More on the Half-Year in Soaps

Carolyn Hinsey writes the "It's Only My Opinion" column in Soap Opera Digest and serves as one-half of the "Dueling Divas" in Soap Opera Weekly.
I would love to have her job. She gets paid to watch soaps and write two catty (kinda) columns in two national magazines. Of course, I'm sure there is much more to her job than that, but wouldn't it be fun to find out.

Hinsey's SOD column reads like a blog. She writes in a breezy, webster style. You know, the same way any soap fan would write if given the chance. Just like a some blogs, e-mailed opinions from her many readers appear at the bottom of her column. And Hinsey must have struck a nerve. Most of the people who comment write in her style.

Hinsey can be a bit reactionary and just doesn't get it about the crime of rape. Memo to Carolyn: The victim does not have to scream, fight, bite, etc. for the act to be rape. Battery is intentional, unwanted touching. It does not require that the victim respond in any particular way. I hope you never are called to serve on the jury of a rape case. No matter what the judge instructs about the law, erroneous pre-conceived notions can be hard
to put aside.

Hinsey relies on stock phrases a lot. "That's funny," "I'm not buyin' it," and "play all the beats" are just a few of the comments she uses over and over. I am guessing that working under a deadline and with few constraints are the reasons for this.

One annoying web habit is the practice of combining the made-up prefix nu- with a soap character's name whenever a new actor is cast in an established role. Grayson McCouch of As the World Turns is nuDusty for just one example. Hinsey didn't create this usage, but she could do her part to retire the term if she stopped using it.

Also, I am not sure why soap fans cannot accept recasts. Shows have to recast roles because young, good-looking actors want to move on to greener pastures. Is this anything new? Fans (and critics) strain for any reason not to like someone: He/she looks nothing like the previous actor; he/she looks just like the previous actor but doesn't sound like him/her or hasn't grasped the role; is too old (nuLucky on General Hospital) or too young (nuJoey on One Life to Live); his/her personality has changed; the actor is okay but the powers that be botched his/her backstory. Those last two accusations have been unfairly hurled at McCouch. Oh sure, McCouch's Dusty Donovan is cute, sexy, etc,. But ATWT fans know that Dusty was not best friends with Paul. Paul's best friend was Andy. And Dusty is evil now. So those things are McCouch's fault? Turn in Hogan Sheffer (ATWT's Head Writer) to the Continuity Police. Don't blame McCouch, whose swaggering, sleazy take on Dusty has made a huge splash on ATWT. (A quibble with the wardrobe people--when Dusty debute it was cold outside, yet he was often shirtless. Now it is summer and he is always in dark colors and wearing a jacket.) Perhaps Sheffer can be forgiven. When Brian Bloom left the show years ago, his Dusty was a good-looking, honorable young man. But he had debuted as a not-terribly-good-looking pre-teen brat. Young Dusty hung out with younger kid Paul and tried to lead him astray. Maybe they weren't best friends, but neither were they strangers. Young Master Donovan was a bad kid. McCouch's incarnation could be Dusty returning to his former relationship and the nasty behavior that went with it.

Casting About

Casting changes are a big story in soaps this year. ATWT and other CBS shows have benefitted mightily from actors moving around. Along with McCouch, ATWT has recently acquired Real Andrews as forensic investigator Dr. Walker Daniels (recently Taggart on GH), John James as Dr. Eric (Rick) Decker (James was my hero as Jeff Colby on Dynasty in the 80's. Alas, Dr. Decker has been revealed as a serial killer, so James will be leaving the show), Bailey Chase as Dr. Chris Hughes, and Roger Howarth (Todd from OLTL) in the oft recast role of Paul Ryan. He is nuPaul to McCouch's nuDusty. (Yeah, I know I'm not doing my part to retire that no-longer-clever term). Jennifer Ferrin just debuted as Paul's half-sister Jennifer. I am going to withold judgment for now. She appears to be better than the previous actress who was anemic, but at times she seems to be looking past her scene partners at cue cards. (I was under the impression that ATWT didn't use cue cards). Hope I'm wrong about what she is doing. Chase is the weakest of the bunch. Many times, he doesn't seem to know what to do with his eyes (cue cards again?). Worse, he can barely talk. One day I clearly heard him save "lifes" as the plural form of the noun "life."
My dictionary and thirty-odd years of readin' and writing' tell me that the plural is "lives" with a "v!!!!" My opinion must not count for much, however. Chase tied with veteran Michael Park as favorite ATWT actor in one of SOD's fan polls.

