Where the Heart Is (1969 TV series)
Encyclopedia
Where the Heart Is is an American soap opera
telecast on the CBS
television network from September 8, 1969 to March 23, 1973. Created by Lou Scofield and Margaret DePriest
, the program ran for 25 minutes, the remaining five minutes of its timeslot ceded to a CBS news break.
Scofield and DePriest were the original head writers. A year after the soap’s premiere, they were succeeded by Pat Falken Smith
. In 1972, Smith was replaced by Claire Labine
and Paul Avila Mayer
. The series was produced by Tom Donovan and directed by Richard Dunlap.
, Where the Heart Is focuses on the sexual and psychological intrigues of the dysfunctional Hathaway family. Although some believe that the serial was patterned after Grace Metalious’ scandalous novel Peyton Place
, the serial was actually CBS’ attempt to create a psychosexual, family melodrama popularized by NBC’s Days of our Lives
. With such prurient themes as unabashed adultery, out-of-wedlock babies, and vaguely incestuous love triangles, the serial's irreverent, fast-paced stories were in contrast to the other serials on CBS which were staid and conservative.
The serial opened with the death of pious Hathaway family patriarch Judge Daniel Hathaway. Judge Hathaway had three adult children: Julian (James Mitchell
), a professor of literature at the local university, Kate (Diana van der Vlis
), a sympathetic but sexually repressed law student, and Allison (Louise Shaffer
), the liberated black sheep of the family. In the first episode, Allison returned to Northcross for her father’s funeral, having left town years before with her sister’s fiancée Roy Archer (Stephen Joyce). Intrigued by the new family dynamic, Allison and Roy decided to settle down in the Hathaway mansion, much to the chagrin of Kate, Julian, and the family’s cantankerous housekeeper Stella (Bibi Osterwald).
Having never gained his father’s love, Julian sought affection elsewhere, developing an unfortunate affinity for the many young women he taught at Northcross University. When the serial began, Julian had recently married nubile Mary (Diana Walker), his adult son Michael’s former girlfriend. Michael was pursued by the amoral Vicky Lucas (Robyn Millan), even though she knew he still carried a torch for Mary. Vicky managed to seduce Michael, and when she conveniently became pregnant, he married her. Vicky attempted to become the sort of wife in which Michael could take pride, even getting lessons in “style” from his snobbish Aunt Allison. However, when Vicky overheard her husband profess his love for his stepmother, she angrily drove off in an ice storm. The car crashed, and she miscarried. Vicky exploited Michael and Mary’s guilt for weeks by faking paralysis, but when Mary accidentally discovered her standing, the two rivals had a fight at the top of a staircase. Mary, who was also pregnant, fell down the stairs and languished in coma. Undaunted, Vicky slipped into Mary’s hospital room and tried to unplug her respirator, but was caught. Vicky was confined to a state mental hospital, while Mary, now recuperated from the accident, gave birth to Julian’s son Daniel.
Julian’s sister Allison didn’t find success in love either. After her husband Roy died, Allison married Dr. Hugh Jessup (Rex Robbins and David Cryer), who had problems with commitment. Allison’s demanding nature sent him into the arms of confused, but sweet, Christine Cameron (Terry O'Connor and Delphi Harrington). When Christine became pregnant, Hugh filed for divorce and left stony Allison, who was aghast that Christine seemed to elicit sympathy from most of their family and friends. After giving birth to Hugh’s illegitimate daughter Katina, Christine became the target of harassing phone calls and insidious notes, and everyone believed that Allison was her rival’s stalker. It transpired that the real culprit was Christine’s kindly, old neighbor Will Watts (Robert Symonds
), a deranged psychopath who had murdered his adulterous wife decades before. Envisioning Christine as his dead wife, Will spirited her away to an isolated cabin, where Hugh managed to rescue her just as Will was ready to kill her. Christine had a nervous collapse and had to be hospitalized. Meanwhile, a bored Hugh cheated on Christine with ex-wife Allison, who decided she wanted Hugh back.
