Julia's way with words

[Gothick]

Dear fans,

once again, I've been looking around for the episode in which Julia exclaims to somebody or other some version of the line:  "Mrs. Johnson is a neurotic hysteric!"  I've been re-watching the Quentin haunting storyline shows (and how wonderfully done they were) and have seen some great scenes with Mrs J, including an episode with Harry #2 in which they are cleaning "Matthew Morgan's cottage" because "Tom Jennings" is about to move in--odd on two counts, first because Laura had been the previous occupant of that cottage but is never mentioned, not even by her own son, and two that Tom Jennings had been dead about three months at that point.  Anyhow, still no sign of Julia's reading of Mrs J's beads.

Anybody have a clue when and where this happened?

Thanks,

G.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Check out Ep #686. 

[Julia99]

Anyhow, still no sign of Julia's reading of Mrs J's beads.

Anybody have a clue when and where this happened?

err what? "reading Mrs. J's beads"??

I am enjoying an episode where Barnabas is moaning about Vicki and Burke and Julia says "Don't DElude yourself." The inflection in her voice had me laughing.  

[Mysterious Benefactor]

One of my favorite Grayson/Julia line deliveries is coming up in the WP in Ep #928. I've posted about it before, so some may already know what I'm referring to.    But I'll be sure to point it out when it comes...

[quentincollins]

Matthew had lived in the cottage for years while Laura only stayed there a few weeks, so I can understand how people still thought of the cottage as Matthew's. The name had stuck.
As for mixing up the Jennings brothers, well, they were identical.

[michael c]

the show has a funny habit. when a storyline is over it's over. it rarely gets mentioned again.

after her storyline laura is never referred to by name again(except during 1897 which is a totally different set of characters). if she's even referenced her name isn't spoken. during the part of the early barnabas storyline where david fears barnabas liz says that she hasn't seen david so frightened since "his mother" tried to come back. during the cassandra storyline when liz objects to roger and cassandra's hasty marriage she reminds roger that technically he's "still married" but again laura's name is not uttered.

think about adam. he dominates the plot for most of 1968 but when he's gone he,and all of the destruction he caused,are never even referred to and the quentin storyline gets underway as if adam(and eve)never existed.

even major,major characters like victoria and joe. when they're gone everyone acts like they were never even part of the story before. does maggie ever even mention her former fiances name?

it's almost like they just wanted to march forward with whatever plot was at hand without alot of tethers to what came before.

[Gothick]

I do love Grayson's delivery of the line "Mrs Johnson is a repressed hysteric."  It really looks as if she's biting back a big blurt of laughter.

David has dialogue where he explains to Amy who Matthew Morgan was, but all he says is that "he was somebody who used to work for us."  Imagine if he had said, "Yeah, he was my best buddy for awhile, but then he kidnapped Miss Winters, kept her bound and gagged in a secret room behind the bookcase in the Old House, and was about to make mincemeat of her brains with an axe when Josette's ghost gave him a heart attack."

I tried imagining the conversation in which Barnabas and Julia have to explain to the kids:  "David, we know we said Aunt Elizabeth was dead, but we were wrong.  We came *this close* to burying her alive, but luckily we didn't, and she woke up and she's upstairs now having a nice tall brandy."

Maybe the difficulties trying to come up with plausible references to some of the bygone storylines that wound up in rather lurid scenarios partly accounts for the weird "amnesia" around such characters as Joe, Vicki, Jason, et al.

G.

[Sandor]

I enjoyed Grayson's characters hurling some good barbs or uttering some memorable quips in that great voice of hers:

Julia reacting to Nicholas Blair's latest fiendish scheme: "That's monstrous!"
Julia responding to Barnabas' exclamation that Dr. Lang can help make him "a free man": "...Or a dead one!"
Magda to a cursed Quentin: "You have no future!"
Julia, again to Nicholas Blair: "I'm glad that Eve is dead, and as far as I'm concerned, she can stay dead!"
Magda: "I only like Gypsy music."

Sometimes I got the feeling that old storylines or written-out characters were not referred to again in future scripts - because whatever was going on in Collinwood at that moment was so confusing, it was all the characters (and writers AND actors) could do to focus on the present.

[michael c]

interesting theory sandor.

still it might have lent the show more emotional depth if say maggie once in a while referred to her dead father or her institutionalized former fiance or her best friend who just vanished into thin air.

but like you said the day-to-day atmosphere at collinwood was so chaotic...

[Gothick]

Well, we all know the story about the time the writers got so confused about events in the past of the show that had to be known in order for a certain day's script to be done... after arguing pointlessly for awhile, DC or somebody said:  "Hey, there are all those kids waiting outside the studio--let's ask them!"  And sure enough, the "studio kids" were able to provide a letter perfect summary of "the story so far."

If only they had done this more often... for instance, when trying to recall whether Josette had died in 1795, 1796, or 1797 ...

G.

[MagnusTrask]

That's a great story... and shows ought to hire at least one fan as a continuity expert.  It'd help me a bit with my blood pressure.

[Julia99]

I enjoyed Grayson's characters hurling some good barbs or uttering some memorable quips in that great voice of hers:

Good pix sandor!