Santa Barbara - the show, not the city

Dame Judith Anderson will not be in attendance...

[quote]Dame Judith Anderson

Didn't Minx cook Laken's bird or was that Augusta?

Augusta cooked Laken’s pet pigeon because Laken was using it to send messages to Ted Capwell.

Odd that they didn’t invite Carrington Garland and host it at her mother’s hotel.

It was Augusta.

Which of the Masons is gonna show up?

Will JFP run to the stage to take over the mic at the opening panel?

R5 Mason Reece

R5 The ones that are still alive. According to Lane Davies' FB page, these are the actors in attendance (plus Jerry Dobson).

Jerry Dobson (Co-Creator), Lane Davies (Mason #1), Nancy Lee Grahn (Julia), Marcy Walker Smith (Eden), A Martinez (Cruz), Gordon Thomson (Mason #3), Harley Jane Kozak (Mary), Judith McConnell (Sophia), Louise Sorel (Augusta) John Allen Nelson (Warren Lockridge #1), Leigh McCloskey (Ethan Asher / Dr. Zach Kelton), John Wesley Shipp (Martin Ellis), Ava Lazar (Santana #1), Carrington Garland (Kelly Capwell #3), Robert Thaler (Pearl), Robin Mattson (Gina #2), Joseph Bottoms (Kirk #1), Jane Sibbett (Jane Wilson/Roxanne), Steve Meadows (Peter Flint aka the Carnation Killer), Vincent Irizarry (Dr. Scott Clark), Sherilyn Wolter (Elena Nikolas aka Eleonor Norris), Kristen Meadows (Victoria Lane), Terri Garber (Suzanne Collier), Richard Eden (Brick Wallace), Jane Rogers (Dr. Heather Donnelly ), Ally Walker (Andrea Bedford), Michael Brainard (Ted #2), Robert Brian Wilson (Channing Jr.), Peter Love (Ric Castillo), Robert Newman (Kirk #2), Crystal Chappell (Jane Kingsley), Kathy Shower (Janice Harrison), Terry Davis (“Madeline Capwell”), Miranda Wilson (Sandra Mills), Gina Gallego (Santana #3), Frank Runyeon (Michael Donnelly), Ria Pavia (Elaine Bernowski), Valorie Armstrong (Marisa Perkins)

It looks like both surviving Masons will be there.

Santa Barbara’s dialogue and acting were top notch. The problem with Santa Barbara was they never were able to successfully develop more than 10 or so characters, so they were overexposed and the actors were worn out.

Oops I didn’t see Carrington’s name.

Also:

WRITERS/PRODUCERS: Mary Dobson (writer) Michele Val Jean (writer) Patrick Mulcahey (writer) Courtney Simon (writer) Sheri Anderson Thomas (Co-Headwriter) Chris Dunn (writer) Thom Racina (writer) Debbie Bachtell (Production Manager) Penny Moore (Writers Assistant) Catherine Kalyani (Writers Assistant) Rob Chatlin (Writers Assistant) and Gary Tomlin

DIRECTORS: Peter Brinckerhoff Andrew Weyman Tony Morina Dan McCaffrey

WARDROBE: Richard Bloore (Costume designer)

MUSIC: Dominic Messinger (Composer, Music Supervisor)

R9 also they had the same issue Ryan's Hope did, where by midway through the run many of the leading characters had anywhere from 3 to 5 different actors that had played them through the run.

I learned English as a gayling watching this show with my grandma. 😊

Also Beverly Hills and Melrose Place, so it's been a nostalgic day for me.

If John Allen Nelson AND Todd McKee were in attendance, I'd have to get out the lube.....

Santa Barbara is one of the most beloved soaps, well written and acted for a lot of its run, but it could never find a freaking audience. Maybe if they would have sandwiched it between Days and AW. Oh well. Both Nancy Lee Grahn and Crystal Chappell will be there, will anyone else get to say a word?

If ever you're in my arms again...

Rowr!

I'm most surprised Marcy will be there.

I thought The Lord wouldn't allow such frivolity.

I'm surprised that Kim Zimmer isn't going to be there.

OMG, Terri Garber! It was a dud SB character but this gayling worshipped Ashton Main from North & South.

[quote] Both Nancy Lee Grahn and Crystal Chappell will be there, will anyone else get to say a word?

RUN ON SENTENCE!! Learn to use a fucking semi-colon at the VERY least!

According to Patrick Mulcahey, Nancy Lee Grahn’s nickname amongst the SB writers was Nancy Lee Groan, because she never stopped complaining.

She still hasn’t stopped!

Great use of a fucking EXCLAMATION point!

I loved when Gina went on Wheel of Fortune to win furniture for the empty Lockridge estate she rented with Keith after the Lockridges were written out.

With all the shitty news and the death of Bob Newhart, this is the thread I need.

I loved Santa Barbara. The last truly great soap.

Except when the asshole writers decided to pair Cruz with Kelly.

Then I gave up.

What has Nancy done to her face??

R26. What have you done to your FUCKING keyboard to generate TWO question marks?!

Interesting conversation between Nancy, Lane, and hot muscle daddy Michael Fairman.