Kate, Julian, and Allison’s sensible sister, married stalwart Steve Prescott (Lawrence Luckinbill, Ron Harper
) after a long courtship. Steve quickly developed amnesia and became involved with single mother Ellie Jardin (Zohra Lampert
). Eventually, Steve’s memory returned, and when Ellie was murdered, he and Kate adopted Ellie’s mute son Peter (Michael Bersell). Peter’s muteness was psychosomatic, having developed after he witnessed a deadly fire involving his Aunt Margaret Jardin (Rue McClanahan
), who had an incestuous attachment to her brother Robert (Keith Charles
), Peter’s father. When Robert failed to return his sister’s feelings, she ran him down with a car and killed him. Peter also died in a tragic accident, and Kate, unable to cope with all the tragedy around her, began to display increasingly erratic behavior, hearing voices and acting lewdly. Kate feared that she was dying from the same brain aneurysm that claimed the life of her mother, but in reality, she had developed a truculent split personality called “Betty”.
In the show’s final year, Julian fell into a steamy affair with conniving student Liz Rainey (Tracy Brooks Swope). After he rejected her, Liz, secretly pregnant with his child, married Michael. Now ensconced in the Hathaway home, Liz tortured Julian, constantly threatening to tell Mary and Michael about their affair. She also instigated vicious rumors on the university campus that Julian and Mary were engaged in a ménage trois with Loretta Jardin (Alice Drummond
), Peter’s aunt, a recovering alcoholic high school teacher. Meanwhile, Liz’s father John Rainey (Peter MacLean) became involved with Christine Cameron, who was caught in a court battle with Hugh and Allison for custody of Katina. Christine sought therapy with psychiatrist Dr. Adrienne Harris (Priscilla Pointer
), unaware that she was John’s estranged wife. Desperate for reconciliation with John, Adrienne subtly manipulated Christine into having a complete nervous breakdown, forcing her to be institutionalized.
During the serial’s last week, all of Liz and Adrienne’s machinations were exposed, and they decided to move in together to rebuild their lives, without Michael and John. Mary, who left Julian after discovering that Liz was pregnant with his child, forgave him. Christine was released from the psychiatric hospital, reunited with John, and happily learned that Hugh and Allison agreed to share custody of Katina with her. Kate realized that her psychological problems stemmed from the repressive moral code inflicted upon her by the late Judge Hathaway. Before she entered intensive therapy, Steve promised to whisk her away for a long, relaxing vacation in the Caribbean. Julian, who had always blamed Michael for his mother’s death in childbirth, went to visit Michael, who was falling in love with the now reformed Vicky (Lisa Richards), the new proprietor of a country health food store called Back to Nature. Father and son agreed to put the past behind them and concentrate on the future. They were left in a warm embrace as the scene faded to black for the last time.
, one half hour. It was the final addition to what would be, for two-and-a-half years, a daytime lineup on CBS consisting of 8 soap operas and no game shows. Where the Heart Is had a struggle on two fronts: first, Jeopardy!
, one of daytime’s most popular shows, aired on NBC
against it, and, second, because of its rather strong prurience and intimations of taboos such as incest
, some affiliates, primarily in the Midwest and South, refused to clear the show. Late in its run, other markets (where the show was tape-delayed an hour to run in the 1:00 PM/12 Noon access slot) saw Where the Heart Is air against ABC's up-and-coming All My Children
.
Although the soap achieved fairly healthy ratings, averaging a 6.7 and 26% share for its three-and-a half year run, it was typically the lowest-rated soap on CBS’ daytime schedule. Advertisers weren’t thrilled either, as demographics suggested the serial was attracting a younger, less desirable cult audience. In February 1973, with the network locked in a battle with NBC for daytime ratings supremacy, CBS decided to cancel it, along with another “underachiever,” Love Is a Many Splendored Thing, in a bid to bring up the daypart’s overall rating. As one industry insider revealed about the cancellations, "It was a matter of pride, CBS didn't like being third in the ratings. So, rather than struggle to improve the quality of these shows, it just canceled them."
(Rae Woodard), Diana van der Vlis (Nell Beaulac/Sherry Rowan), Robyn Millan (Delia Reid Ryan Coleridge #2), Roy Poole (Neil MacCurtain), Gregory Abels (Art Thompson), and Keith Charles
(Homer Dowd). On the production side, many who worked on Where the Heart Is were later responsible for finally making a major success out of the long-running ABC
serial General Hospital
. Both Margaret DePriest
and Pat Falken Smith
were members of GH’s writing staff, as well as those who helmed it, in various periods during its glory years of the late 1970s and 1980s. Claire Labine
would later be a GH head writer during the show's renaissance era in the 1990s. The connection of Where the Heart Is to Ryan's Hope continues with the fact that Pat Falken Smith, in between her stints at General Hospital, served as RHs head writer from 1983 to 1985.
