There used to be a lot of characters on one one episode

[Chatty Cakes]

Is it me or did they show more characters back then? It seemed we saw a lot of people today talking about Jack and Victor before we ever saw Jack.

[garciab006]

Definitely not just you. The reason the stories moved so slowly was because there were so many characters on the canvas with lots of story to tell.

[DallasGal]

And more sets. I miss the days when there was a change of scenery instead of scene after scene in CL or Society.

[Y&ROn&Off]

Loved how Jack/Liv/Nathan showed up mid show. It's little things that i enjoy....

[LisaM1983]

I thought that was odd they just popped up midway through. I have to think a scene or two was edited out in yesterday's re-run.

[DallasGal]

I really liked Olivia. Her affair with Brad always seemed a bit odd to me. Ashley was her BFF and it didn’t feel like something she would do.

[RestlessFan]

I think Olivia also got intimately involved with Neil Winters at one time or the sisters, Dru & Olivia, both shared Neil Winters. I think soap operas do this a lot thru the years, sisters have shared men. Same with Ashley and Tracy, both were involved with Brad at one time or another.

[kyzer sosay]

Remember that these are
SPECIAL EVENT episodes

[RestlessFan]

This was the standard or Y&R used to have so many families over the years and Bill Bell knew how to write for a bigger cast and so he wrote long story arcs and the stories were told slowly, too, took his time to tell them, yet he knew how to keep them compelling and engrossing enough that you want o tune in. Bill Bell was a master storyteller and that's why he made Y&R #1 for decades and he created all these characters over the years, too.

[LisaM1983]

Yesterday's episode was actually pretty typical for the time period. There were more characters and storylines happening in tandem.

[DallasGal]

This was a typical show. This episode was under the label of rivalries but I thought the rest the of show was better than the cat fight (which I hate to see grown women do).

I consider a special event to be a wedding, funeral or disaster episode.

[soapfan6]

I love when characters show up. It makes it seems like everyone is living life. I hate that whomever is on during the first arc of any episode are the only characters we see, but it does make it easier to decide rather to tune in that day.

[Forever Fan]

Yep, I usually know within 10 minutes if I want to tune in for the day. But that doesn't work with the classic episodes. You can tune out early and miss one of your favorites in the second half.

[Smithey]

There used to be more cast members because they had a bigger budget. When ratings drop, they have to cut costs. I long for better writing and bigger casts.

[Shalaydra75]

That is why ratings use to be much higher. There was a cast that appealed to a broad audience.

[snuebee]

I really have been enjoying the classic episodes and that is a good point, several characters were on and it was not a focus on one character like Adam or Phyllis. No wonder the ratings are not what they used to be. These clasics have me glued to the tv.

[GwenSharonteam]

Completely agree, we have plenty of characters in one episodes compared to the recent ones.
The focus by episode had multiple storylines with a mixed of the cast of different families, but I don’t think they had more cast ... YR has still a large cast, the problem they’re not writing for everyone and they have perhaps 2 or 3 storyline and other characters are filler ... before there’s multiple set used , and people were interacting in professional and personal level ... right now , a character is seen only on his/her personal or professional environment but not the both, ... than Rey is not used daily as a cop, is a nonsense..seeing him just once in a while filling a complaint like he’s a cat officer who is busy when a cat is stuck in a tree, is a waste .. before Paul was seeing investigating all time, and busy being in relationship with Lauren or someone else ..., right now, everything is linear, trivial without subplot, and really you can guess easily what is going to happen , and what killed mostly YR writing over the years, and its obvious misconceptions of supercouple and stardom ...I was watching from the beginning BB for his romance but YR for the drama..real drama that could happen to any member of the cast, everyone had the right of a great storyline. They didn’t have to be a part of the core families to be sure to see your favourites. Bell was genuinely writing for everyone with the same qualities..., sadly now, it’s like the same conversation over and over, with little action and real interaction with purpose between the characters ...

[TwoOfEach]

It’s a Catch-22. YR features fewer characters per episode because the budget has been cut but people whose faves aren’t featured don’t tune in so the budget drops and they rely even more on younger, cheaper actors.

Same with sets. It costs a lot to set up and take down sets. So now we see fewer sets and they are smaller in order to fit them in the same studio. The Grand Phoenix always films first and then the actors who are waiting to film can stay there while waiting for the cameras to move to their set.

[YoungBold]

I don't know that it was that many more characters than now. The bigger difference to me was that they weren't all talking about one or two storylines or circling around the same people. Its almost like watching three to four separate shows loosely tied together versus today where one overarching story dominates with very little else going on.

[YoungBold]

It’s a Catch-22. YR features fewer characters per episode because the budget has been cut but people whose faves aren’t featured don’t tune in so the budget drops and they rely even more on younger, cheaper actors.

Same with sets. It costs a lot to set up and take down sets. So now we see fewer sets and they are smaller in order to fit them in the same studio. The Grand Phoenix always films first and then the actors who are waiting to film can stay there while waiting for the cameras to move to their set.

I honestly know nothing about sets, set design or putting up or taking them down. But I do wonder how large a space they have to work with and if they couldn't permanently set up most of the sets.

[creation]

Those were the good old days, when soaps told riveting stories and could actually manage to have several plots going on at once, with multiple characters......how things have changed!

[Forever Fan]

Scenes were a lot longer, with meaningful dialogue that connected the characters.