History of All My Children (1980-1989)
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| History of All My Children series | |
The early 1980s was a golden period for the show. Interesting younger characters, such as Jenny Gardner and Greg Nelson (Kim Delaney, Laurence Lau), Liza Colby (Marcy Walker), Jesse Hubbard (Darnell Williams), Angie Baxter (Debbi Morgan) and a now-grown-up Tad Martin (Michael E. Knight), who was now legally Ruth and Joe's son.
The storyline involving Liza plotting to win Greg back after he left her for Jenny was a huge fan favorite, as was the Jenny/Greg supercouple. The aforementioned Jesse and Angie made history as daytime's first African-American supercouple. Last but not least the legend of "Tad the Cad" was born when Tad Martin took Liza Colby's virginity, then simultaneously began carrying on with her mother, socialite Marian Colby.
On the not-so-younger side, Jenny and Tad's birthmother Opal (Dorothy Lyman) was also added to the canvas. Powerful businessman Adam Chandler (David Canary) and his twin brother Stuart arrived in town and became a frontburner characters.
Another popular couple was the pairing of Cliff and Nina (Peter Bergman and Taylor Miller). While the two loved each other deep down, they went through four marriages and three divorces throughout the 1980s.
The show made their first attempt at tackling the taboo topic of homosexuality in 1983. Tricia Pursley played the confused Devon McFadden who believed she was falling in love with her psychiatrist, Lynn Carson played by Donna Pescow. Lynn admitted to being a lesbian and Devon admitted her crush. Other soaps and television shows had done stories hinting at bisexuality, but never homosexuality, much less with women.
All My Children intelligently tackled the issue of drug use when Mark LaMura's character, Mark Dalton, became addicted to cocaine after years of casual use. His sister, Erica staged an intervention with his friends to have him confront his problems. They practiced a "tough love" policy that had Mark admit to the addiction. The informative episode showed how to hold an intervention, and the stages to go through for a successful confrontation. The most prominent performance would be from Kathleen Noone (Ellen Chandler), Mark's ex-wife. Noone was so captivating that she would win the Supporting Actress Emmy for the intervention scenes.
Controversy hit with the arrival of Cindy Parker (Ellen Wheeler), who would later fall in love with Stuart Chandler (David Canary). The character was revealed to have AIDS. Through visits by Dr. Angie Hubbard, the show educated the public on how the disease was spread and how to prevent it. Cindy had contracted HIV from her husband, Fred, who contracted it from sharing needles for drug use. Cindy would be attacked by a vigilante hate group lead by her niece Skye Chandler (Robin Christopher). The tragedy of the attack showed the extremes of violence that was occurring everyday to victims of the disease. The final swan song for Cindy was her tragic death in 1989, but Ellen Wheeler would be back to play Cindy's evil twin Karen, who kidnapped an infant Adam Chandler Jr. Both Wheeler and Canary won Emmy's for their performance in the AIDS storyline.
Viewers where engrossed with the character of Natalie (Kate Collins), who started off as a vixen that wouldn't stop until she got what she wanted. When the storyline called for Jeremy (Jean LeClerc) and Natalie to marry, no ordinary dress could be used for the rich heiress Natalie. Calvin Klein allowed the show to use one of his couture line dresses, as long as they did not alter it. The lace and silver lined dress fit Collins perfectly, and would be the most expensive dress used on the show. It was a mix of satin, lace, and pure silver. From then on, Daytime was used to showcase some of the most fashionable wedding apparel.
Susan Lucci's growing popularity came to an apex with her first onscreen pregnancy with daughter, Bianca Montgomery. All of her former male co-stars returned for a two day "Dream" episode special. It was one of the first shows to utilize old show clips for a whole episode.
Other memorable storylines from the decade include: the arrival of Erica's "half-sister" Silver Kane (who was actually an imposter named Connie), Erica's modeling for the Sensuelle Company, Erica writing her autobiography and turning it into a motion picture, Brooke discovering her "mother" (her biological mother was really a homeless woman named Jane) was a mob boss and leader of an international drug cartel, The revelation that Lars Bogard was a Nazi (and that Olga was his sister), Cecily (Rosa Nevin) and Nico's (Maurice Benard) wild antics, and the arrival of Dixie (Cady McClain) just to name a few.
Main article: All My Children
