My 1998 GH Weekend!
Story by Stacey
edited by Boo and LCiam

First of all, we had an absolute blast! I've been attending for the past three years and this was the best! An online friend had flown out for the last two years, she came in and we hung out for a couple of days, and then went up to LA.

We stopped at the Beverly Hills Television and Radio Museum - it is awesome! There aren't exhibits but for $6 you have two hours to watch any of their classic tapes. They had some very early GH, AMC, OLTL - I could have spent days in there! We watched the 96 GH event held there. It had great clips and it was fun to see some of my GH faves at an event - set the tone for the weekend to come.

Friday am we went down to the soap boutique, which is held every year in one of the pool side rooms. It was a great time to pick up GH merchandise and buy fan pictures. I got a lot of great ones there! Around 3:00, Nolan (Chris Ramsey, PC) and Marshall, (ex-GL) were by the pool. Nolan was wonderful. He was very funny, very warm and charmed everyone! Marshall had pics that he autographed and handed out. I didn't know who he was but he is gorgeous and also very nice.

Friday night we attended the first ever PC event. There were only 200 people and in a smaller, more intimate room than the GH luncheon. The actors were all very warm, Julie, Lisa, and Jay especially so! Lisa is very charismatic and was wonderful. We found out we are from the same town and chatted for a moment.

Jay was there last and was wonderful. He was very warm and approachable. They seemed very interested in meeting the fans. Ron Hale is always a joy! He is a very classy guy - signed my Nurse's Ball shirt (while on my back!). Cari was also very kind - and it was very warm in this room.

Saturday we went to our annual pilgrimage to the Hollywood Book and Poster shop on Hollywood Blvd., a few blocks down from Mann's Chinese Theater. They have slides of old GH stuff, on the set shots of Robert, Anna, Luke, Sean, etc.. They have some OLTL, and AMC, and shots from shows like Full House, Melrose Place, movies, etc..

We attended Vanessa's TVC charity event to raise money for Sojourn (which provides services to battered women and children). This event was very well done. Over $15,000 was raised for this organization. The food was excellent - pasta cooked for individual orders. There was a Q&A with Vanessa & Tyler, and a professional photographer who took 5x7 pictures of the fans with V&T for a $5 donation to Sojourn. Having a professional take the pictures was an especially nice touch - anyone who has attended a fan event knows what it is like to hand your camera to the person behind you and then find your head cut off!

Vanessa was very gracious and appreciative. Originally, autographs were not going to be given due to time constraints. A beautiful autographed picture of Vanessa was included in the packets given out, which was a nice touch - great idea to have it already autographed. A friend really wanted to get an S&B jacket signed so she offered a $100 donation! I guess this brought out the "fish bowl" and from then on autographs were provided for a contribution to the fish bowl to benefit Sojourn (I heard that the fish bowl contained $5,000 by the end of the evening!). I left to travel back to the Sportsman's Lodge for the Wally & Rena event but heard that V&T stayed much longer than the scheduled 5:30-8:30.

I had given Vanessa my V&M #2 tape and my friend had given her S&B 4 & 5 - Vanessa said how much she enjoyed the tapes! I told her how fans from all over the US and Canada had contributed clips to the interview tapes. The TVC had collected money from fans to give V&T a beautiful housewarming basket - it was HUGE and chock full of stuff! It was so heavy Tyler couldn't carry it out (or so I heard!).

I heard many glowing reports of this event - fans seemed very pleased. There was one fan in particular that came to my attention at Maurice's event. This young woman was in a wheelchair and told Maurice that she had saved for two years to come out to California. Every time she wanted to buy something she would hold off, so she could save her money for this trip, and with tears in her eyes she commented on how it was worth every penny to meet him - then he came down and kissed her! And Michael Sutton did the same! Jim Warren actually took a picture of her with them - I know I had tears in my eyes! She also was able to meet Vanessa, and Vanessa was wonderful with her as well. It's so nice to see that these actors are so kind and considerate, and so willing to go out of their way. There wasn't a dry eye in the room at the MB event when he kissed her!

From Vanessa & Tyler's event we were off to see Wally & Rena back at the Sportsman's. This was a great event - it was wonderful to see Rena again! She reported being in contract negotiations for a role (that was the part she got on Melrose Place) - she said it was not daytime but assured the audience that should she ever choose to daytime again she wouldn't go anywhere outside of GH!

They were warm and funny! Their daughter Rosabel's nanny, Paul, was there and there was a lot of interaction between him and W&R. Rena laughed and said Rosabel calls him "Paula"! When someone from the audience asked if they would have more children and they answered that they would like to have another child at some point, Paul responded by asking for a raise!

Rena noticed the "Ride of a Lifetime" tickets being sported in the front couple of rows by fans. She commented how much she appreciated the continuing support and was amazed that fans were still asking about Lois 2 years later! But she did say that she has no plans to return to GH at this time. Wally was asked about his lack of storyline. He believes one of the reasons that N&A haven't caught on more is that there has been a lack of commitment to the storyline by the writers/producer (I'm paraphrasing here). Seems that all the support for a N&L reunion may have Wendy doubting whether fans will accept Ned with someone besides Lois. The audience assured Wally that we were ready for Ned to move on (even though Lois will come first in our hearts!). One audience member pointed out that she was having difficulty accepting N&A as Nancy Lee looks older than Wally does. W&R pointed out that they are near the same age (that is NLG and Wally), but that youthful looks run in Wally's family - evidently his father is 80, but you would never know it. So while he may look younger they are near the same age. Rena took great joy in sharing that Wally is going to be 40 on his birthday, that month!