Heart’s most prominent daytime alumnus is James Mitchell
, (Julian Hathaway) who in 2008 celebrated twenty-nine years as All My Children
’s Palmer Cortlandt
. Another famous alumna was Rue McClanahan
, (Margaret Jardin) who went on to bigger fame in Maude
playing Maude Findlay's scatterbrained friend, Vivian Cavender Harmon
; and later reteamed with Bea Arthur
on The Golden Girls
, where she played the lusty Blanche Devereaux
. After the show went off the air, Bibi Osterwald, who played the Hathaway family's housekeeper, Stella, played David Birney
's mother, Sophie Steinberg on the short-lived sitcom Bridget Loves Bernie
.
, Bill Glen, Lou Scofield, Margaret DePriest
, Paul Avila Mayer
, Pat Falken Smith
Studio #44 in New York. Like most soap operas of the late 60s/early 70s, it fell victim to the industry practice of wiping
tapes for re-use. Although the master tapes for Where the Heart Is were erased, some rare kinescopes of the series remain in the possession of private collectors.
Only seven videotapes of the soap are confirmed to exist. These are non-circulating copies stored at the UCLA Television Archives. The archived episodes were telecast: March 8, 16, and 24, 1971, April 1 and 9, 1971, and March 12 and 20, 1973.
Soap opera
A soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...
telecast on the CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
television network from September 8, 1969 to March 23, 1973. Created by Lou Scofield and Margaret DePriest
Margaret DePriest
Margaret DePriest is an American daytime serial writer.She began her career as an actress both onstage and on television. Her acting credits include a contract role as the first Abby Cameron on The Edge of Night from 1965-1966....
, the program ran for 25 minutes, the remaining five minutes of its timeslot ceded to a CBS news break.
Scofield and DePriest were the original head writers. A year after the soap’s premiere, they were succeeded by Pat Falken Smith
Pat Falken Smith
Patricia Falken Smith was a television writer, most famous for her stints as head writer of several soap operas, including General Hospital and Days of our Lives.-Biography:...
. In 1972, Smith was replaced by Claire Labine
Claire Labine
-Early career:Although she originally aspired to be an actress, Labine eventually became a critically acclaimed writer. She attended the University of Kentucky where her major was journalism, but later she switched to playwriting major at Columbia University’s School of Dramatic Arts...
and Paul Avila Mayer
Paul Avila Mayer
Paul Avila Mayer was an American television writer and producer. His father was the late screen writer Edwin Justus Mayer, and his daughter is director Daisy von Scherler Mayer.-Positions held:...
. The series was produced by Tom Donovan and directed by Richard Dunlap.
Storylines
Set in the fictional town of Northcross, ConnecticutConnecticut
Connecticut is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and the state of New York to the west and the south .Connecticut is named for the Connecticut River, the major U.S. river that approximately...
, Where the Heart Is focuses on the sexual and psychological intrigues of the dysfunctional Hathaway family. Although some believe that the serial was patterned after Grace Metalious’ scandalous novel Peyton Place
Peyton Place (novel)
Peyton Place is a 1956 novel by Grace Metalious. It sold 60,000 copies within the first ten days of its release and remained on the New York Times best seller list for 59 weeks. It was adapted as both a 1957 film and a 1964–69 television series....
, the serial was actually CBS’ attempt to create a psychosexual, family melodrama popularized by NBC’s Days of our Lives
Days of our Lives
Days of our Lives is a long running daytime soap opera broadcast on the NBC television network. It is one of the longest-running scripted television programs in the world, airing nearly every weekday in the United States since November 8, 1965. It has since been syndicated to many countries around...
. With such prurient themes as unabashed adultery, out-of-wedlock babies, and vaguely incestuous love triangles, the serial's irreverent, fast-paced stories were in contrast to the other serials on CBS which were staid and conservative.
The serial opened with the death of pious Hathaway family patriarch Judge Daniel Hathaway. Judge Hathaway had three adult children: Julian (James Mitchell
James Mitchell (actor)
James Mitchell was an American actor and dancer. Although he is best known to television audiences as Palmer Cortlandt on the soap opera All My Children , theatre and dance historians remember him as one of Agnes de Mille's leading dancers...
), a professor of literature at the local university, Kate (Diana van der Vlis
Diana Van der Vlis
Diana Van der Vlis was a Canadian stage, screen and television actress best known for her characters ‘Dr. Nell Beaulac’ on the ABC soap opera "Ryan's Hope" and 'Kate Hathaway Prescott’ on the CBS soap opera Where the Heart Is...