I remember loving this storyline . Gina fakes her death to expose Kirk. Kirk has a heart attack when she pops out of the bathtub.

R29 that was great TV. So many great and over the top storylines that had humor and revenge unlike any other soap.

Gina’s and Keith’s wedding was also a really fun episode.

The inability to find the right C.C. Capwell (or even a remotely believable one) really hurt the first couple years of the show. They should have tried to lure Jed Allen away from DAYS in 1984. Wasn't like he was doing anything there; Don Craig had been permanently back-burnered by that point.

One of television's best intros

Minx shoots CC in the ass

So trippy to see Dame Judith in that very 80's silk top.

R33, I have to respectfully disagree. As much I loved the show, I never liked the generic opening.

When the Dobsons returned in 1991, they did this odd dinner party episode at the Capwells-Mason brought Pamela to the Capwell mansion for dinner with the family.

They brought Marj Dusay back and brought Rosa the housekeeper back (she hadn’t been seen in years).

The dialogue was reminiscent of early Santa Barbara, but the magic was lost-too much had happened since the Dobsons were thrown out of the stucio.

As soap-deaths go, being crushed by a giant neon "C" is pretty epic.

Lane Davies’ reaction to Mary’s death should have won him an Emmy

My nearby NBC affiliate (WPTZ Plattburgh NY, Burlington VT) never aired a single episode. I didn't see it until a Montreal station aired it years later - in French.

R39: Lane Davies should have been nominated for multiple Emmys.

The Mason-meets-God-sequence (while in cardiac arrest) was fantastic! Hilarious in parts (God was played by Brian Frons, president of NBC daytime), but also very touching because he sees Mary again. This clip with the "receptionist" is gold.

The “receptionist” also played Bunny, the cross dressing mobster who lived with Gina and Brandon.

I want to find the episode that was written in iambic pentameter.

There are some clips on this FB page, R42:

YouTube used to have full episodes in English, and I went down a nostalgic rabbit hole for a few years, making it all the way to 1990, then Sony pulled the plug. There was a new host site called SoapTubeTV, but they also got shut down.

I don't get why a copyright holder would be protective of an 80s soap opera they are never going to air and charge people to watch.

Marcy and A reunited!

Marcy could have put in a little effort....

Not expecting her to be a size 2 at her age or after so many years out of the business but a hair trim and style, supportive undergarments and a flattering outfit would have done wonders and not broke the bank.

Any more pictures from the big event last week?

Patience R48. My assistant is downloading them as we type!

[quote]I don't get why a copyright holder would be protective of an 80s soap opera they are never going to air and charge people to watch.

In a recent interview with Michael Fairman, co-creator Jerome Dobson said they have been working on securing the rights to post SB episodes on the internet.

The rights he mentioned would likely be the music rights. SB used a lot of popular music at the time.

[quote]When the Dobsons returned in 1991, they did this odd dinner party episode at the Capwells-Mason brought Pamela to the Capwell mansion for dinner with the family.

The Dobsons got Patrick Mulcahey to come back just to write those dinner party episodes.

Here's the Michael Fairman interview with Jerome Dobson and A Martinez from June.

The video of the interview is included at the end of the print story.

Natalie Cole's "A Little Bit of Heaven" -- one of several theme songs for Cruz and Eden.

I remember SB used The Art of Noise (“Moments in Love”) for Eden and Robert’s theme.

The one that sticks in my mind (Cruz & Eden) is "Slave to Love" by Bryan Ferry.

Soap Opera watchers are so embarrassingly white trash and imbecilic, it’s so pathetic

Santa Barbara had some incredible lead characters -- Cruz, Eden, Mason, Julia, CC, Sophia and Gina as well as Lionel and Augusta.

And all of them with the exception of Julia were characters there from the very beginning. Julia would join about 10 months into the show's run, starting in May 1985. Lionel and Augusta would come and go over the years, but they were there from the start.

But beyond those core characters, show had a hard time developing other characters. None of them stood out or shined as brightly as that core group mentioned above.

Looking at the list of attendees at the reunion, I was scratching my head trying to remember many of them.

R56. What the FUCK kind of run-on sentence was that?! Replace the last comma with a period. Then capitalize "it's" while adding a period after "pathetic." Also, adding "embarrassingly" to "white trash" is an oxymoron, but with your wordsmithing skills, I'm sure you knew that!

Tell 'em, Nancy!

After they dumped the Lockridges, the show would try to introduce a new core family every year.

They tried to build the Donnelly family around Frank Runyeon-after 9 months he was the only one left.

They introduced the DiNapoli family, with Signy Coleman and Tawny Kitaen playing sisters-they were gone in less than a year.

They tried giving Gina a mother (Stella Stevens) and a brother (Steve Bond)-they were gone in a year.

They introduced the wealthy Richards family-they were written out in six months.

Then they gave up and brought back the Lockridges.

r60 That list is very revealing. They sure went through a lot of supporting families that never caught on.

Here's another one for your list -- The Walker Family headed by Kim Zimmer with Eric Close and Sydney Penny.

They only came on in 1992, so had less than a year before the show was canceled in January 1993.

