Writing
Todd and Blair's creation as a couple is described as factoring in several aspects of their own personalities, as well as their individual life experiences. In an interview, former One Life to Live head writer Michael Malone detailed the varying elements, what he set out to create, and how the couple eventually evolved:
Todd and Blair were a great deal alike, two bad apples, two lost souls: conniving, deceitful, wounded and hiding the wounds for all they were worth behind a smart and sexy facade. Both were very much on guard against ever being susceptible to love. (A Scarlett and Rhett match-up, to use my perennial GWTW analogy that used to drive Josh Griffith crazy. I loved the movie, he didn't.) The idea for Todd/Blair came from wondering what would happen if two tricksters set out to trick each other, with no genuine thought of romance, and what if the ultimate trick was on them and they fell in love? In the beginning, Blair was trying to marry Todd for his money before he found out he was the heir to the Lord fortune, and Todd was trying to hurt any and everybody in town. Slowly they learned how much they had in common — both had rotten childhoods that left them with deep insecurities, both had rotten reputations in Llanview (and deserved them), both were willing to go to any lengths to get what they wanted — the safety of immense wealth, the thrill of somebody else's spouse, social acceptance by those who'd rejected them.
As soon as we put them together, the chemistry between Roger and Kassie was wonderful and we knew they would work as a couple. But deepest down, we planned to play that Blair was still in love with Max. That old flame was going to flare up and start fireworks as she and Todd started to fight over the ultimate prize of their daughter, Starr. Different producers, network folk, different writers took their story other places. — Michael Malone
In a 2001 interview, when asked if Todd and Blair are soulmates, actress Kassie DePaiva, portrayer of Blair, stated "Yes. Their connection is so deeply rooted. Less is more with them. They don't even need dialogue to speak. What they don't say speaks volumes."
In a 2008 interview, actor Trevor St. John, then-portrayer of Todd, spoke of Todd and Blair's on-again/off-again relationship. "It’s a never-ending cycle," he said. "That’s what people expect; they want Todd and Blair together, and the writers give them what they expect. It’s not necessarily true that they’ll do exactly what the fans want, but they do have an expectation, so the writers meet it." St. John did express discontent with the back and forth nature of the couple, however. He noted wanting something different. "Like I said", he stated, "there is an endless recycling of breaking up with Blair and getting back together, breaking up with Blair, then getting back together."
Read more about this topic: Todd Manning And Blair Cramer
Famous quotes containing the word writing:
“No race can prosper till it learns there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem.”
—Booker T. Washington (1856–1915)
“When writing a novel a writer should create living people; people not characters. A character is a caricature.”
—Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961)
“The Twist was a guided missile, launched from the ghetto into the very heart of suburbia. The Twist succeeded, as politics, religion, and law could never do, in writing in the heart and soul what the Supreme Court could only write on the books.”
—Eldridge Cleaver (b. 1935)