), a sympathetic but sexually repressed law student, and Allison (Louise Shaffer
Louise Shaffer
-Biography:Shaffer was born in Woodbridge, Connecticut, where she showed an interest in acting early on in her life. After finishing high school, she attended Connecticut College for Women, then Yale Drama School...
), the liberated black sheep of the family. In the first episode, Allison returned to Northcross for her father’s funeral, having left town years before with her sister’s fiancée Roy Archer (Stephen Joyce). Intrigued by the new family dynamic, Allison and Roy decided to settle down in the Hathaway mansion, much to the chagrin of Kate, Julian, and the family’s cantankerous housekeeper Stella (Bibi Osterwald).
Having never gained his father’s love, Julian sought affection elsewhere, developing an unfortunate affinity for the many young women he taught at Northcross University. When the serial began, Julian had recently married nubile Mary (Diana Walker), his adult son Michael’s former girlfriend. Michael was pursued by the amoral Vicky Lucas (Robyn Millan), even though she knew he still carried a torch for Mary. Vicky managed to seduce Michael, and when she conveniently became pregnant, he married her. Vicky attempted to become the sort of wife in which Michael could take pride, even getting lessons in “style” from his snobbish Aunt Allison. However, when Vicky overheard her husband profess his love for his stepmother, she angrily drove off in an ice storm. The car crashed, and she miscarried. Vicky exploited Michael and Mary’s guilt for weeks by faking paralysis, but when Mary accidentally discovered her standing, the two rivals had a fight at the top of a staircase. Mary, who was also pregnant, fell down the stairs and languished in coma. Undaunted, Vicky slipped into Mary’s hospital room and tried to unplug her respirator, but was caught. Vicky was confined to a state mental hospital, while Mary, now recuperated from the accident, gave birth to Julian’s son Daniel.
Julian’s sister Allison didn’t find success in love either. After her husband Roy died, Allison married Dr. Hugh Jessup (Rex Robbins and David Cryer), who had problems with commitment. Allison’s demanding nature sent him into the arms of confused, but sweet, Christine Cameron (Terry O'Connor and Delphi Harrington). When Christine became pregnant, Hugh filed for divorce and left stony Allison, who was aghast that Christine seemed to elicit sympathy from most of their family and friends. After giving birth to Hugh’s illegitimate daughter Katina, Christine became the target of harassing phone calls and insidious notes, and everyone believed that Allison was her rival’s stalker. It transpired that the real culprit was Christine’s kindly, old neighbor Will Watts (Robert Symonds
Robert Symonds
Robert Symonds was an American actor. He was the associate director of the Repertory Theatre of Lincoln Center from 1965 through 1972.-Career:...
), a deranged psychopath who had murdered his adulterous wife decades before. Envisioning Christine as his dead wife, Will spirited her away to an isolated cabin, where Hugh managed to rescue her just as Will was ready to kill her. Christine had a nervous collapse and had to be hospitalized. Meanwhile, a bored Hugh cheated on Christine with ex-wife Allison, who decided she wanted Hugh back.
Kate, Julian, and Allison’s sensible sister, married stalwart Steve Prescott (Lawrence Luckinbill, Ron Harper
Ron Harper (actor)
Ronald Robert "Ron" Harper is an American television and film actor.- Biography :Harper was born in Turtle Creek in Allegheny County near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the son of Mabel Grace Champion and George Harper...
) after a long courtship. Steve quickly developed amnesia and became involved with single mother Ellie Jardin (Zohra Lampert
Zohra Lampert
Zohra Lampert is an American actress, who has had roles on film, television and stage. She may be best remembered for her role as the title character in the 1971 cult horror film Let's Scare Jessica to Death, as well as starring alongside Natalie Wood and Warren Beatty in the 1961 romance film...
). Eventually, Steve’s memory returned, and when Ellie was murdered, he and Kate adopted Ellie’s mute son Peter (Michael Bersell). Peter’s muteness was psychosomatic, having developed after he witnessed a deadly fire involving his Aunt Margaret Jardin (Rue McClanahan
Rue McClanahan
Rue McClanahan was an American actress, best known for her roles on television as Vivian Harmon on Maude, Fran Crowley on Mama's Family, and Blanche Devereaux on The Golden Girls, for which she won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in 1987.-Early life:McClanahan was born Eddie Rue...