Howarth's switch from OLTL's Todd to ATWT's Paul has to be the biggest casting story of the year thus far. (Vanessa Marcil leaving GH after just a few months would be a strong candidate for a tie. But Marcil's departure was not all that unexpected, given the conditions of her return). Howarth is one of a slew of ABC actors to "defect" to CBS this year. Actually the trend started over a year ago when Cady McClain left her role as Dixie on
All My Children supposedly to pursue other career options. Shortly thereafter she ended up on ATWT as nuRosanna. Other ABC actors who have come to CBS are Sydney Penny, Keith Hamilton Cobb, and Real Andrews. Penny has played roles on other soaps, and was not on contract at AMC, so her choice to go to The Bold and the Beautiful is not surprising. Andrews was not being used much as Detective Taggart on GH, so again his decision to go to a show that immediately showcased him in a big story makes sense. Cobb is a bit of a mystery. He left AMC with some pretty public remarks about not being used. He had refused returning to the role that made him a soap star and had refused opportunities to go to other soaps. Maybe he could no longer afford to hold out for
movies and prime time roles. I don't watch B&B or Y&R, so I have no idea how Penny and Cobb are doing. I do watch ATWT and can report that Andrews is pretty good. His sometimes halting line delivery takes some getting used to. I'd like to believe that he is making a conscious decision as an actor to make it appear that his character chooses his words carefully. At least he hasn't made up any words yet. Both SOD and SOW have speculated that all the ABC actors going to CBS shows has to do with former ABC daytime executive Barbara Bloom taking the VP Daytime position at CBS. Bloom claims that CBS is not going after ABC actors. The network is simply trying to get the best actors for each role. (Ms. Bloom, please explain Bailey Chase).

But back to Howarth. He won an Emmy playing OLTL's Todd as a menacing rapist. The show then attempted to turn the character into a romantic lead, albeit with lots of demons. Howarth had left the role several times over the years and had voiced displeasure at changing Todd from a villain to a sexy anti-hero. However, he'd always returned to OLTL and had never appeared on another soap during his absences. Howarth stopped talking to the soap press years ago, so fans have heard nothing from his mouth about why he chose to take over the role of Paul Ryan. In the July 15, 2003 issue of SOD, ATWT's Head Writer Hogan Sheffer says, "We knew that he hated playing Todd and hated the fact that there was an attempt to take such a violent, base character and turn him into a romantic hero." Leaving his signature role was an act of conscience for Howarth. If so, he is not the only soap performer to do so this year. The same SOD issue reported that Deanna Wright, who plays Kay on Passions, has decided to leave her role because the character is at odds with her Christian beliefs. I applaud both Howarth and Wright for taking stances in favor of moral uprightness, something so rarely seen these days, even among the self-righteous. I don't know if Howarth is a Christian or just an enlightened male who understands rape and its ramifications.

Howarth's predecessor, Scott Holroyd, would have been more than capable of playing the embittered, transformed Paul whose fiance, best friend and mother have done him wrong. But I would not have wanted to miss Howarth's take on the character. He's smart-aleck and passionate, ready to take on his father, his mother, Dusty, Rose--anyone who crosses him. No longer the voice of reason, Paul has no qualms about starting a fracas over his family's dinner plans or asserting his agenda to protect sibs Jennifer and Paul from their blood-sucking mother. (Turns out Port Charles is not the only soap with vampires.) Yet he is playful, too. Loved his sparring with McClain's uptight Rosanna. When he told her "This is fun," I wondered if he meant that in character or as a comparison to what he had to do at OLTL. Howarth's Paul seems capable of evildoing without being truly evil. Is this nuandimprovedTodd, perhaps?