this, but it goes back to the Monty years: some actors, usually the men, can demand leather jackets and can rewrite their scripts, but the women can't get even a little bit of job security.

 

That's basically what happened to Denise Alexander in 1984. She asked GM to put her on a shorter schedule, and GM responded by killing Lesley off instead. 

Edited February 6, 2016 by UYI

[SlovakPrincess]

I didn't realize she was that young at the time. But 15 or not that kid is tiny. I'm sure he was thrilled, though. Maybe.

 

I found out about that video when either ET (above) or TMZ or something unearthed it a few years ago. GH in the '80s was a wild-ass place BTS and people allegedly got up to all sorts of shit, so I don't think Demi Moore was some predator or any better than any number of the male stars (Tony Geary). Still, oof.

 

Ooh, tell us more ....

 

http://www.reactiongifs.com/r/jspop.gif

[jsbt]

I'm pretty sure there's people way better versed in that than me (for example, I didn't know how old that kid was).

[Asp Burger]

That's basically what happened to Denise Alexander in 1984. She asked GM to put her on a shorter schedule, and GM responded by killing Lesley off instead.

 

Also Genie Francis in 2002. She wanted a contract more like Tony Geary's, and Jill Farren Phelps wasn't going for that. Not only did they write her out with the Rick Webber plot and make her a wig on a stick for years, but JFP said in an interview that Genie needed to take some time and decide whether she really wanted to be on General Hospital.

[katie9918]

I saw Robert/Anna first and I still vastly prefer Robert/Holly. There was just something so earnest and honest and innocent between RnH that I never saw with RnA.

If Anna wasn't using him, he was using her, or they were using each other.

Holly IMO was the true love of Robert's life and I hope TR escapes this sinking ship before these writers say otherwise.

[jsbt]

I vastly prefer Robert and Anna myself, but I always figured I was in the minority. Also I never caught any of them in their prime, it's all YouTube.

Edited February 6, 2016 by jsbt

[Francie]

I don't think it became an either/or situation until long after the fact, when social media came into existence and people experienced the show more collectively than individually.

 

Robert and Holly were a popular GH couple in the early 1980s. Then again, having lived through it at the time, so were Luke and Holly. They were the lead couple of the second half of 1982, they got all the press, etc.

 

Gloria became committed to Robert and Holly when Tony Geary was leaving. Before then, they were in a Casablanca-like triangle, with Geary as Bogart (complete with owning a gambling casino) and Robert was a combination of best friend police chief Renault and the stalwart, upstanding, safe choice, Victor Laslo. That's the way Guza, a staff writer at the time, remembers it as well, as he wrote Tony, Emma, and Tristan into a triangle again in 2006.

 

Robert and Holly then had a year of what Tristan has called "fluff" in terms of storylines. But their charm carried them through. Holly was part Myrna Loy of the Thin Man and part Lucy Ricardo, who was always whining about being in the band being a detective in Robert's police force.

 

Gloria brought on Anna in 1985 to give them a more substantial story. But instead of becoming much of a triangle, it became about developing Anna as a character. Tristan was resistant to the idea of triangle and Emma was pulling double duty on Dynasty, so she was largely written off or Holly was isolated in England with her nanny or on an abandoned train with two dayplayers.  When Emma left GH for good in 1985, there was a rushed couple day reunion between Robert and Holly before she left for Australia.

 

Up until 1991, there were hints and teases about Robert and Anna, but they were always paired with other characters. Each, individually, though became the undisputed most popular characters of GH and (not so?) arguably of daytime. They won every magazine and televised fan award events in terms of lead actor and lead actress, for all of daytime. They were the King and Queen of, at least, GH, if not daytime. Along comes back Gloria, who wonders why the King and Queen aren't married, and she puts them back together. Fans like me were thrilled. But they had other fans who preferred them with others who were not as pleased.

 

Finola left in late 1991 and Tristan followed a few weeks later. Gloria tried to, once again, replace one British ballerina turned thespian for another, but Emma's return to GH in 1992 was an unmitigated disaster that not only has been wiped from the collective minds of the audience, but as we saw from last year, from Tony's and Emma's as well.

