... that beginning being 1970. Susan Lucci often said that she was lucky in that she did not have a long slow rise to the top. She started out of college as the star of "All My Children" and was never really toppled from that position. At age 23 she played the high school brat, the kid that liked to take boys away from other girls just to hurt both of them in the end, trying to compensate for a famous movie making father who deserted her and her long suffering mother. When the show ended in 2011, I was somewhat sad, given that the disappearance of most soap operas was due to the arrival of cheaply produced reality shows, not so much a lack of ratings. Why pay Susan Lucci to act like a spoiled brat when people will behave like rutting pigs for free if they feel people are watching them, the network suits figured? However, perhaps in retrospect it was a good time to end the show. Lucci was within months of being eligible for Medicare by that time, and although she was remarkably well preserved, all good things must come to an end.
One of the big changes in soap operas to come around was in the mid 1970s when soaps began to introduce wealthy dynastic families and business power struggles as the center of the story lines versus ordinary people dealing with infidelity, divorce, sex and pregnancy before marriage - things that in general were discussed among the actresses playing housewives at the kitchen table over a cup of coffee. All My Children introduced first the Cortlandts to fill that spot in the late 1970's and then Adam Chandler as a rival businessman to the Cortlandts, with bad blood going back to the West Virginia hills from which both families came and the feud having very personal roots.
Finally there is Phoebe, who was the matriarchal version of Erica, who thought that her blue blood and full bank accounts made her better than anybody else and that she knew best for all concerned, and had no more problem meddling in other people's lives than Erica did. Played by Ruth Warrick, she did a splendid job at the role from the show's inception until then end of her life when her illness made her unable to continue regular appearances.
Several acting careers started here - Sara Michele Gellar, for example, later became the star of the long running TV series "Buffy The Vampire Slayer". Several acting careers ended here with good long running parts such as Ruth Warrick as Phoebe Tyler, David Canary as Adam Chandler, and James Mitchell as Palmer Cortlandt.
Here is where I usually say "catch it if you can", but you can't since the only soap opera ever put on DVD was "Dark Shadows", and there isn't even a Soap Net channel anymore because so few soap operas still exist. Look for the remains of this show on youtube. Some enterprising individuals have put some portions even from the early 1970's out on youtube. I don't know what they were using in the early 70s to record. Was there such a thing as a squirrel powered Betamax in 1970?
