Forgive the obvious pun in the title but this post has gone through a variety of stages. It began several months ago when a FH reader wrote in asking if I would do a feature on actor Bill Shanks. The reader wrote one of his favorite parts of the blog was Blast from the Past, especially the soap stars that he grew up watching were featured. Bill Shanks played Dr. Casey Peretti on the soap from 1986 through 1990. Unfortunately, after quite a bit of research I found very little of Shanks on the net. But this week after reading an interesting NY Post article on New York and the soaps I thought of a good reason to post a bit of Shanks and some other starts from some NYC based soaps.
I did not watch the cancelled As The World Turns nor have I seen a second of One Life To Live which ends it's forty plus year run this Friday. That does not mean however that I don't mourn the death of the daytime soap. (R.I.P ABC Soaps) There is something comforting, even safe about soaps. I have vivid memories of getting home from school as a kid, making a peanut butter sandwich and sitting with my mother as she watched Another World. I remember watching The Young And The Restless with the girl I was dating in Jr High. I still DVR Days Of Our Lives from time to time when there is a storyline of interest (current Chandler Massey is rocking the house with his coming out storyline). Currently daytime is riddled with shows that frankly scare me. I like Dr. Oz, but between his show, The Doctors, Dr. Phil, The Chew and the slew of other shows, when you turn on the tv during the day now the only thing you find out is how wrong everything your doing in your life is! The bedroom scenes from Bay City are looking tame in comparison to the reality based 'stories' on most of the talk shows.
Jon Hensley & Brian Bloom
The story in the NY Post was interesting as I have always thought the NY soap world seemed quite special in the genre's hay day. I remember how it was depicted in Tootsie and how it became a running storyline for Joey on Friends (Although Days Of Our Lives is actually filmed in CA). Soaps in NY make sense as many soap actors move back and forth between their shows and the stage. Give me a juicy soap opera over a bunch of loud mouths talking about topics many know little to nothing about.
If you want to check out a comprehensive journal of the history of hunks on the show there is no better place to visit than SoapHunks.Net. Here are a few of my favorites from the soon to be gone One Life To Live:
Christopher Douglas
David Fumero
David A. Gregory
Joe Lando
