Michael Zaslow and Maureen Garrett were interviewed for the premiere edition of Soap Opera Weekly On Video, released in December of 1994 to coincide with the magazine's 5th anniversary.  Following are excerpts from the interview which was conducted by Mimi Torchin, Editor of Soap Opera Weekly.

Torchin:  What's always interested me about the two characters is:  do you think that they always loved each other, in spite of everything?

Zaslow:  Absolutely, yeah.

Garrett:  There was a depth of relationship that they just never found anywhere else ... that kept drawing them back.

Zaslow:  They also ... they were just so damaged.  At least, speaking for Roger ... Roger was such a damaged soul; so lacking in, really, self-knowledge and a philosophy of life, and so on -- so easily hurt, and would lash out and would protect himself in all the wrong ways, and would never act in his own true self interest ... always, always screwing things up.  The more important it was to him the more he would screw it up ... like a lot of people in society.  I think there is an easy identification for people with him because we all have had that.  I certainly have; I know it.

Torchin:  What about Holly?

Garrett:  Holly was just so innocent.   I think she just didn't have any of the tools to know how to deal with someone who had such rage in him, so she would run to her mother, and close off instead of finding a way to deal with him.  So it was inexperience ... and then she became battered and ran.

Zaslow:  Do you think what attracted her to Roger was very much like Desdemona attracted to Othello, you know, that sort of thing?

Garrett:  I often played that; that was like her dark side.  Ed was the good man and the draw to Roger was the dark side that she didn't know very well and didn't want to explore, but was always compelling.

Torchin:  What I think of as the turning point of course, and I'm sure you'll agree, is when Roger almost died.  Isn't that when you sort of realized what life would be like without him there?

Garrett:  Yeah, and the concern for his condition, I mean, it was pure love ... "I care about you and want to take care of you".

Zaslow:  Nurturer.

Garrett:  Yes.

Torchin:  And you saved him.  There was the reversal; there was the woman as the savior, finally, Holly no longer being the woman who was always rescued.   There she was the rescuer.  Do you think that sort of freed you to express your love finally, or to recognize it?

Garrett:  Yes, it was very much a lion with her cub.  And with no one else in town standing by him, it was up to her to take care of him, to pull him through.

Torchin:  Where do you see Roger and Holly going from here?

Garrett:  It's not up to us.

Torchin:  Where would you like to see it go?

Garrett:  Well I think they have to always be growing and changing and adapting.  I would love to see them as a couple because it feels like it's been held away from us for so long that now it's so great to be exploring, and it's like "let us go further with this --- let us get through the rough times instead of always breaking the characters up" ... I'd like to see them ride through the rough times to a real deep understanding of each other.

Zaslow:  What I think is so funny is that there's this pretended wisdom that when couples get together, that's the end of the drama ... that's the end of the interest.  I mean, do we really believe that in society that when couples get together, that everything is smooth from then on?  ... it's just "what do you want for breakfast, what do you want for lunch, and what do you want for dinner?"   I mean, it's silly.  There's so many issues that come up, particularly when you have children, but even without that, in terms of your own personal growth, and how it conflicts ... perhaps how something that I'm developing for myself will conflict with my mate, and vice versa ... and it brings up old problems from the past and how to settle them and how to learn to communicate.  It's a never-ending process and it can be very interesting.

Garrett:  The lessons of commitment:  once you've made that commitment and how you keep it exciting and keep learning and growing.

Torchin:  I think the fans want to see you together.  I think that this has been a long time coming and I think they want their satisfaction.

Zaslow:  It takes a lot of talent to write that kind of stuff.   It takes a lot of, not only talent, I shouldn't say talent, but it takes a real commitment to looking inside yourself as a writer, to explore that.

Garrett:  And it can't be another time of Holly reaching the last straw - this is it - that she shuns him and turns away.  She's already had the last straws in this relationship.  They've all been used up. So now it's like "what do we have left ... where do we go from here?"

Torchin:  How would you feel about being parents again?

Zaslow:  I was just thinking about that ... then the question of, well, we could try and whether or not we were successful ...

Garrett:  Or it could just happen when we least expect it.

Zaslow:  And "my God, oh Lord, how do you feel about that?"...that kinda thing.  It could be very interesting, many different ways that you could go with that issue.

Torchin:  Can you imagine being on Guiding Light without each other?

Garrett:  No.

Zaslow: It's in my contract.

Garrett (laughs):  No. It's been the center of it for me.

Zaslow:  Yeah, me too. 

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02/16/06 12:56:01 AM