Pat Falken Smith: “Most people I know are living soap operas'”

Pat Falken Smith: The Drama and the Lawsuits

By: Michael Poirier

“If ever I knew a litigious person, it was Pat, who went to court as often as some people go out for a frozen yogurt,” said Ann Marcus, former headwriter of Days of Our Lives and other soaps, about her hard-charging contemporary Pat Falken Smith.¹

Falken Smith’s colorful career encompassed stints as headwriter of no fewer than five soaps: Days, General Hospital, Guiding Light, Ryan’s Hope and the short-lived Where the Heart Is. Of her tumultuous years in the soap world, she once observed wryly, “Nothing is ever normal in daytime television.”²

It was also very prophetic about her own life, which was as dramatic as the soaps she penned. “I get plots from my own life, she said. ” I’ve been married three times and been around. Most people I know are living soap operas.”³

A native of Minnesota, she began pursuing her writing career in California. She started as a story analyst and writer of special projects at Warner Bros. Soon, she was churning out scripts for Ford Theatre, Playhouse 90, and Climax. Her resume added story editor of Bonanza, and also working on classic shows such as Father of the Bride, Shane, and National Velvet, among others.⁴

According to the comprehensive website, Jason47.com, Falken Smith joined the writing staff of Days of our Lives in May 1966. A few months later, when Bill Bell was hired as Head Writer, she soon departed, only to return in February of 1968.

Her first foray into being in charge of writing a show was in mid-1971 when she took over the racy daytime drama, Where the Heart Is on CBS. How racy was it? I asked actress/writer Louise Shaffer about some of her memories playing Allison Hathaway, one of the show’s complex characters. She said when Claire Labine and Paul Avila Mayer took over from Pat, “David and I did a love scene on a jungle gym and — I think — the hood of a car.”⁵

Unfortunately, due to the noon timeslot, CBS was hiring and firing writers frequently. Falken Smith went back to Days in January of 1972. The following year, Bill Bell was working on creating his own show, The Young and the Restless. His contract made it so he was still in charge of the long term story, but soon Pat was being groomed to take over Days. She became the official Head Writer in May of 1975, just as the show expanded from half an hour to one hour a day.

• Whistling Girl, by Ann Marcus, Mulholland Pacific Publishing, 1998
• The Greenville News, August 16, 1976
• Time Magazine, ‘Sex and Suffering in the Afternoon’, January 12, 1976
• The Greenville News, August 16, 1976
• Email from Louise Shaffer to Michael Poirier, September 17, 1921

Reflecting on her responsibilities, she declared, “When you are writing five hours of film a week, 52 weeks a year with no hiatus, it has to be exciting. You never know what’s going to happen. Especially, because daytime TV does not have the restrictions imposed on nighttime television. There are few areas into which we cannot go.”⁶

Pat’s team took home the daytime Emmy for best writing team in 1976. That same year, she married off daytime’s most popular couple at the time, Doug and Julie. Doug’s portrayer, Bill Hayes remembered that, “Tall and voluptuous Pat Falken Smith thought sexy and wrote sexy. Her scenes were always fun to play.”⁷

However, all was not well at the studio. Early in 1977, Executive Producer Betty Corday, the widow of Ted Corday the creator of Days of Our Lives, began looking for a new Head Writer. She met with veteran scribe Ann Marcus who was praised for her work on Search for Tomorrow, Love is a Many Splendored Thing, Mary Hartman, etc. who was reluctant to take over another show. However, with some convincing, she agreed to do it and Pat, for whatever reason, was out. This action led to her filing a lawsuit.⁸

Ann Marcus reflected on that time. “I’m not exactly sure why she left, but after she did, she sued everyone connected with it- including her ex-husband, NBC, Columbia, Betty Corday, and eventually Ellis and me.”⁹ Pat’s lawsuit was for 12 million dollars, alleging breach of contract and contractual interference.¹⁰

A few months later, the interracial storyline Pat had set up, was dropped by the network. The actors were interviewed about the situation, talking about their dismay about the lack of intimacy. The reporter contacted Falken Smith, who defensively shot back, “In daytime programing, the drama is much stronger when you don’t show intimate love scenes. If Richard and Tina thought it unrealistic that a young engaged couple didn’t kiss, that’s tough. It

