Soap queen Dorian Lord, aka Robin Strasser is in limbo. In five months her contract expires and so far, it seems that she is the only one negotiating. Bear in mind we’ve seen literally half the veterans and best actors of daytime television soaps being axed or otherwise asked to take pay cuts that are far more than they should be.
Witness the exodus from Days of our lives, where those who were considered to be older, most notably the greats of the show were let go., seeming very much like age discrimination to everyone who viewed it.
We’re pleased that we aren’t alone in thinking this.
Robin herself makes the comment when discussing her possible leavetaking from her show. In her statement Strasser comments “I have promised my fans friends, I have promised myself, I have promised the universe; when I wanted to come back to the show so badly between 2000 and 2003, when I was blacklisted from ABC Daytime,” Strasser recalled. “I said that if I get back in, I’m staying. They can carry me out… measure the door for a gurney or my coffin because that’s it. I’m staying. I’m not quitting. I am not refusing to negotiate. What I am able to say right now is that I have been asked to make no announcement and to say nothing.”
Strasser was previously noted as saying that there was no negotiation involved on the network’s part.
“I know that it is a bigger paycut than other actors have been asked to take, and anybody who was asked to take a larger paycut was making two or three times as much as I was,” Strasser said of the networks final offer. “In 2003 when [executive producer] Frank Valentini broke the blacklist and got me back on the show, that necessitated my taking a 63% paycut. So I got 63% of what I had negotiated in the 1990s. So what I am seeing is something that feels disrespectful, something that feels inequitable [and] it makes me feel discriminated again by virtue of … I’m an older woman.”
Well Hallelujah. Someone had the courage to say it. So stay tuned. If Strasser doesn’t get some kind of feedback from the network, her last date to show will be December 18.