Nelson Branco's SOAP OPERA UNCENSORED: Issue 53 Read online

SOAP OPERA UNCENSORED

  Volume 02, Issue 43 (No. 53)

  BY NELSON BRANCO

  Copyright 2012 Nelson Branco

  INSIDE — UNCENSORED’S 1-YEAR ANNIVERSARY ISSUE — THE TRUE MAN SHOW: EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH Y&R’S MICHAEL MUHNEY: THE RETURN OF ADAM NEWMAN AS GENOA CITY’S LEADING MAN; THE LATEST ON THE DAYTIME EMMY AWARDS; THE MAGIC THAT IS SHARON CASE; WORKING WITH THE DYNAMIC DUO OF JOSH AND JILL; WHO DOES ADAM REALLY LOVE, SHARON OR CHELSEA; AND THE LATEST ON HIS NEWBORN SON, TRUMAN! — Y&R: Is Michael Graziadei Out? — SUPER-SIZED GH RETURNS — Did Steve Burton Throw Shade At GH On Twitter? — B&B WELCOMES MORE VETS FOR STEPHANIE’s GOODBYE — What I Learned From Watching DALLAS: Season 1, 2 — CONTROVERSY: WHY FANS ARE IN AN UPROAR OVER TODD AND CARLY ON GH! — Best-Selling UNCENSORED Issues! — WHY LAURALEE BELL’S LIFE IS BETTER NOW THAT MAB IS OUT OF Y&R —Top 10 Ways To Reboot GH — LAST WEEK REVIEWS! — Casting Coach! SOAP PORN! UNCENSORED Quotes Of The Week!

  UNCENSORED MASTHEAD:

  FOUNDER/EDITOR: Nelson Branco

  EDITOR AT LARGE: Denette Wilford

  SUBSCRIPTION DIRECTOR: Karen Anderson

  Follow Soap Opera Uncensored at: @nelliebranco or @SoapUncensored

  SPECIAL 1-YEAR ANNIVERSARY SPECIAL SUBSCRIPTION RATE:

  Next issue, UNCENSORED celebrates its one-year anniversary. For one week only, email [email protected] for information on how to subscribe for $20.00/year.

  1-Year Normal Rate: $24.99 (*normally $129.48)

  *Based on $2.49 e-newsstand price

  COMING SOON: VENICE — UNCENSORED

  To pre-order the upcoming book, VENICE: THE SERIES — UNCENSORED, at a special price email: [email protected]. The Sapphic tome, which will be out this fall, chronicles the web soap’s meteoric rise, punctuates and analyzes its relevance in serial storytelling and its groundbreaking achievements in the online and soap opera medium. With every single Crystal Chappell interview I’ve ever conducted in one e-book — and those of her VENICE co-stars/directors — this is one must-buy keepsake in addition to episode synopses and reviews, top ten lists, fearless predictions, translated quotes, humour, and exclusive season four previews. Plus: Tributes to GUIDING LIGHT’s Otalia and new interviews! Order your copy now!

  Say What?

  UNCENSORED QUOTES OF THE WEEK

  “Wow. Can u imagine? What is GH doing?”

  —Steve Burton on Twitter after a fan tweeted he/she was worried Maurice Benard hadn’t re-signed with GH yet

  Translation: Hello fire, let me pour some gas on you.

  “When I first heard Susan was retiring [from the role], I went to [exec producer] Brad Bell and said, ‘What will we do? How do we handle this? What's going to happen to me?’ [Laughs] Because, as an actor, it's all about me, of course! But Brad is using this great loss to refocus B&B in a new, really exciting direction. This is a huge change for our show and for me, personally. Eric has kind of been in Stephanie's shadow in recent years, even in business. [Laughs] Even in mourning! She won't even let him grieve the way he wants to grieve. She's running everything from the catbird seat, telling everyone how to be sad! But, yeah, Eric will be getting his power back.”

  —B&B’s John McCook in a lively and candid interview with TV GUIDE’s Michael Logan regarding his co-star Susan Flannery’s upcoming exit

  Translation 1: Hurry up and die already, Stephanie!

  Translation 2: I’m so never having a storyline ever again!

  “One of the foreign journalists who covers B&B asked me, ‘Is the loss of Susan Flannery the beginning of the end for your show?’ I said, ‘You stop right there! This is the end of the first 25 years. This is only the end of the beginning. And now there's a new beginning.’”

  —McCook in the same interview

  Translation 1: Nelson Branco asks the stupidest questions!