Would they have survived longer than a year? No idea, but with Kim Zimmer (Jodie) heading up the family, it suggests the Walkers weren't going to disappear suddenly, like so many of the other families.

And then having Cruz and Jodie's daughter, BJ (Sydney Penny), romance, then marry Warren Lockrididge, it also suggested longevity.

I didn’t understand why they fired Carrington Garland. I thought she was great as Kelly and had good chemistry with Roscoe Born. She also looked like Marcy Walker and gave Kelly an edge-there was a sibling rivalry between Eden and Kelly that made sense,, since Eden was the golden child in the Capwell family.

She was replaced by Eileen Davidson, who I love, but was not Kelly.

Show started off with the Perkins family and they were all completely gone within a year. For some unexplained reason the Joe Perkins character never seemed to catch fire; neither the Dane Witherspoon version or the Mark Arnold version.

So, the show just decided to abandon the family altogether, killing off Joe, sending Jade off to later become Jennifer Rose Horton, and I don't even remember what happened to Amy after she was pregnant by the king of some never-before-heard-of European monarchy.

Meanwhile, the show stuck with the Andrade family for many more years, but seemed to accept pretty quickly they were going to be relegated to supporting characters. Rosa was there as the Capwell maid throughout, the ultimate in supporting roles.

But if Santana hadn't been so vital to the original plots of the show -- being the birth mother of Capwell heir Brandon, whom Gina adopted -- I wonder if the show would have stuck with the Andrade family at all.

R48 This twitter account posted quite a few videos and photos

Lots of content on this account.

Interview from 2000 with Jerome and Bridgett Dobson.

A fascinating read.

R63, wasn’t Amy paired with a character named Brock (Wallace?)?

I remember thinking that the actor who played Brock was so sexy.

Thank you posting that interview, R66. I find the Dobson fascinating.

R67

It was Brick Wallace and yes he was paired with Amy.

Turned out he was the real Channing Capwell III.

Sophia was pregnant with Lionel’s baby and Minx couldn’t allow a Lockridge to be raised as a Capwell so she managed to purchase a circus baby (fake Channing) and swapped the newborns. That Minx!

But Minx loved and watched over her grandson from afar while he was raised by his circus family. When he reached adulthood she made arrangements for him to come to Santa Barbara to work for her. Where he met Amy and fell in love.

Anyway after many adventures, the truth came out. It was all very dramatic but in the end Sophia and Lionel begged forgiveness (for what I don’t know) and told Brick how much they loved him and then…

Brick left town. Yup. Up and disappeared.

Amy was paired with Brick, who was Sophia and Lionel’s illegitimate son. He was played by Richard Eden.

Bridget Dobson inferred more than once that the character of Mason , and his rocky relationship with his father, were inspired by her relationship with her parents.

Whenever we talk about this show , I am always reminded of Bridget Dobson racing to the podium to accept the Emmy for Best Show, after they had been locked out of the studio by NBC. Jill Phelps is behind her, livid that she had been upstaged.

The network should have allowed the Dobsons to fire Anne Howard Bailey as headwriter, which led to the lockout. Ann Marcus would have been perfect for this show, having written Days, Mary Hartman and Falcon Crest.

R70, one of the best moments in the history of daytime television!

JFP can’t hide her contempt. She’s sure no actor. R70

Come on. Bridget was beyond a cunt! What a nasty ass bitch.

Bridget tried to fire Anne Howard Bailey, the head writer...which caused the lockout of the Dobsons by NBC.

I never understood what her issue was with Bailey. Anyone know the scoop?

This article from Michael Logan gives more detail r74.

Bridgie was a nasty old cunt. Even Jerry couldn’t stand her but he had no balls to leave her.

The only people I have heard bitch about the Dobsons were nasty cunts themselves-Jill Farren Phelps and Helen Wagner. Who else had a problem with them?

From SOD

Marshy Water needs a filter!

Kristen Meadows looks like Kathy Griffin if she went to a red carpet event 12 hours after getting a facelift.

Michael Brainard looks like someone’s kindly grandfather with a toy train collection.

Carrington Garland looks fantastic. The rest of them look like the before pictures for a plastic surgery ad, or the after pictures of a botched plastic surgery proxedure.

Never ever would have guessed that’s Kristen Meadows, the giver of blowjobs to Paul Rauch. And he fired her anyway. lol

Three of the biggest hacks in daytime-Robert Guza, Chuck Pratt and Jill Farren Phelps-got their start on Santa Barbara.

R82 Wrong! They all had daytime jobs before Santa Barbara. Phelps was working at GL in the mid 70’s and then went to GH before SB. Guza was at GH early in his career.

Did Jill Farren Phelps work at Guiding Light before she started working in the music department of General Hospital?

I should have rephrased-their first jobs as headwriter/EP were on Santa Barbara

Yes, the same Santa Barbara that won tons of Emmys, including 3 in a row as Best Show. Guza, Pratt and Phelps are all multiple Emmy winners. They must have done something right.

R86. They each had their moments, I'll stand with you on that. Towards the ends of their careers though, none of them were up to par with their heydays.

I loved the Carnation Killer storyline.

Joe Marinelli has died.