1. was my story and gratuitous kissing was not part of it.”¹¹

Two years later, Doug Marland was exiting the top writing spot at General Hospital and Pat was offered the job. Her first day was August 6, 1979.¹²She took the drama and made it even more exciting as ratings kept rising, often capturing the number one spot in the Nielsen ratings, with Young and the Restless and All My Children occasionally taking it as well. She and the innovative Executive Producer Gloria Monty devised a story that would break up young lovers Laura and Scotty and pair her with Luke Spencer. Convinced he was about to be murdered by the mob, Luke raped Laura at the disco. Their chemistry was so strong, that the show eventually

• The Greenville News, August 16, 1976
• Like Sands Through the Hourglass, by Bill & Susan Hayes, New American Library, 2005
• Whistling Girl, by Ann Marcus, Mulholland Pacific Publishing, 1998
• IBID
• The Chicago Tribune, March 27, 1979
• The New York Daily News, June 15, 1977
• The (Memphis) Commercial Appeal, July 18, 1979

stopped calling it rape and called it a seduction. Pat told journalist Linda Hirsch in 1982, “I don’t think we did a rape story, but a seduction story… she panicked and called it rape because she couldn’t face her own sexuality.”¹³ However, viewers watched Laura go to rape counseling, which was also reported in the weekly news synopsis of the soaps. The show revisited it decades later with Luke admitting he did rape Laura.

The show’s popularity continued to soar through 1980, but for whatever reason, One Life to Live co-headwriter Gordon Russell was brought in as a script writer that spring. According to the press, Pat had been assured by the top brass that her job was safe. By July, it was said that Russell would officially take over for her on August 11.¹⁴

Sadly, Russell became “desperately ill” and those plans fell through. He died in January 1981. Pat’s job was safe at the moment.¹⁵

By October of 1980, Pat’s meetings with Gloria Monty were filled with disagreements about the choice of direction for the show. “When I first heard about the Ice Princess story line last October, I said I hated it. We had just been through a ‘running-from-the-mob’ caper. But I tried to right it.”¹⁶

A twist of fate made it easier for Monty to take the show in the direction she preferred as there was a 92-day writers’ strike that lasted from April 11, 1981 through July 12. She, her main consultant A.J. Russell, and the scab writers leaned into the science fiction angle that involved villains who intended to freeze the world.¹⁷

It was during this time period that ABC, through the efforts of Eleanor Timberman, retained novelist Joe DiMona as a consultant for their soaps. Admittedly he did not care for All My Children and One Life to Live, but was intrigued with General Hospital. He soon received a call from Timberman that came with an outrageous request. “Joe, can you freeze Port Charles?”

He proceeded to look up diamonds in his Enycyclopedia Britannica and stopped when he saw the words “carbonic acid”. DiMona phoned her back and said, “Mikos (Cassadine) will use carbonic acid to seed the clouds with weather machine- and the people in Port Charles will be shoveling snow for a year!” The happy executive said she loved it.¹⁸

Falken Smith was appalled at the state of the show when she returned to her office once the strike was over. “At first people thought it was campy. But soon they were beginning to laugh at – not with – us.”

• Soap Opera Digest, June 8, 1982
• Fremont Tribune, July 19, 1980
• The Columbia Record, February 6, 1981
• The Boston Globe, October 1, 1981
• IBID
• Memories of a Soap Opera Writer, by Joseph DiMona, Nostalgia Unlimited Publishing, 1994

By mid-August, according to Smith, she had decided to resign. “I couldn’t stand it any longer. I met with Gloria Monty and Jackie Smith (ABC’s vice-president, daytime programs) and told them I had to leave. The bigger the ratings, the more of a failure I felt. We were all going in different tracks.”¹⁹

And with that, Falken Smith and her entire staff left General Hospital. Very quickly, the situation became volatile as Chicago Sun-Times columnist Gary Deeb claimed Falken Smith had been fired. It wasn’t true, even according to an ABC spokesperson, said the writer, “left of her own volition.” Adding fuel to the fire, ABC exec Jackie Smith publicly said, things, “were not working out satisfactorily.” The scribe claimed Monty, “told members of the cast, the crew, and the directors that she had fired me.” Falken Smith said she would file a libel suit against Deeb unless he issued a retraction.²⁰

Gloria Monty put together a replacement team that included her sister Norma Monty, Joe DiMona, A.J. Russell, Leah Laiman, and Thom Racina.²¹ While Pat was offered a return to Days of Our Lives. Her new assignment was to get the ratings up. What had gone wrong while she was gone from the NBC soap? She decisively answered, “The show had become sterile, confined to upper-middle class Wasps talking about things that had happened off stage.” Although, she didn’t think it would be easy to turn things around.²²

