Post by jag11 on Jun 12, 2007 22:10:37 GMT -5
June 19, 2007 issue SOD (pp. 34-35)
Between John's death and Drucilla's disappearance, Genoa City has been awash in grief. Then Nick and Sharon's plane went down en route to a business meeting in Clear Springs and we had to go through it all over again... except Y&R portrayed the tragedy with a spin and attention to detail that made it seem completely different.
Rather than showing the crash, Y&R focused on the aftershock, as characters received word of the accident. Nikki and Victor were the first to get the news, and they clung to the faint possibility that perhaps Nick and Sharon weren't on board. A shocked Brad found a private place to grieve over Sharon, while her husband, Jack, completely fell apart, numbing his pain with alcohol as he watched the report on television.
Meanwhile, a blissfully unaware Phyllis left Nick a cheerful message informing him that their daughter, Summer, said "Dada." Michael arrived and gravely informed his pal of her husband's death, and Phyllis dissolved into gut-wrenching sobs. "I'm gonna die," she cried, as Michael tried to comfort her. Michelle Stafford brilliantly conveyed myriad emotions--shock, confusion, fear--that pummeled Phyllis as she struggled to process the news. And Y&R hit the smaller, poignant story beats, too, as when Phyllis's sadness turned to panic on the realization that she'd have to tell her stepson, Noah, that he was now an orphan.
Learning about the crash from J.T., Victoria's reaction was played without dialogue. She staggered toward the door as if she'd been punched and slumped over, rejecting J.T.'s attempts to reach out for her.
The anguish was punctuated with a moment of elation at the Newman ranch, when an oblivious Sharon walked in. But cheers gave way to more tears when she explained that she'd gotten off the plane at the last minute. Sharon returned home, where a confused Jack briefly mistook her for a ghost. Once convinced that his wife was alive, Jack embraced her, sinking to the ground with joy.
As Nick's death began to set in, so did anger. Noting Brad's elation upon seeing Sharon, Victoria went to spend the night with J.T. Nikki blamed Victor for sending Nick to Clear Springs. "Your project killed him!" she yelled, before storming out.
And then there was the feeling among Nick's loved ones that the situation was literally unbearable. The town gathered for his funeral service without Nikki. "I can't do it!" she wailed to Kay. "I don't know how I'm going to bury my son," Victor admitted to a sympathetic Jill.
Phyllis was determined to keep a part of Nick with her. When the fireflies Noah had collected with Nick died, she got another jarful, then bravely promised Summer a good life. "Daddy is with us, I feel it," she announced with fluttering hope.
Playing so much tragedy in such a short period risks numbing the audience with repetition. But Y&R's writers and cast demonstrated, with heart-breaking, intimate details and deeply moving performances, that every loss is unique and life-changing--and that the process never gets any easier
Editors' Choice: Crash & Burn
Between John's death and Drucilla's disappearance, Genoa City has been awash in grief. Then Nick and Sharon's plane went down en route to a business meeting in Clear Springs and we had to go through it all over again... except Y&R portrayed the tragedy with a spin and attention to detail that made it seem completely different.
Rather than showing the crash, Y&R focused on the aftershock, as characters received word of the accident. Nikki and Victor were the first to get the news, and they clung to the faint possibility that perhaps Nick and Sharon weren't on board. A shocked Brad found a private place to grieve over Sharon, while her husband, Jack, completely fell apart, numbing his pain with alcohol as he watched the report on television.
Meanwhile, a blissfully unaware Phyllis left Nick a cheerful message informing him that their daughter, Summer, said "Dada." Michael arrived and gravely informed his pal of her husband's death, and Phyllis dissolved into gut-wrenching sobs. "I'm gonna die," she cried, as Michael tried to comfort her. Michelle Stafford brilliantly conveyed myriad emotions--shock, confusion, fear--that pummeled Phyllis as she struggled to process the news. And Y&R hit the smaller, poignant story beats, too, as when Phyllis's sadness turned to panic on the realization that she'd have to tell her stepson, Noah, that he was now an orphan.
Learning about the crash from J.T., Victoria's reaction was played without dialogue. She staggered toward the door as if she'd been punched and slumped over, rejecting J.T.'s attempts to reach out for her.
The anguish was punctuated with a moment of elation at the Newman ranch, when an oblivious Sharon walked in. But cheers gave way to more tears when she explained that she'd gotten off the plane at the last minute. Sharon returned home, where a confused Jack briefly mistook her for a ghost. Once convinced that his wife was alive, Jack embraced her, sinking to the ground with joy.
As Nick's death began to set in, so did anger. Noting Brad's elation upon seeing Sharon, Victoria went to spend the night with J.T. Nikki blamed Victor for sending Nick to Clear Springs. "Your project killed him!" she yelled, before storming out.
And then there was the feeling among Nick's loved ones that the situation was literally unbearable. The town gathered for his funeral service without Nikki. "I can't do it!" she wailed to Kay. "I don't know how I'm going to bury my son," Victor admitted to a sympathetic Jill.
Phyllis was determined to keep a part of Nick with her. When the fireflies Noah had collected with Nick died, she got another jarful, then bravely promised Summer a good life. "Daddy is with us, I feel it," she announced with fluttering hope.
Playing so much tragedy in such a short period risks numbing the audience with repetition. But Y&R's writers and cast demonstrated, with heart-breaking, intimate details and deeply moving performances, that every loss is unique and life-changing--and that the process never gets any easier