), who had an incestuous attachment to her brother Robert (Keith Charles
Keith Charles (actor)
Keith Charles was an American theatre and television actor who was active from 1956 until he retired in 2003. His work included Broadway and off-Broadway roles, and television work, including recurring roles on eight soap operas...
), Peter’s father. When Robert failed to return his sister’s feelings, she ran him down with a car and killed him. Peter also died in a tragic accident, and Kate, unable to cope with all the tragedy around her, began to display increasingly erratic behavior, hearing voices and acting lewdly. Kate feared that she was dying from the same brain aneurysm that claimed the life of her mother, but in reality, she had developed a truculent split personality called “Betty”.
In the show’s final year, Julian fell into a steamy affair with conniving student Liz Rainey (Tracy Brooks Swope). After he rejected her, Liz, secretly pregnant with his child, married Michael. Now ensconced in the Hathaway home, Liz tortured Julian, constantly threatening to tell Mary and Michael about their affair. She also instigated vicious rumors on the university campus that Julian and Mary were engaged in a ménage trois with Loretta Jardin (Alice Drummond
Alice Drummond
Alice Drummond is an American actress of stage and television.Drummond was born as Alice E. Ruyter in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, daughter of Sarah Irene , a secretary, and Arthur Ruyter, an auto mechanic. She graduated from Pembroke College in 1950.She played Nurse Jackson on the TV series Dark...
), Peter’s aunt, a recovering alcoholic high school teacher. Meanwhile, Liz’s father John Rainey (Peter MacLean) became involved with Christine Cameron, who was caught in a court battle with Hugh and Allison for custody of Katina. Christine sought therapy with psychiatrist Dr. Adrienne Harris (Priscilla Pointer
Priscilla Pointer
Priscilla Pointer is an American stage, film and television character actress. She began her career in the theater, including productions on Broadway. Later, Pointer moved to Hollywood to act in films and on television...
), unaware that she was John’s estranged wife. Desperate for reconciliation with John, Adrienne subtly manipulated Christine into having a complete nervous breakdown, forcing her to be institutionalized.
During the serial’s last week, all of Liz and Adrienne’s machinations were exposed, and they decided to move in together to rebuild their lives, without Michael and John. Mary, who left Julian after discovering that Liz was pregnant with his child, forgave him. Christine was released from the psychiatric hospital, reunited with John, and happily learned that Hugh and Allison agreed to share custody of Katina with her. Kate realized that her psychological problems stemmed from the repressive moral code inflicted upon her by the late Judge Hathaway. Before she entered intensive therapy, Steve promised to whisk her away for a long, relaxing vacation in the Caribbean. Julian, who had always blamed Michael for his mother’s death in childbirth, went to visit Michael, who was falling in love with the now reformed Vicky (Lisa Richards), the new proprietor of a country health food store called Back to Nature. Father and son agreed to put the past behind them and concentrate on the future. They were left in a warm embrace as the scene faded to black for the last time.
Broadcast history
CBS' Daytime division, which produced the serial in-house, made the strategic error of scheduling the show in the 12 Noon/11:00 AM Central timeslot, moving ahead the previous occupant, Love of LifeLove of Life
Love of Life is an American soap opera which aired on CBS Daytime from September 24, 1951 to February 1, 1980. It was created by Roy Winsor, whose previous creation Search for Tomorrow had premiered three weeks before Love of Life, and who would go on to create The Secret Storm two and a half years...
, one half hour. It was the final addition to what would be, for two-and-a-half years, a daytime lineup on CBS consisting of 8 soap operas and no game shows. Where the Heart Is had a struggle on two fronts: first, Jeopardy!
Jeopardy!
Griffin's first conception of the game used a board comprising ten categories with ten clues each, but after finding that this board could not be shown on camera easily, he reduced it to two rounds of thirty clues each, with five clues in each of six categories...
, one of daytime’s most popular shows, aired on NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
against it, and, second, because of its rather strong prurience and intimations of taboos such as incest
Incest
Incest is sexual intercourse between close relatives that is usually illegal in the jurisdiction where it takes place and/or is conventionally considered a taboo. The term may apply to sexual activities between: individuals of close "blood relationship"; members of the same household; step...