  Translation 2: No, Steffy/Liam/Hope marked the end of our show!

  “Oh, hell no! [Laughs] I always tell [my wife] Laurette, "One day they'll call you from B&B and say, 'He's dead. Come get him!' I want to be the really old guy on our show. I want to be Macdonald Carey. I don't want to quit. There's no reason for an actor to quit! I think Susan's gonna miss this like crazy, the camaraderie on the set, all the bullshitting with the crew, the excitement of a job well done. For God's sake, I want to keep showing up no matter what's wrong with me. A severe limp? Gastric problems? Puh-leeze. I'm going to act until I can't!”

  —McCook on the possibility of ever retiring

  Translation 1: Like sands through the hourglass, I still can’t act.

  "She uses her phony online persona called 'Brittni' to form a relationship with Jamie and draw information out of him — deeply personal and hurtful stuff about his past troubles with the law — and then she blasts it out to everyone on FacePlace. She'll also be using texting and instant messaging to disparage him further."

  —Josh Griffith on Y&R’s new cyber bullying storyline involving Summer

  Translation 1: We took a page out of Victoria Rowell’s playbook.

  Translation 2: Just call Summer, ONE LIFE TO LIVE’s Marty Saybrooke 2.0; Ronan, Reverend Andrew 2.0; and Jamie, Billy Douglas 2.0.

  Translation 3: Which means I have Susan Haskell-like plans for Hunter Haley King.

  “I certainly didn’t have high expectations for myself.”

  —Katie Couric in the NY DAILY NEWS regarding her fledgling talk show, KATIE

  Translation 1: Neither did anyone else!

  Translation 2: Which is why I invited Jessica Simpson as my first guest.

  “So many people who work on web series have Emmys.”

  —B&B’s Katherine Kelly Lang in DIGEST regarding her producing work on THE GROVE and VENICE

  Translation: I’m trying a new strategy!

  “I was so naïve, I thought, ‘Maybe I can do this [professionally].’”

  —GH hair model Lindsey Morgan on the moment she decided to act after almost nabbing a series lead on FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS

  Translation: Computer says, “No.”

  “We’re definitely getting off it, right? We don’t have to repopulate [laughs]? I would have to say Brandon Barash.”

  —GH’s Bradford Anderson on which GH co-star he’d like to be stuck on a desert island with

  Translation: Because you know I’d be carrying the baby.

  Cover Story

  THE TRUE MAN SHOW

  Y&R’s Michael Muhney returns to the front burner to reclaim what is rightfully his. Plus: daytime’s most exciting leading man welcomes his newborn son, Truman Muhney!

  “No man is rich enough to buy his own past.”

  —Oscar Wilde

  On the critically-acclaimed cable drama BREAKING BAD, Bryan Cranston’s Walter White organically evolves from the protagonist to antagonist of his own story over the course of several seasons.

  Likewise, on daytime’s number-one soap opera, Michael Muhney’s Adam Newman is involved in a similar narrative experiment. However, Adam’s journey is the opposite of Walter’s: the son of “The Great Victor Newman” has successfully navigated from being the show’s antagonist to its protagonist. (Adam’s also acts his own antagonist.)

  Which is why Adam Newman is the most fascinating character on daytime TV. And, by proxy, Michael Muhney is daytime’s most thrilling leading man.

  It’s been an interesting year for the Chicago, Illinois native. Criminally, he failed to earn a final 2012 Daytime Emmy Award nomination as Outstanding Lead Actor after leading the charge for some much-needed Emmy reform just before he delivered another tour-de-force performance when Adam lost his eyesight. After this inspired game-c
hanging storyline, Muhney was suspiciously thrown on the backburner for the entire summer with arguably lesser actors.

  But then a miracle happened: absent showrunner Maria Arena Bell was ousted in favour of Emmy-winning soap vet Josh Griffith, who stepped in as the skilled and passionate scribe of daytime’s number-one soap.

  Around the same time, the 37-year-old thespian was offered the lead role in a huge prime-time series; but Muhney did something arguably none of his co-stars or soap peers would’ve done: he bet everything on Y&R and decided to continue playing the Michael Corleone of daytime, as soap blogger “Y&R Critic” brilliantly pointed out recently.

  And he’s been rewarded nicely: Within one episode of the executive switch, Adam returned to the front burner and is back into the Newman sphere making Genoa City must-see TV.

  If that wasn’t enough to warrant space in this week’s issue, Muhney and his wife, Jaime, welcomed their third son into the world, Truman, this past Sunday. “Truman is 7 pounds 3