Onstage and on TV, a Full House for Two Pairs
By Bridget Byrne
Special to The Washington Post
Thursday, November 23, 2006
If there's an entertainment phenomenon as powerful as buzz, it might well be nostalgia. How else to explain the current public appetite to see '80s soap opera stars reunite?
Decades after two soaps pairings -- Luke-and-Laura and Krystle-and-Alexis -- fascinated millions of Americans, apparently our nation turns its eager eyes to them. Again.
"I'm sure it's not as simple as their being so overwhelmingly taken with Luke and Laura, but somehow it's a signpost in their own lives, I imagine," says Anthony Geary, who's spent the past few weeks promoting the 25th-anniversary celebrations of the wedding on the daytime ABC soap "General Hospital" -- when his dicey character, Luke, swore eternal love to sweet young Laura.
The wedding episode became a cultural touchstone as a soap opera record 30 million people tuned in and the union made magazine covers. Last week, fans watched "General Hospital" reunite Genie Francis, who left the show in 2002, and Geary (their characters renewed their vows after Laura awoke from a four-year coma).
Tomorrow, SOAPnet, a cable channel devoted to the genre, will air five hours of special programming, titled "Luke and Laura 25: Something Old, Something New," that includes the original wedding sequence and the stars sharing their memories.
"We have just had fans going crazy over this," says Deborah Blackwell, the channel's executive vice president and general manager. "It's one of those events that everybody remembers, and they know where they were and what they were doing."
Also back in the limelight are good blond Krystle and brunet baddy Alexis -- or at least the women who played them.
Twenty-three years after their famed lily-pond catfight helped propel "Dynasty" to high ratings, Linda Evans and Joan Collins share billing in the touring show "Legends!" The James Kirkwood comedy, about aging movie star rivals, has begun a two-week run here at the National Theatre.
"I can't speak for the audience, but they certainly know why they have come," Evans says.
Pamela Bellwood, who starred with Evans as "Dynasty's" Claudia Blaisdel, says she knows why: "It's all cyclical. "If people don't come up with new ideas, they go back to nostalgia."
Bellwood notes that at least one current TV hit, "Desperate Housewives," is really little more than a take on classic soaps like "Dynasty" and "Dallas."
"Nostalgia is just one step before tongue-in-cheek," she says.
As for remembering the Luke-and-Laura wedding episode, "I have the feeling that people have hung their own histories around that date somehow," Geary says. "I know that so many people come up to me and remember exactly where they were and what they were doing and that college classes were called off for the day, or they left work and rushed home to catch it because it was kind of before VCRs were very big."
Not that Geary, 59, counts himself among those nostalgics. "I wasn't really aware that it was the 25th anniversary until they told me," he says. "It's not a date that I mark in my personal calendar."
Blackwell says she thinks "it was the very contemporary quality of the two of them that really captured people's imagination."
"I always think that part of what we enjoy about soap operas so much is watching couples encounter many, many difficulties just as we all do in our lives, but it's inspiring to see how Luke's love for Laura is so enduring," she says.
And what about Krystle and Alexis? Is their animosity so enduring?
Certainly memories of their verbal and physical fights for the affection of glamorous tycoon Blake Carrington (John Forsythe) must underscore the characters that the actresses portray in "Legends!" The play's aging divas, Leatrice and Sylvia, cling to their glamour and celebrity in hopes of being cast in a new play, but are still unable to curb their mutual animosity.
Promos for "Legends!" tout the soap stars' reunion in this "classic catfight comedy."
"No physical fight -- it's not like 'Dynasty,' " Evans says. "You cannot do that 300 times" onstage. "I'm in my 60s and [Collins is] in her 70s. That would not be the best plan.
"We definitely fight, but it's fun, it's a comedy," laughs Evans, who just turned 64. (Collins is 73.)
Nolan Miller designed the stars' costumes for the play, just as he did for "Dynasty" when producer Aaron Spelling put few limits on the extravagant wardrobe budget.
Having known Evans since the 1960s, when they worked together on the western soap "The Big Valley," Miller suggested that the play's director, John Bowab, approach her about reuniting with Collins. Evans loved the idea and took on the challenge, even though she'd never acted onstage.
Miller, who now sells his clothes and jewelry on QVC, has no doubts pinpointing why audiences are coming to "Legends!"
"It's to see Joan and Linda. . . . It's very amusing, like an episode of 'Dynasty.' "
As for the reunion of Luke and Laura, Geary says he's not surprised that every opportunity has been used to "exploit" the memories.
"We caught lightning in the bottle the first time," he says. "I'm just grateful that anybody cares. I mean, 25 years later, that is kind of amazing."
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