Longtime cast members of Days of Our Lives were elated by Falken Smith’s return. Susan Seaforth Hayes excitedly claimed that Pat, “She’s only created No.1s. She’s accessible; she’s not in an ivory tower. She’s a tall, zaftig redhead.” Susan’s husband Bill commented that he could already see the difference in quality. “The dialogue is colorful and has purpose.”²³

Also colorful was her public battle with her old boss at General Hospital. Pouring out her frustrations, she said Monty was, “a genius” but that, “they were volatile characters together. It wasn’t an easy relationship, but I respect her talent.”

The comments about Monty came fast and furious. “A lady I despise…Gloria’s a people-eater. A people-killer…a liar… a megalomaniac… If the lady wants to write the show herself, let her.”²⁴

Meanwhile, Gary Deeb did eventually print a retraction. As Falken Smith referred to Monty as a, “crummy, insecure broad,” the General Hospital producer admitted the writer had indeed left on her accord, and said nothing more for the moment.²⁵

• The Boston Globe, October 1, 1981
• IBID
• Memories of a Soap Opera Writer, by Joseph DiMona, Nostalgia Unlimited Publishing, 1994
• The Miami News, March 6, 1982
• The Arizona Republic, December 1, 1981
• The Boston Globe, October 1, 1981
• The Tennessean, March 19, 1982.

A television special on soap operas included a back-and-forth between the two. “If the show had been on radio,” hissed Pat, “I’m certain Gloria would have done the acting parts as well.” Perhaps in a sign that she was moving on but not without a final dig, Monty simply said, “Pat and I are dear friends. She was a great writer, and when her sub-writers left with her, they all wrote notes to me saying they were sorry to be leaving.”²⁶

Falken Smith inherited a strangler story from the previous writers, which one critic derided as a “rip-off” of slasher movies like Friday the 13th.²⁷

The original killer, according to the press, was supposed to be Stuart Whyland who was played by Robert Alda. Falken Smith decided to take the story in another direction and made Jake Kositcheck (Jack Coleman), the infamous murderer. His reasoning was his mental unraveling over his fear of impotence leading him to kill sexually active women.²⁸ I interviewed Jack Coleman who played Jake. He said, “I remember Jean Bruce Scott was very upset, because we had become really good friends. She knew that meant I was a dead man. I was not upset. I kind of liked it… go out in a blaze of smoke.”²⁹ when chatting with Catherine Mary Stewart, the original Kayla Brady, she reminisced that, “Nobody knew, so that was kind of great, because we were all sort of anticipating who this horrible person would be.”³⁰

One of the most surprising victims was the character of Mary Anderson who was played by Melinda Fee. Pat had written for the character as it had been previously played by Barbara Stanger, and decided the character was now no longer essential. Fee was at a party when Falken Smith approached her. “Sorry, you’re going to be killed” Upset by recent family tragedies, Fee went to producer Al Rabin to confirm if this was true, When he did, Fee initially claimed she wouldn’t show up for work. Rabin took her concerns seriously and said he’d find a way to make her death “significant.” In a few days told her he’d make her sendoff mean something. She was pleased when she found out her character’s final act would be unmasking the murderer for the audience to see. “The strangler wasn’t supposed to be unmasked until two months later, but they gave that to me as a going away present.”³¹

All was going well, until an article in the entertainment news, hit the papers on April 24, 1982. Doris Worsham reported Pat Falken Smith was out as Head Writer. Columbia Television Pictures refused to comment. However, Margaret DePriest, Falken Smith’s friend and associate Head Writer, told Worsham the following: DePriest says that Falken Smith left the show over a “contractual dispute with Columbia. She said that it could not be resolved and it all happened within two days. We were left a bit breathless.”

