THE DUMB & THE USELESS

Halle-mothereffing-Lujah!

I just went on Wikipedia and read the news that Lynn Marie Latham, head writer and executive producer of The Young & The Restless has been fired. FIRED!

I'm SO relieved that the official word on this decision is finally out. Now we can look forward to a much-anticipated, well-deserved improvement in what had been, up until a year or two ago, the best soap on the tube.

I hope this change means that we won't *ever* have to see Y&R's history and characters disrepected in the way that Lynn Marie Latham and her crew betrayed the show and us, the viewers.

I'm still *very* uncomfortable when I remember back to when she took over reigns of Y&R ... suddenly almost all of Y&R's characters became wisecracking, sarcastic, criminal, attention-hungry, media "stars" in a small, midwest city who dramatically snap shut their cell phones at the end of every scene.

Here's a clue, Latham: the drama is not in riding your actors until they have perfected their ability to physically manipulate a small piece of technology for melodramatic effect in your poorly contrived scenes. The drama is in KNOWING your show, your characters and your audience and writing storylines, story arcs, dialogue, scenes and episodes that pay tribute to the essence of the show, the core of its values, the talent of its actors and the intelligence of its viewers. Word!

Do you think she'll learn her lesson from the Y&R disaster she created? We can only hope, but it really doesn't matter anymore because CBS daytime has FINALLY done what needed to be done a long time ago. I just hope that their inaction on this matter doesn't cause the show to lose its' number one status (which it has now had for nearly 1,000 weeks!)

BTW: How in the HELL did Latham manage to win a WGA award recently for writing Y&R? She must have the WGA fooled in the same way that she had Barbara Bloom and everyone else at CBS daytime fooled.

2008 is Y&R's 35th anniversary year and I cannot think of a better way for Y&R to celebrate! This is really great news for viewers (and hopefully for the cast, too).

One more time... all together now... YEEHAW!

To celebrate the good news, I looked back at some photos of me with a few of the stars of The Young & The Restless - I've had the chance to meet lots of the cast on different occasions so I thought I'd post them up here, too...