Sacrifice

One of the great things that has occurred on GL in 2007 has been the resurgence of Vanessa and Matt and the story of their marriage. In a strangely ironic twist, the characters and the actors are more interesting now than they have ever been, but the effort exerted by the show to play their story is meager at best with most of the major events of their lives going on off-screen.

I have never been what you would call a Vanessa/Matt fan, but I must admit to looking back on their past a bit more more fondly now than I did before mainly because Maeve Kinkead and Kurt McKinney are doing such boffo work in the present. That's one of the reasons that I've chosen to present Sacrifice in this, the first entry of the second year of the GLMP blog.

Sacrifice occurs in February of 1999 and covers the events that spill out from Dinah's shooting of Hart and Vanessa's subsequent spiriting of Dinah out of Springfield. Wendy Moniz (still the definitive Dinah for many viewers) gives a blockbuster performance in the early section of this clipset, both in her tearful goodbye with Kinkead's Vanessa and in the montage that recalls Dinah's entire relationship with Hart.

The central event of this set though is the effect of Matt's perceived betrayal of Vanessa when he exposes to the police her complicity in Dinah's escape, an act which lands Vanessa in jail. This sets up a series of emotionally brutal fights that sweeps Beth, Ross, Lillian, and others up into their drama. Beth especially does not come off especially well in this set, being as she was one of the characters that suffered the worst under the barely coherent regime of Barbara Esensten and James Harmon Brown.

One final exciting feature of this clipset is that it features some of the earliest appearances of Orlagh Cassidy as Doris Wolfe. Even in these early scenes, Cassidy displays a glimmer of the potent characterization that she would bring to Doris years later.

Less effective is the hospital drama surrounding Hart's fight for life as he combats the influence an actual Angel of Death (thank you Esensten and Brown!), but Sacrifice remains an interesting look at Vanessa, Matt, Dinah, and the characters that surround them.

Sacrifice--

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If It Isn't Love

This week, we step back into the life of Amanda Spaulding, this time in 1982. If It Isn't Love deals with treacherous Mark Evans (played by Mark Pinter who would return to GL in 2003 as Brad Green) as he toys with the affections of Jennifer Richards and her daughter Amanda.
There's a scene a little more than halfway through this clipset that shows Amanda in control at the Spaulding offices, giving instructions to her secretary over the phone and being quite the commanding presence at work. It occurred to me what a radical change that was from the frightened, artistic girl that Amanda was in her first years in Springfield (see the Mountains blog entry for example).

I can't help but wonder how that change was received by viewers at the time, especially in this age of vociferous outcry whenever a character does something or changes in a way that displeases his or her fans. Obviously, in the hands of Doug Marland, these changes were handled more gradually and were explained better, but still this is a very different Amanda than the one viewers first met in 1978 and grew to love in the ensuing years.

It's also worth mentioning that headwriter Marland's work on the show ends abruptly in the middle of this set. As many GL historians are aware, Marland quit GL after his friend Jane Elliot was fired from the show and her character, Carrie Marler, was taken off the canvas. Maybe it's because I know this that the post-Marland scenes seem so different to me. Certainly the tone of the Amanda/Mark/Jennifer triangle seems to become more overt and pedestrian and the plot is suddenly very convoluted. I don't know exactly how many (if any) of Marland's plans were retained after he quit, but I do see a change in the quality of the storytelling after his departure.

That said, this is still a very entertaining and, at times, heartbreaking set, especially the section that deals with Amanda's discovery of Jennifer and Mark's marriage, juxtaposed with Morgan's joy at the event and Carrie's (or rather one of Carrie's alters') pleasure at Amanda's suffering. As with any storyline involving Amanda, the work of Kathleen Cullen in the role makes the entire thing worthwhile and this is a very interesting look at the evolution of the character.

Also of note is the presence of early-going versions of Josh, Ross, and Vanessa.

And so, enjoy If It Isn't Love--
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Please join us next week as we celebrate the 1 year anniversary of the GLMP blog!