• The Clarion Ledger, January 14, 1982
• The Des Moines Register, July 11, 1982
• IBID
  
• Interview via Cameo by Michael Poirier, September 23, 2019
  
• Interview via Cameo by Michael Poirier, December 11, 2020
  
• The Desert Sun, April 2, 1982

“Columbia told me that it was not working out and asked me to take over the show,” DePriest said. “There was no problem with Pat’s direction of the show as I perceive it. I thought the show had improved immensely since she took over. Pat will be missed.”³²

Soap Opera Digest, who had interviewed Pat Falken Smith for the June 8, 1982 issue added a note at the end that read: Ed note: As we go to press, we learn that Pat is no longer with “Days of Our Lives.” Reached for comment, she said, “We came to a mutual parting of ways due to legal difficulties from an old lawsuit. Maggie (DePriest) will be headwriter. She’s had an excellent background and will do a very good job.”³³

By May, Lynda Hirsch was reporting that Falken Smith was looking to take her talents to the growing cable television market.³⁴ Her initial title for the show to be produced on Showtime was The Pressure Cooker.³⁵

In a startling bit of news, Falken Smith was asked to take over Guiding Light, when Douglas Marland quit over the direction of the show.³⁶ His battles with Producer Allen Potter became public, similar to Pat’s battles with Gloria. In fact, Marland recommended her as his replacement.³⁷ Her work would begin on September 27.³⁸

One of her first changes was to cut down on the number of characters seen in an episode. Marland would average about 20 characters a day, Falken Smith preferred to use only 8-10 per episode.³⁹

Starting in November, the press began reporting that Falken Smith had been replaced by L. Virginia Browne.⁴⁰ The powers-that-be told Lynda Hirsch, “It just didn’t work out.”⁴¹

No shrinking violet, Falken Smith spoke with Hirsch to tell her side of the story. “I was stunned, since I had assumed that my option was going to be picked up by the show… Word came to me two days before the option should have been picked up. I did not get word from the show’s producer, Alan Potter, but instead was called by Procter & Gamble official Ed Trach.”

“It was very difficult for me to be writing a New York soap and living on the West Coast… When I first signed on to write for ‘Guiding Light,’ the show was dreadfully behind. In fact, it was not

• The Oakland Tribune, April 24, 1982
• Soap Opera Digest, June 8, 1982
• Green Bay Press Gazette, May 9, 1982
• The Pittsburgh Press, July 25, 1982
• The Courier News, September 18, 1982
• Argus Leader, November 3, 1982
• The Courier News, September 18, 1982
• The Asbury Park Press, September 30, 1982
• Akron Beacon Journal, November 12, 1982
• The News Journal, November 16, 1982

unusual for an actor to be getting his script one day before taping. I literally locked myself into my New York hotel room for two weeks, trying to get the show caught up.”

“Also, when I came on ‘Guiding Light,’ there was to be no head writer per se… I had to deal with long term storyline projections turned in by other writers. None of these were acceptable, and so I took on what amounted to head-writing duties. I felt that I needed to get paid for these duties. I am a good writer, therefore my work does not come cheap. Perhaps it was felt I wanted too much money for my services.”

One aspect of being let go pleased her, she was able to throw herself into creating a daytime soap for NBC based on the Judith Krantz novel, Scruples.⁴² Her other creation for Showtime would now be called, Lone Star Bar & Grille.⁴³ She & NBC forged ahead with their collaboration, described as a prequel to Scruples hoping for a premiere date sometime in the fall of 1983.⁴⁴

The first reviews of Falken Smith’s Lone Star Bar & Grille were not kind. Deborah Morganstern Katz derided the pacing as “slow,” the dialogue being “stiff” and the plot “nonexistent”.⁴⁵ Andrew Edelstein called it “one, turgid production.”⁴⁶

Shortly after Lone Star Bar & Grille closed its production doors, Falken Smith was advised that NBC would not be going forward with Scruples.⁴⁷The decision was likely due to NBC hiring Brian Frons to take over as Vice President of Daytime Programming in the spring of 1983. For whatever reason, he chose instead to work with veteran soap scribes Jerome and Bridget Dobson on their creation, eventually to be called Santa Barbara, which would premiere July 30, 1984. (A new book by Melissa Braverman Spears set to be published in 2025, will chronicle the history of the iconic Santa Barbara.)

