| May saw the end of Megan McTavish's writing | | | | "You want the audience to believe that this really |
| career for the popular soap opera All My Children. | | | | could be happening, and once you start doing so |
| The 58 year old joined the writing staff of the | | | | many stories that are so unrelatable, you get a |
| daytime drama as head writer in 2003 and was | | | | little tune-out," Esensten said. "So even if some of |
| later criticized for the plots she produced were | | | | our stories appear to be larger than life, the goal |
| often dark. The fans were left distraught and | | | | is for the audience to think, 'Wow, I've been |
| dissatisfied, thus the producers of the show let | | | | there! I wonder what she's going to do.'" |
| her go and replaced her with two veteran soap | | | | The writing partners started their work on All My |
| opera writers, Barbara J. Esensten and James | | | | Children early last month and were surprised to |
| Harmon Brown. | | | | see previous co-workers from other shows and |
| Esensten and Brown have been known for their | | | | even happier to be reunited with some of the |
| work on daytime dramas such as Guiding Light, | | | | actors. |
| Loving, The City, Port Charles and Days of Our | | | | "It was kind of like old home week," Brown said. |
| Lives. Initially, producers were skeptical on hiring | | | | Executive producer Julie Hanan Carruthers threw |
| them, however, the writers have been working | | | | a cocktail party as a welcome gesture to |
| hard to carry out their plans for All My Children. | | | | introduce the two to the rest of All My Children. |
| In a conversation with Soap Opera Digest, | | | | There, they had a chance to meet their new |
| Jsames Harmon Brown said, "Our main goal is to | | | | writing staff and since then have created an open |
| make the stories a tree with many branches - | | | | and comfortable environment for their writers. |
| the so-called umbrella stories. That's always the | | | | "We were very fortunate to be able to inherit this |
| goal when we come to a show, but the positive | | | | show with the actors and writers and, obviously, |
| thing about this show is that there are so many | | | | working with Julie...we're really having a good time," |
| great characters, rich history and family | | | | Esensten said. "We have a lot of humor injected |
| entanglements that it's really not that difficult to | | | | into the meetings, some of which we can't |
| make those branches grow." | | | | repeat, but we've taken our writers out for |
| Barbara J. Esensten agreed, adding that as the | | | | dinner and drinks and stuff and just had a lot of |
| new headwriters of the show, they need to | | | | fun with it. |
| present more realistic and relatable storylines. | | | | |