Santa Barbara came on with the hopes of changing the daytime industry and it did to many respects. THe Dobsons should be applauded for their soap. Sadly, Santa Barbara was on NBC which does not care for it's daytime audience. As an Another WOrld fan, I can say that network does not show the respect of daytime drama audiences by canceling one of it's soaps. Santa Barbara tried to be like other soaps just when it came out but it didn't work. Then, they brought together Cruz and Eden played by A Martinez and Marcy Walker. They were very good together. The casting was beyond to describe. The cast included Dame Judith Anderson, Janis Paige, Nicolas Coaster (a soap vet to say the least), Sydney Penney, Nancy Lee Grahn, Louise Sorel, Jed Allan, Jane McConnell, and the list just goes on. When you are a favorite of Jill Farren Phelps, you become quite active on the show. Just to say that Grahn and Allan both joined General HOspital since Santa Barbara. The writing was witty and weird, brilliant and sometimes sloppy at the height of Santa Barbara's fame. But sadly, this show became a casualty of daytime's losing audience. Most people don't stay at home during the days like they used too. There are daytime audiences like me willing to tape while at work. I'll just wonder what it might have been if Santa Barbara had been allowed to grow old and gracefully. Santa Barbara won't be forgotten anytime soon. We still have a bit of it on General HOspital.

Hi readers! First of all I enjoy this site! I had thought years that I'm a crazy girl who love a soup-opera so much that I've learnt an other language (!)so that I could understand it! I'm from Hungary and I could it watch only on a German channel. And now I'm writing and listening in English! :-) I grew up with these "families" and I miss it very much. Some years ago I found some websites which deal with our stars, follow them and where we can discuss our feelings. It's fantastic! Thank you for everybody! In Hungary has never been aired that show. I don't know why? But I hope that one time hungarian people can also get to know SB. They don't know what they are out of.

What was it about "Santa Barbara" that managed to get dedicated non-Soapists like me hooked? Humour, in a word. SB is the only soap I'm aware of that had an all-the-way-thru' sense of humour about itself. I discovered this , as so many do, while surfing the channels. Up came an incident in SB when a lawyer character is seen in a coma. He fantasises himself into an all-white version of his lawyer's office (i.e. Heaven) where he is seen arriving bedecked in white from head to toe. His first stop is his secretary's desk. "She", also a vision in white, is not his real secretary but one of SB's male characters who is also a transvestite. He/she is seated at his/her desk, filing his/her nails AND--here is the piece of resistance that made SB irresistable to me--watching the opening credits of his/her favourite soap on the office TV. The favourite soap being--what else?--"Santa Barbara! A nice little touch of post-modernism there, I think.Then there was the murder of the lounge singer by the local District Attorney and her husband.(A very Santa Barbara reversal of the usual plotline!) They hide the body in a freezer which provides a superb full- face picture of the corpse for the closing credits. The make-up artist has done a superb job, ice crystals mixing with mascara and blusher to achieve that all-over "dead" effect. AND, forgoing the Santa Barbara theme music, the episode ends with the dear departed lounge singer's own voice singing the highly appropriate "AM I BLUE?"!!!From then on I was hooked. Humour and a wonderfully anarchic script that had characters trapped in dungeons at the beginning of an episode and attending a" black tie 'n' frocks party" at the end, are what made Santa Barbara a soap like no other. And I daresay we shall not see its like ever again.

I am simply overjoyed to see so much love for this unique and superior daytime soap! I have always loved this show (and I am NOT a daytime soap fan), and it seems to me that just about everyone who has seen it would agree that it was way above the cut. I came across it quite by accident and became addicted for years to come. Many people have mentioned how great the writing was, or how it managed to incorporate comedy into it regularly. The storylines were always intricate, thrilling and well thought-out. Some of the actors on this show were simply Oscar-worthy, and many have gone on to achieve considerable success in the industry, most notably Robin Wright Penn (She was always a natural). The relationship/repartee between Mason (Lane Davies) and Julia (Nancy Grahn) was pure, unadulterated genius. They were like "Moonlighting" meets Hepburn & Tracy. Gina (Robin Mattson) and Keith (Justin Deas) were simply outrageous! Never were two evil people so darn entertaining at every turn! Not only that, but Ms. Mattson managed to make Gina a character who you could sympathize with on same level, in spite of all her flaws. Her love for her son, Brandon, was NEVER in question, although her treatment of just about everyone else was deplorable! I should mention that the original Gina (Linda Gibboney) was simply outstanding, and I was shocked to see her go. It took me a while to warm up to Ms. Mattson, who gave the character a different twist, but in her capable and accomplished hands, I grew to love her portaryal. This show worked on so many levels. It definitely deserved the Emmys it won. In fact, it deserved many, many more. I would like to take a moment to comment on the real people behind the characters. I am an actor, writer, director, singer and producer. I used to watch this show when I was about 12 and 13 years old. As a young kid with stars in his eyes, I would write to all the actors, and so many of them were beyond accomodating. A Martinez, who played Cruz, used to write back to me every month. And, he didn't just drop a note. He would write complete letters, answering all my questions and responding to all my hopes and aspirations. He saw this young kid who looked up to him, and he embraced it. It is people like that who truly gave me inspiration to follow my dreams and goals. Another one who would always take the time to write me back was Jane Sibbett, who played Jane. These people really took the time to reach out to me and make me feel valued, and that has affected me into my adult years. I should point out that both of these actors work consisitently. Jane Sibbett was part of another superb show called "Herman's Head" for four years. I truly am happy for them. Finally, I had the pleasure of running into Judith McConnell, who played Sophia, at an audition recently. I couldn't resist telling her how much I loved the show. She was with her daughter, and her eyes just lit up. I can tell you, from speaking to her, that she loved doing the show as much as we loved watching it. They knew they had something special and extraordinary, and the years she spent on that show are very fond in her memory. Meeting her was a great experience, because I got to connect to her in a real way. She was very gracious and appreciative, and can I say she looks fabulous? She looks like she's still in her late thirties, and she's got to be about sixty! I wish every one who had a part in this show success, and I would be honored one day to work with just about any of them.