ABC hoped to help the ratings of its show, Ryan’s Hope, by hiring Falken Smith in the fall of 1983. It was not a good match. Tom Lisanti documented her turbulent tenure in his excellent book, Ryan’s Hope: An Oral History of Daytime’s Groundbreaking Soap. Actors such as Fred Burstein remembered her saying she mainly based her writing on who her teenaged daughter paid attention to. Martha Nochimson was a member of the writing team and described Pat as, “talented, experienced, but jaundiced, bitter, jealous, and suspicious.” Pat also would have the writers like Martha over to her apartment and never changed out of her pajamas. Instead of working on story, Martha recalled Pat having her answer fan mail. Defensive of the criticism she was receiving, Pat told Soap Opera Digest, “They either love what I am doing or they hate it—

• The News Journal, December 2, 1982
• The Times and Democrat, January 3, 1983
• The Morning Call, May 28, 1983
• The Times, June 4, 1983
• Hickory Daily Record, June 10, 1983
• The Times, September 11, 1983

but they are passionate about it and that’s good.” As Lisanti notes in his book, it was not good. The ratings and demographics tanked under Falken Smith. Eventually the producer fired her.⁴⁸

Despite her failed tenure at Ryan’s Hope, ABC immediately worked out a deal for her to go back to General Hospital as Head Writer, which was still produced by Gloria Monty!⁴⁹

The two somehow managed to co-exist peacefully and there was no buzz in the news for once. Perhaps having Norma Monty, Gloria’s sister, as a co-writer helped. New excitement came in the form of several super couples created during this period such as Frisco and Felicia, Duke and Anna (with equally great chemistry with Robert Scorpio, Anna’s ex). Suddenly, at the end of 1986, it was announced both Gloria & Pat had decided to leave the soap of their own volition. They would be replaced by H. Wesley Kenny as Producer and Ann Marcus as Head Writer.⁵⁰

Perhaps tired of the grind, Pat returned to Days, in the summer of 1987, but this time as a consultant.⁵¹ That came to an end when the WGA went on strike from March 7, 1988 through August 7, 1988. The soaps were written by scab writers who weren’t knowledgeable about the shows. Falken Smith told a reporter, she refused to watch the soap. “That would be supporting the scab writers… I understand why they’re being used. Otherwise, they (the network) could lose the show, and we won’t have a show to come back to.”⁵²

When the strike was over, Pat was asked to come back to General Hospital as Head Writer to replace Ann Marcus. Marcus had come back from the strike and didn’t take kindly to ABC Daytime Exec’s Josie Emmerich’s treatment towards her in a meeting and told her off. Ann’s husband Ellis remained with the show as an Associate Head Writer. As Ann recalled, Pat, “couldn’t have been nicer or more respectful,” towards Ellis.⁵³

This stint would prove short, and she was out 6 months later.⁵⁴ This time it was the ratings. General Hospital had been dethroned from the number one spot by The Young and the Restless and couldn’t seem to capture it again. It’s very last time as the highest rated soap was the week of December 19, 1988 through December 23, 1988.

The following year, Pat was interviewed by an Australian newspaper. “Now, I’m working on revamping E Street, an Australian show.” Rumor had it she was paid 1.5 million dollars. Due to the Australian Writer’s Guild, this would be against the rules. Sydney Network exec Bob Shanks refused to confirm the story.⁵⁵

• Ryan’s Hope: An Oral History of Daytime’s Groundbreaking Soap, by Tom Lisanti, Citadel Publishing, 2023.
• Reno Gazette-Journal, February 14, 1985
• Clarion-Ledger, December 18, 1986
• Courier Post, August 1, 1987
• Argus Leader, May 11, 1988
• Whistling Girl, by Ann Marcus, Mulholland Pacific Publishing, 1998
• The New York Daily News, March 28, 1989
• The Sydney Morning Herald, September 11, 1989

Shortly after this, Pat wrote the forward to Mary Ann Copeland’s book, Soap Opera History.

Our last look at Pat Falken Smith comes from an interview she did for the June 17, 1997 edition of Soap Opera Weekly with Robert Schork. The article was entitled, What’s Wrong with Soaps. Pat, feisty as ever, had strong opinions about what she was seeing on daytime. “They’re destroying characters. On Days of Our Lives, they made the leading lady a monster who had green eyes – isn’t that crappy? I see this Marlena character as totally destroyed. She’s been the one important woman always … she’s a psychiatrist, and she gets possessed? It’s phony, and it wrecked the character, which is unforgivable. If you want to do that kind of story, pick a new character, but don’t bastardize the good characters you have by doing that.”

A few years later, Pat Falken Smith passed away on May 19, 2001. Although, many soap operas have been canceled, Days of Our Lives and General Hospital, where Falken Smith had her most success, still remain on the air today.

Thank you to Connie Passalacqua and Ed Hayman for their contributions, editing, and publication of this article.