Still Restless, but not so Young: Soap honored on its 35th Anniversary

FLASHBACK: In honor of its 36th anniversary on March 26, here's a look back at the special celebration held in 2008 honoring The Young and the Restless

The Young and the Restless, the top-rated soap opera for the past 20 years, was feted on Aprill 10 (2008) at the Paley Center for Media (formerly known as the Museum of TV and Radio) in Beverly Hills in honor of its 35th anniversary on the air. The CBS soap opera debuted on March 26, 1973 and has been captivating viewers ever since.

Nine long-running cast members took the stage for a panel discussion about the show’s longevity, its ups and downs and their characters. Audience members were enthralled, adoring the anecdotes and the behind the scenes gossip. They asked insightful questions of the actors that displayed a rich, deep understanding and loving memory of the show’s history. But occasionally reel life intervened as a few audience members asked questions by addressing the actors by their characters’ names.

And the actors proved they really aren’t very different from their characters. Jeanne Cooper was every bit as outspoken in real life as grand dame Kay Chancellor is on the show, Christian J. Le Blanc is just as quick with the quips as his character of lawyer Michael Baldwin is. Peter Bergman is as articulate as his Jack Abbot is, while Jess Walton is just as feisty as Jill Foster Abbot is.

Each of the actors noted that when hired, they were just hoping to stay on the show for 3 months. Once they passed that milestone, then they each started working on developing the characters more for longevity.

And because the actors have played the characters so long, they understand them extremely well. Melody Thomas Scott who plays heroine Nikki Reed Newman said, “If there’s a line of dialogue that just would not come out of her mouth, I’ll change it on the set. We all do that.”

All admit the beauty of the show is the interpersonal relationships which allow them to develop their characters. Bergman noted that viewers see a side of Jack when he’s interacting with his sisters or when he’s interacting with his father that gives the character more dimension than would be available in any other medium.

They also talked about the evolution of soaps. In the past 10-15 yeas, most soaps have been speeding up the storytelling process, justifying that by citing audience research demanding faster scene pacing and quicker resolution of storylines. Bergman disagrees with that philosophy, saying, “Tell them a good story, you can take as long as you want.”


Doug Davidson who plays detective Paul Williams believes that soaps have gotten more conservative, believing that they could get away with more things 20 years ago than they can today. He noted that every soap used to have a town slut and a town cad who bedded anyone and everyone. But since AIDS came along, the town sluts and cads have pretty much disappeared from soaps.

In the 80s and early 90s, many soaps tried more risqué love scenes that began to border on soft core porn. Y&R even had a famous episode featuring Davidson’s bare butt. And that caught the attention of the porn industry. At one point, the soap received a letter from porn industry officials telling them, “We do our job best, so you get back to telling the stories we love to watch.”

While profanity has become much more common
on soaps in the past 20 years, there was a time it was completely verboten. Cooper says she was the first to use the word “bitch” on daytime, whispering the word at the end of scene with her nemesis Jill. Since it was not in the script, she was amazed and delighted they kept it in.

And real life has also influenced the storytelling. When Cooper decided to have a face life in 1984, the face lift was written into the show for Kay, which aired footage of Cooper’s actual procedure and recovery. Cooper says CBS officials refer to that as the “first reality show.”

Melody Thomas Scott who has been on the show since 1979 marvels at her character’s longevity, saying, “I’ve had 4 generations [of a family] stand in front of me and say, ‘We’ve watched you our whole lives.’”

Cooper, who was and still is very vocal about her disapproval of the storyline that made Jill Foster into Kay Chancellor’s long lost daughter, commented exasperated, “Nikki is the daughter who Kay always wanted, but instead she got Jill.”

Jess Walton, who plays Jill, said she was initially in favor of that storyline believing it would offer some greater depth for the characters. However, she notes that such scenes never really materialized in the scripts. She now, also, would like to see that plot point undone.


On all the legal shenanigans lawyer Michael Baldwin gets away with, Christian LeBlanc quipped, “I’m the smartest person in a stupid town.”

And on the number of unsolved crimes that Genoa City residents get away with, LeBlanc joked, “Just one good policeman needs to come to town. We’re all felons!”


On Nick and Phyllis’s very active sex life that frequently involves sex on the sofa, Joshua Morrow (who plays Nick Newman) joked, “Every time we have people over, I’m like, ‘Man, you don’t want to sit there.’”

Michelle Stafford who plays Phyllis Summers Newman admits she has the dirtiest mouth on anyone on the set.

Cooper says she would love for her character to have an affair with young Kevin Fisher, “He’s a psycho and I love it!” Cooper admits that whenever she had a scene with handsome Greg Rikaart (who plays Kevin) and the camera is not on her, she will runs her tongue over her lips. Once the does that, all the other actors in the scenes can barely keep their composure.

All photos by James F. Mills