(I was also sure to stop by Wendy Riche's table on Sunday and assure her that I was indeed ready for Wally to have a storyline - read romance! Many N&L fans were interested in seeing what chemistry will occur with V. Many of us liked his storyline with Lois due to the quirkiness of this character, which lightened Ned - he can get rather stuffy and heavy with all the Q drama. But I digress...)

When asked about his staying on the show, given his lack of an interesting challenging storyline, he reported that someone in the family had to pay the bills! He also assured the audience that most likely he would be staying until at least sometime in the year 2000.

The audience also lamented that what is missing in Ned's storyline is missing in much of the show: the humor, romance, and fantasy that was there during early N&L, S&B, R&S, and K&L in 94. I've heard audiences make similar comments at other fan events over the last couple of years. Kurth & Taylor were great as always. They sang "You give me wings" (something like that - Justin & Adrienne's song from Days). Wally stayed till 1:00 am signing autographs and taking pictures. Rena stayed quiet late, as well - until around 12:00.

I went to bed at 2:00 and got up at 7:00am (no wonder I was wiped out when I got home Monday)! We went down early to check in for the main event. I bought my $30 worth of raffle tickets (really wanted that studio tour)! Jim Warren was there, with a wide selection of gorgeous 8 x10 color photos of the actors he represents. At check-in there were many tables set up in the courtyard outside of the ballroom. It was a pretty location with trees, flowers, and a little brook trickling in the background. Different fan clubs were set up on different tables with merchandise, pics, t-shirts, etc.. Then, of course, the raffle tables with items to be given away. There were two raffles - one for the studio tours. This year FOUR tours were given away. One of the tours was with Rebecca, one with Julian (wouldn't that have been fun!), two for a PC/GH combined set visit - 1/2 day on each set! When we checked in and got our packet we were all very surprised to find a BEAUTIFUL photo of the cast in the costumes for the Bacchanalia, in a nice cover with the GH 35th Anniversary embossed on it - very classy!

The luncheon began seating around 10:30 -11:30. This seemed earlier than before. Jonathan and Rebecca were down in the courtyard before the luncheon taking pics and signing autographs. I really liked the set up for the luncheon, this year - every effort was made to allow the maximum time to see the actors. We had lunch first, while raffle tickets were called. This was a GREAT idea, as gave us something to do while lunching. It gave us a chance to visit and make new friends amongst our table mates. I won a GH t-shirt (was my year to win shirts)! I WAS ONE # AWAY FROM WINNING THE STUDIO TOUR WITH REBECCA! Can you believe it?! I will forever wonder if I had bought another $10 worth of raffle tickets whether I would have won it! So close..... It was announced that the actors would not be having lunch - they were served snacks in a separate area to allow more time with fans. Then the introductions occurred, there was a brief Q&A and each actor was asked one question previously submitted by fans to the fan club. The favorite actor and couple categories were not announced at the event. The fan club decided to present those in the next newsletter to allow more time for actors with fans.

Stuart was asked if his wife had a difficult time watching Alan's drug addiction storyline. He said yes, that his family found watching Alan's descent painful, and that his wife can't watch it anymore. I didn't tell him, but I agreed with her! Just too painful to watch my prince slink so low! I'm sure he enjoyed the storyline, though. It was kinda funny when Stuart was commenting that his wife couldn't watch anymore that Wendy kicked him from behind! He laughed, and then told us, of course, to keep watching! Mary Beth was asked what she has been doing with her time away from the show. She said she had been a mom, and spent more time with her friends. At someone else's prompting, she added that she had been training for a triathlon that was coming up in two weeks. Stephen was asked what he does to keep in shape, and he mentioned he eats fats, carbs,...a well balanced meal and learns his lines on the "climber", plus some weight training during the week. He said it was "all a pain" though. He also did this funny dance at one point saying he danced to keep fit...had us all rolling on the floor laughing! Not Stefan-like behavior at all.

Very quickly, we got to the main event. Tables were set up throughout the room with many of the more popular actors put in the main area of the ballroom with the high ceilings (this was very good thinking). Each actor had a single file line. The fans were amazingly well-behaved. Everyone was so polite, so sure to let you know they weren't trying to cut but just walking through to the next line - very courteous.

First on my list was John J. York - I had missed him last year and he is one of my favorites! He is such a sweet person! Next was Julian. He was incredibly charming - I'm even a bigger fan now! He seemed thrilled with the fan support. Rebecca was incredibly beautiful, and amazingly thin. At one point, Ingo came over and hugged her - a cute photo moment, which I didn't get. Stephen Nichols was really funny - he was great (he is in superb shape, didn't wear black but a oh so tight t-shirt - he looked great!) I told him I had recently found a tape with a harmonica jam session by his character Steve on Days at the Brady Fish Market - we laughed that it's too bad Stefan won't be doing any harmonica playing (Steven is very good!). Jackie Zeman had the LONGEST line, mostly because she generously chatted with each fan (I never did make it up to see her - we didn't get in line for her till 3:30 and they had to be out of the ballroom by 4:00). She literally stayed until she was kicked out! Real was very warm, and he had a steady line, as well. Ron Hale was there, also (I was surprised since he was at the PC event!). Little Lucas (Justin Cooper) was giving out autographed pics (as did Jackie, and Mary Beth).

A friend told MBE how nice it was of her to come to the event considering Katherine had "died," but she was quick to say she wasn't dead! John Ingle was very sweet, but then he always is. Tyler and Jonathan were there - both seem very shy. Vanessa stayed for hours - her line never seemed to dwindle either. Billy was gracious, and hammed it up with Rebecca for the camera. I have to say that the event was very well run. Both the actors and the fans seemed relaxed, and they were all very approachable and friendly! Thanks to the Fan Club for a great event!

Pictures of this event available at CurlyQgrl@aol.com

Have you had the chance to attend a fan event? Your fellow soapfans would love to hear about it. Send an email to SoapFanMag @aol.com

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