Marlena’s Soap Opera Press Memories, Part Two

In Part One of this collection of Marlena’s “back in the day” soap press memories, I revisit some of the very wonderful experiences I had as a young soap journalist. It’s a job I still have 40 years later, and I still take a lot of pride in my work.

I spent most of my early years in the soap press writing for just about every soap magazine out there and eventually graduating to cover soaps for real life publications like The New York Times, TV Guide, USA Today, Reader’s Digest, Adweek, Variety and Newsday. I was a columnist with a newspaper syndicate called United Features, now unfortunately defunct. UFS upgraded me to coverage of primetime shows and the very new cable medium.

Was that really such a step up? My husband Moose, a retired newspaperman, likened my path to the phrase often used in the sports world when a player moves from the minor to the major leagues: “going to The Show.” That’s how it felt at the time, though I never really left the soap world behind, nor did I want to. I love writing about soap opera, our unique genre of serial drama that has played such a memorable role in our popular culture. I’m thrilled that soap opera nostalgia has such an enthusiastic market, and that there are signs (witness the success of “Beyond the Gates”) that soap opera is alive and well.

The soap press really is unique, like sports and fashion reporting, a world unto itself. At times, some of its practitioners have been more than a tad unprofessional. Soap journalism has been filled with fights, copycatting and other incendiary warfare. My opinions were and are controversial – read, telling the truth — and I have fought many battles in the soap press. At particularly heated moments, I feel like I’m in a junior high school at recess.

No, I don’t want to name names or bruise anyone. So, let’s pick up where we left off, and just stick to funny stories about some of the actors’ writers, executive producers in the business I have covered and been fortunate to become well-acquainted with.

Because I’m a writer I always loved interviewing and getting to know head writers like the late Jim Reilly, Douglas Marland, Ages Nixon, Michael Malone, Claire Labine (my neighbor when I lived in Brooklyn), Lorraine Broderick, the late Henry Slesar and on and on. So many of them were caring, loving people. On the other hand, a few didn’t hesitate to call and scream at me big time for something I wrote about them.

Actors are particularly vulnerable in our soap medium. There’s an “All My Children” actress (now on another soap) who screamed at me so loudly on the phone that she gave a migraine headache. But for the most part actors, head writers, and executive producers I’ve interviewed have been sweet, even sending flowers as thanks for stories about them. I have a whole bulletin board full of soap thank you notes over my desk.

So many of the wonderful people I’ve interviewed are gone. When I interviewed MacDonald Carey,who so memorably played Tom Horton on “Days of Our Lives,” he read his poetry to me. And OMG, the times that the late Joe Mascolo, the one and only Stefano on “Days,” called and sang opera to me. Francis Reid was nothing like the motherly Alice Horton on “Days.” In our interview she was a real pistol! I loved both Jeanne Cooper (who played Katherine Chancellor on “The Young and the Restless” in that low gravelly voice) and darling Darlene Conley (Sally Spectra on “The Bold and the Beautiful”) so much that I cried when each died.

Speaking of sweethearts, as I write this it is the anniversary of the death of Thom Christopher, who played Carlo Hesser on “One Life to Live.” I met him when the show did a remote in Central Park staging the arrival of his squeeze Alex Olanov, played by Tonya Walker, arriving like Cleopatra on the Nile. Thom always remembered I was the only reporter there. His thank you note is indeed up on my bulletin board like so many others. I loved him dearly.

Oh my, I’m really dropping names, aren’t I? I’m having fun recalling those days, and I hope you are, too. There’s more. Now here’s what you were waiting for: the names of the soap world figures who have been strange or horrible to me. I once went down to the Brooklyn “Another World” studio to interview a hot young actor who is now a used car salesman. As I entered his dressing room, he said, “Forget the interview, Marlena. Let’s have a séance instead.”  I walked out immediately.I once wrote that I didn’t particularly like an actor on “Guiding Light” who is now a hot primetime commodity. He was in a play on West 42^nd Street and I was offered tickets. When I got to the theater his publicist literally threw me out.

Now, now Marlena! Just one more for the road. A “Guiding Light” superstar actress really hated me for a reason I don’t remember. (Okay, I thought her character was wild and crazy and not a good role model for women viewers.)   When my boss Mimi Torchin staged the Soap Opera Weekly awards in a Broadway theater, I arrived with my future husband Moose. As soon as we sat down at that offended actress’ table, she declared that we “smelled,” and she led her cast mates in a hasty exit from the table. I was mortified. Moose, who never left home without his Old Spice, was a real professional newspaper man and critic, and he couldn’t believe that such ridiculous behavior happened in the soap world.

Yikes! These things really happened to moi as a soap world reporter and critic. When I got very lucky and “graduated” to the world of covering movies, primetime and cable I was treated as a total professional journalist, whether or not I was really liked.

From this distance, I can laugh at all these episodes. I still really do love soaps and the soap world most. When my time comes, I want someone at my funeral to say, “The only soap interview she never got was Tony Geary because his photographer/publicist hated her for no reason.”  And of course, her legacy doesn’t end there. She got to interview Donald Trump when he was the host of the “Celebrity Apprentice.” Yes, folks, Trump guested on soaps, too. Check out YouTube for excerpts of “Loving” and “All My Children.”  I wonder if our President remembers me.

Watch the 2025 Daytime Emmy Awards on Friday, Oct. 17. The ceremony begins streaming at 7:00 p.m. ET. See the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) website at watch.theemmys.tv, as well as other platforms like Apple TV and Roku. Marlena will share her impressions of the ceremony on Monday.