, some affiliates, primarily in the Midwest and South, refused to clear the show. Late in its run, other markets (where the show was tape-delayed an hour to run in the 1:00 PM/12 Noon access slot) saw Where the Heart Is air against ABC's up-and-coming All My Children
All My Children
All My Children is an American television soap opera that aired on ABC from January 5, 1970 to September 23, 2011. Created by Agnes Nixon, All My Children is set in Pine Valley, Pennsylvania, a fictitious suburb of Philadelphia. The show features Susan Lucci as Erica Kane, one of daytime's most...
.
Although the soap achieved fairly healthy ratings, averaging a 6.7 and 26% share for its three-and-a half year run, it was typically the lowest-rated soap on CBS’ daytime schedule. Advertisers weren’t thrilled either, as demographics suggested the serial was attracting a younger, less desirable cult audience. In February 1973, with the network locked in a battle with NBC for daytime ratings supremacy, CBS decided to cancel it, along with another “underachiever,” Love Is a Many Splendored Thing, in a bid to bring up the daypart’s overall rating. As one industry insider revealed about the cancellations, "It was a matter of pride, CBS didn't like being third in the ratings. So, rather than struggle to improve the quality of these shows, it just canceled them."
Cast
Where the Heart Is boasted a large cast of performers, many of whom later appeared on Ryan’s Hope, which was created by Where the Heart Is final head writers Claire Labine and Paul Avila Mayer. These included: Louise ShafferLouise Shaffer
-Biography:Shaffer was born in Woodbridge, Connecticut, where she showed an interest in acting early on in her life. After finishing high school, she attended Connecticut College for Women, then Yale Drama School...
(Rae Woodard), Diana van der Vlis (Nell Beaulac/Sherry Rowan), Robyn Millan (Delia Reid Ryan Coleridge #2), Roy Poole (Neil MacCurtain), Gregory Abels (Art Thompson), and Keith Charles
Keith Charles (actor)
Keith Charles was an American theatre and television actor who was active from 1956 until he retired in 2003. His work included Broadway and off-Broadway roles, and television work, including recurring roles on eight soap operas...
(Homer Dowd). On the production side, many who worked on Where the Heart Is were later responsible for finally making a major success out of the long-running ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
serial General Hospital
General Hospital
General Hospital is an American daytime television drama that is credited by the Guinness Book of World Records as the longest-running American soap opera currently in production and the third longest running drama in television in American history after Guiding Light and As the World Turns....
. Both Margaret DePriest
Margaret DePriest
Margaret DePriest is an American daytime serial writer.She began her career as an actress both onstage and on television. Her acting credits include a contract role as the first Abby Cameron on The Edge of Night from 1965-1966....
and Pat Falken Smith
Pat Falken Smith
Patricia Falken Smith was a television writer, most famous for her stints as head writer of several soap operas, including General Hospital and Days of our Lives.-Biography:...
were members of GH’s writing staff, as well as those who helmed it, in various periods during its glory years of the late 1970s and 1980s. Claire Labine
Claire Labine
-Early career:Although she originally aspired to be an actress, Labine eventually became a critically acclaimed writer. She attended the University of Kentucky where her major was journalism, but later she switched to playwriting major at Columbia University’s School of Dramatic Arts...
would later be a GH head writer during the show's renaissance era in the 1990s. The connection of Where the Heart Is to Ryan's Hope continues with the fact that Pat Falken Smith, in between her stints at General Hospital, served as RHs head writer from 1983 to 1985.
Heart’s most prominent daytime alumnus is James Mitchell
James Mitchell (actor)
James Mitchell was an American actor and dancer. Although he is best known to television audiences as Palmer Cortlandt on the soap opera All My Children , theatre and dance historians remember him as one of Agnes de Mille's leading dancers...
, (Julian Hathaway) who in 2008 celebrated twenty-nine years as All My Children
All My Children
All My Children is an American television soap opera that aired on ABC from January 5, 1970 to September 23, 2011. Created by Agnes Nixon, All My Children is set in Pine Valley, Pennsylvania, a fictitious suburb of Philadelphia. The show features Susan Lucci as Erica Kane, one of daytime's most...
’s Palmer Cortlandt
Palmer Cortlandt
Palmer Cortlandt is a fictional character on the long-running ABC soap opera All My Children, played by James Mitchell from 1979 to 2010. A major character until 1982, when health issues forced him to reduce his work load, Mitchell continued to appear regularly on the show until May 2007 when he...
