Jung und Leidenschaftlich - Wie das Leben so spielt

As The World Turns started on my birthday in 1956. I was in high school and since the show was only 1/2 hour, I was able to watch it on my lunch hour. I have watched it all these years and really love it. ATWT has produced some great actors and actresses. I loved Meg Ryan as Betsy and Julianne Moore as Franny. I thought Brian Bloome was terrific as Dusty. I was very saddened when the Judge and then Christopher Hughes died. I feel I have grown old with Bob, Kim and Lisa. I wish some of the older actresses could be brought back. I really miss Frannie and Betsy. This year (April 2, 2006) I will have been watching this show for 50 years. So, happy birthday to me and to As The World Turns.

As the World Turns is a piece of Americana culture. Cast members like Helen Wagner, Bob Hastings, Eileen Fulton, Kathryn Hays, Colleen Zenk Pinter, Marie Masters, Elizabeth Hubbard, Larry Bryggman etc. have really helped make my days sometimes. The show was created Irna Phillips, the creator of daytime television. From her ideas, she created the world of Oakdale, Illinois. Helen Wagner should be given many honors besides a Lifetime Emmy Award. Next year, she will be celebrating 50 years of playing the same character on daytime television. Where are the accolades that go with such an achievement? She deserves a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and even to be an honoree at the John Fitzgerald Kennedy Center Honors. Don't stop there! She should be inducted into the television hall of fame for her contributions to television. I think CBS is the best, most supportive network of the three. While Guiding Light needs ever viewer, this year will determine both Guiding Light and As The World Turns future. If you want to know where Desperate Housewives' ideas came from, this is the place and it has been there for most of our lives. I just wish more people would appreciate the fine quality of work that these cast of brilliant actors do for daytime. I would like to see prime time players do the hectic schedules of any daytime player. It goes unappreciated. The story lines have not been the same since Douglas Marland's death but his legacy is his creative contributions to the show like the Snyder family. I will never forget the Angel incest storyline as the most shocking entertaining informing and brilliant portrayal ever anywhere else. Marland weaved stories like his predecessors Irna Phillips, Agnes Nixon, Bill Bell, etc. He is sorely missed even now. I hope As the World Turns and Guiding Light live on television forever so please give daytime a try. You might like it better than prime time, I usually do and I have watched it for 20 years.

For me, ironically enough, it was '84, when Meg Ryan left and was replaced with Lindsey Frost, that I started watching.

Doug Marland became the writer and suddenly this show was truly different from the other soaps.

We got the Snyder farm family and Lily Walsh was recast.

The standout situation to me was Lucinda Walsh shoving Susan Stewart into that Christmas tree and injuring Susan's back. Susan is in the hospital and the gloating Lucinda pays her a visit.

Susan, a recovering alcoholic, becomes addicted to the pain killers for her back. Kim Hughes is helping her son, Andy Dixon, deal with his alcoholism after the bad girl he loved, Julie, has dumped him for Tonio Reyes.

Turns out it was Lucinda who brought Julie to town to begin with.

Kim's husband, Bob Hughes, feels ignored by Kim. He aids Susan with her withdrawal, and next thing you know, the pristine Bob Hughes is having a one night stand with Susan, whose husband Dan had had an affair with Kim decades earlier.

But the fun didn't end there.

Bob and Kim learned they had a long lost daughter, Sabrina Fullerton (originally played by Julianne Moore).

Sabrina (later played by Claire Beckman) was not the most welcoming person. She would feel sorry for the villianous Tonio Reyes (Peter Boynton), giving him all her inheritance from her adopted parents.

Bob would learn of Tonio's evil deeds, and attempt to stop him.

Tonio shot Bob in the back, then fled to South America with Sabrina.

As they drove across the outback, Tonio began confessing to Sabrina all he had done; the lies, the thievery and even shooting her father.

Tonio would say very calmly "Don't try to escape"

Sabrina would respond "I have no where to run to. You've seen to that."

I couldn't believe I had just heard such a powerhouse line in a soap opera.