[SlovakPrincess]

That was just kind of unfair for Emma Samms - being brought in to maintain interest in the show when it was losing two great characters in a depressing story (nobody was going to be happy about R and A dying offscreen, and they probably lost some viewers over that) ... when her character had been mangled to be a con artist again who let Robert think she'd died ... and then she had to try and prop the unpopular Bill character.

Or was the plan to kill Anna off but keep Robert (and reunite him with Holly), and TR decided to leave, instead?

Edited February 6, 2016 by SlovakPrincess

[UYI]

I vastly prefer Robert and Anna myself, but I always figured I was in the minority. Also I never caught any of them in their prime, it's all YouTube.

 

I think the three fanbases--Robert & Holly, Duke & Anna, and Robert & Anna--are pretty equally divided. Of course, a lot of the R&H/D&A fans are one and the same, although there are some R&H fans who didn't like the latter couple, because they've hated Anna (and in some cases, Robin, for being her child with Robert--they wanted Holly to have his first kid, obviously) since the very beginning in 1985 (or D&A fans who didn't see R&H, I guess). I've seen those people out there, too.

 

A REAL minority would be, like, a Robert & Cheryl fan. There's actually one on YouTube who has posted their pairing/other stuff from that particular year (1988).

Edited February 6, 2016 by UYI

[UYI]

Or was the plan to kill Anna off but keep Robert (and reunite him with Holly), and TR decided to leave, instead?

 

I've read about this before, and IIRC, Tristan had wanted to leave in 1991, but Gloria convinced him to stay (for just another year? I think?) by creating Mac. I've heard that Fin being let go a month earlier than her scheduled (voluntary) departure, and then being replaced by another actress for that final month, caused him to quit sooner than he had originally planned, and THAT'S what finally convinced ABC to let Gloria go. 

 

I've always wondered if part of the reason for Tristan seeming to prefer Robert with Holly, rather than Anna, had anything to do with him and Emma Samms being a real life couple throughout basically the majority of the original R&H pairing (1983-1985), even though they broke up shortly after they both left GH.

Edited February 6, 2016 by UYI

[SlovakPrincess]

So TR maybe quit partly out of disgust for FH being unnecessarily fired? Aw, that would make me happy if he stuck up for her in real life.

Or maybe he just hated that temp replacement actress, LOL. She was ... miscast.

As much as Gloria Monty put out a great product for most of her time at GH, when she wanted to shoot herself - and the show - in the foot out of spite ... she really went all out!

Edited February 6, 2016 by SlovakPrincess

[dubbel zout]

GH in the '80s was a wild-ass place BTS and people allegedly got up to all sorts of shit,

 

NLG mentioned (on her short-lived web GH thing, I believe) that people were running in and out of dressing rooms all the time, and drugs were everywhere. That was on Santa Barbara, I think, but I can't believe the rest of the shows didn't have similar behavior. Coke was rampant back then, and it was pre-AIDS to a certain degree.

 

In that gross birthday party video, TG looks like he'd fuck anyone who gave him the go-ahead.

[SlovakPrincess]

In that gross birthday party video, TG looks like he'd fuck anyone who gave him the go-ahead.

 

I was getting an embarrassed-to-be-hanging-out-with-these-uncool-kids vibe from him, actually.   Wasn't he in his early 30s by this point?  

[UYI]

NLG mentioned (on her short-lived web GH thing, I believe) that people were running in and out of dressing rooms all the time, and drugs were everywhere. That was on Santa Barbara, I think, but I can't believe the rest of the shows didn't have similar behavior. Coke was rampant back then, and it was pre-AIDS to a certain degree.

 

 

 

No, it was on GH--Nancy has said she visited the set in the 80's when she was dating Sam Behrens (Jake Meyer, Bobbie's one time husband). She said that the SB set was like a church social compared to GH. 

 

I seem to remember hearing once that TR and FH made sure to shelter Kim from that atmosphere, though, and she was pretty young back then (they also made sure to keep whatever tension they had with each other away from her, too. They didn't hate each other or anything, but they weren't close at first, either.).

Edited February 6, 2016 by UYI

[UYI]

I was getting an embarrassed-to-be-hanging-out-with-these-uncool-kids vibe from him, actually.   Wasn't he in his early 30s by this point?  

 

Yes. In 1979, when they did the rape scene, TG was 33, and Genie was 17.