. Another famous alumna was Rue McClanahan
Rue McClanahan
Rue McClanahan was an American actress, best known for her roles on television as Vivian Harmon on Maude, Fran Crowley on Mama's Family, and Blanche Devereaux on The Golden Girls, for which she won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in 1987.-Early life:McClanahan was born Eddie Rue...
, (Margaret Jardin) who went on to bigger fame in Maude
Maude (TV series)
Maude was an American television sitcom that was originally broadcast on the CBS network from September 12, 1972 until April 22, 1978.Maude starred Beatrice Arthur as Maude Findlay, an outspoken, middle-aged, politically liberal woman living in suburban Tuckahoe, Westchester County, New York with...
playing Maude Findlay's scatterbrained friend, Vivian Cavender Harmon
Vivian Harmon
Vivian Harmon previously Cavender; is a fictional character from the television show, Maude.-Character traits:...
; and later reteamed with Bea Arthur
Beatrice Arthur
Beatrice "Bea" Arthur was an American actress, comedienne and singer whose career spanned seven decades. Arthur achieved fame as the character Maude Findlay on the 1970s sitcoms All in the Family and Maude, and as Dorothy Zbornak on the 1980s sitcom The Golden Girls, winning Emmy Awards for both...
on The Golden Girls
The Golden Girls
The Golden Girls is an American sitcom created by Susan Harris, which originally aired on NBC from September 14, 1985, to May 9, 1992. Starring Bea Arthur, Betty White, Rue McClanahan and Estelle Getty, the show centers on four older women sharing a home in Miami, Florida...
, where she played the lusty Blanche Devereaux
Blanche Devereaux
Blanche Elizabeth Devereaux is one of the four main fictional characters on the 1985-1992 NBC sitcom The Golden Girls, and its CBS spin-off The Golden Palace. In the pilot episode her last name was given as Hollingsworth, but this was somewhat "corrected" in later episodes by making this her...
. After the show went off the air, Bibi Osterwald, who played the Hathaway family's housekeeper, Stella, played David Birney
David Birney
David Edwin Birney is an American actor/director whose career has performances in both contemporary and classical roles in theatre, film and television. He has three children, a daughter Kate, and twins, Peter and Mollie....
's mother, Sophie Steinberg on the short-lived sitcom Bridget Loves Bernie
Bridget Loves Bernie
Bridget Loves Bernie is an American television comedy program created by Bernard Slade, the creator of the 1970–74 ABC sitcom, The Partridge Family, based loosely on the premise of the 1920s’ Broadway play and 1940s’ radio show Abie's Irish Rose...
.
Main crew members
Richard Dunlap, Claire LabineClaire Labine
-Early career:Although she originally aspired to be an actress, Labine eventually became a critically acclaimed writer. She attended the University of Kentucky where her major was journalism, but later she switched to playwriting major at Columbia University’s School of Dramatic Arts...
, Bill Glen, Lou Scofield, Margaret DePriest
Margaret DePriest
Margaret DePriest is an American daytime serial writer.She began her career as an actress both onstage and on television. Her acting credits include a contract role as the first Abby Cameron on The Edge of Night from 1965-1966....
, Paul Avila Mayer
Paul Avila Mayer
Paul Avila Mayer was an American television writer and producer. His father was the late screen writer Edwin Justus Mayer, and his daughter is director Daisy von Scherler Mayer.-Positions held:...
, Pat Falken Smith
Pat Falken Smith
Patricia Falken Smith was a television writer, most famous for her stints as head writer of several soap operas, including General Hospital and Days of our Lives.-Biography:...
Surviving episodes
All 912 episodes of Where the Heart Is were recorded on videotape at the CBS Broadcast CenterCBS Broadcast Center
The CBS Broadcast Center is a television and radio production facility located in New York City, New York. It is CBS's main East Coast production center, much as Television City in Los Angeles is the West Coast hub.-Overview:...
Studio #44 in New York. Like most soap operas of the late 60s/early 70s, it fell victim to the industry practice of wiping
Wiping
Wiping or junking is a colloquial term for action taken by radio and television production and broadcasting companies, in which old audiotapes, videotapes, and telerecordings , are erased, reused, or destroyed after several uses...
tapes for re-use. Although the master tapes for Where the Heart Is were erased, some rare kinescopes of the series remain in the possession of private collectors.
Only seven videotapes of the soap are confirmed to exist. These are non-circulating copies stored at the UCLA Television Archives. The archived episodes were telecast: March 8, 16, and 24, 1971, April 1 and 9, 1971, and March 12 and 20, 1973.