There would be more, with Julie on the rebound from Caleb Snyder and Holden broken up with Lily, Julie and Holden would have the infamous one night stand that would rebound throughout the show with Julie getting pregnant.

Andy would deliver the baby with Snyder sister Iva, who would adopt the baby.

It was all amazing to watch.

Then Kim would have to trust Bob and Susan again when they went to South America to do medical duties and they vanished. Turns out they had been kidnapped and had to operate on the wounded Tonio Reyes!

Remarkable show.

When Conor Jameson was recast, and Neal Alcott (Mary Kay Adams) left the show (she was murdered), it was losing its fun.

Doug Marland would die as the murderer was revealed, but it wasn't exciting.

Then Iva Snyder would suddenly marry and leave the show, and so did I.

Ah well. The moment was gone.

But what a moment it was!

This show, the first half-hour soap opera, had the classic soap opera setting - a suburb with two families who were good friends. Three and later four or five generations of these families were featured. The two families were the Hughes (middle-class) and the wealthier Lowell family. Chris and Nancy Hughes had a more secure marriage than did Jim and Claire Lowell. In fact, Chris's sister had an affair with Jim, who later divorced and was killed. The show was the first to offer the teen romance of Penny and Jeff. Penny's friend Ellen, after being rejected by Don Hughes, had an affair with a married, older doctor and bore an illegitimate son The Hughes family's storylines were more conventional and less plot driven, but those of the Lowell family were daring for their time. Penny and Jeff eloped, but the marriage was annulled. Later, they had a grand wedding to which the viewers were actually invited to attend at the end of the program. The show moved very slowly in the early days. The ratings were not the greatest, but eventually this show became the number one rated soap opera. 1960 proved to be a good year for the show. Don Hastings, Henderson Forsythe, Patricia Bruder, and Eileen Fulton all joined the show that year. Ms. Fulton, as Lisa, was the first great bad lady who was hated by the public. The role was originally intended to be a minor, short role, but the performances of Ms. Fulton insured that the audience would immediately notice the character. In 1965, the production company and network spun-off Lisa to a twice-a-week primetime soap opera called Our Private World. Irna Phillips, the show's creator and headwriter, left the show in the late 1960s. The show struggled creatively. Eventually Ms. Phillips returned, but the ratings had suffered. Ms. Phillips killed off a lot of the Lowell relatives during a short period of time. She was eventually fired from the show herself. Two other headwriting teams (Robert Sonderberg and Edith Sommer, Ralph Ellis and Eugenie Hunt) were able to keep the show interesting. (Others had failed.) But, later, a former actor from the show, Douglas Marland, became the headwriter on two occasions. By the time of his second term, the show had lost so many of the previous characters and had failed to add any new, interesting ones that the show seemed lost. Mr. Marland allowed the unthinkable to happen when the sister-in-law of the show's leading physician (Kim) who had once had an affair with the doctor, was allowed to marry him after the death of her sister. The show continued its downward slide while Mr. Marland and his successors wrote the show. Helen Wagner (Nancy), Don Hastings (Bob), and Eileen Fulton (Lisa) continue on the program today. And the show lights up whenever these performers are given occasionally good storylines or even scenes. But the show has continued to stray away from the core families - always a bad sign for a soap opera.

The number of nominations this soap opera received at the 2001 Daytime Emmy Awards is just one indicator of how excellent this show has been lately. The writing has been especially good, and the acting seems much better than most daytime fare. Of particular interest is the dual roles of long-estranged twin sisters Lily/Rose played to perfection by the talented Martha Byrne. Her scenes opposite herself are brilliant.

This soap opera's best feature, though, is the pace at which story lines move along. There is no spoon-feeding the audience. You have to watch consistently to get involved in the plots: there are no recaps of the past month's twists. Conversely, there have been incredible flashbacks and memories using real original footage from as far back as the series first season (1956). This really adds a warm sense of continuity for characters like Nancy Hughes, played since the beginning by Helen Wagner.