Y&R vs. General Hospital Sets - The Young and the Restless

I started watching General Hospital about a month ago. The first thing that I noticed was the sheer number of sets. Not small sets either; HUGE! GORGEOUS!

I’m still trying to figure out who is who on the show. Closed captioning doesn’t give the names of who is speaking so I have to wait for somebody to mention a character’s name. There are several that I know the story lines but I have no clue what the name of the character is. I did the best I could listing the GH sets.

GENERAL HOSPITAL
Sets from the last 4 or 5 weeks

Tons of background extras in every public venue set.

• 3 different rooms
• Court yard
• Main Entrance hallway

THE YOUNG AND THE RESTLESS
Sets from the last 12 months

Never any background extras

REGULAR

USED ONCE

LIMITED USE FOR A STORY

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Disappointing isn’t it …

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I can think of a couple more regular sets - Victor and Nikki’s living room, Billy and Lily’s condo (with the nasty couch), Victoria’s living room but that hasn’t been seen lately.
MIA - the all-purpose hospital room (kidney transplant? Brain surgery? Same room), hospital waiting room, Jack’s office, Jabot boardroom (PB said those sets may return now that Kyle is back).
“Fun” sets - the cheap dumpy motel room where Adam held Chelsea captive (and some other things happened there). The dive bar where Sally spied on Billy, and where Billy used to meet Amanda.

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I can think of a couple more regular sets - Victor and Nikki’s living room, Billy and Lily’s condo (with the nasty couch), Victoria’s living room but that hasn’t been seen lately.

Those sets were in my original list in my Note file. They must not have copied when I went to move them here.

MIA - the all-purpose hospital room (kidney transplant? Brain surgery? Same room), hospital waiting room, Jack’s office, Jabot boardroom (PB said those sets may return now that Kyle is back).

Anything at Jabot hasn’t been seen in over a year so I didn’t include them.

I completely forgot about the hospital room.

“Fun” sets - the cheap dumpy motel room where Adam held Chelsea captive (and some other things happened there). The dive bar where Sally spied on Billy, and where Billy used to meet Amanda.

The hotel room or whatever it was that Adam held Chelsea was over a year ago. It was also a limited use set created just for that story.

Another limited use set created for one story was the room where Stitch held Mariah.

I forgot about that bar where Sally spied on Billy. It was also a limited use set created for one story.

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Disappointing isn’t it …

Really disappointing. I saw 39 sets in four or five weeks! I didn’t count but I don’t think Y&R even had 39 in the last 12 months, and that’s including sets that were used one time or two or three times for a specific story.

No one is holding business meetings in people’s living rooms. They’re not having business meetings and private conversations in a hotel lobby where everyone can hear. People actually live in houses that you see!

And there are sets for recreation!! A garage, a horse stable with a real horse, a nail salon, a swimming pool that people actually use, an art gallery.

The one thing I’m not enjoying about General Hospital is some of the acting. Not mentioning any names, but there is lots of bad acting and over acting on that show.

I wish closed captioning would give the name of the character speaking. It’s weird to follow a storyline and not even know the names of the people involved.

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I think General Hospital has more actors and actresses then Young and restless. Young and the Restless only focused on the same people instead of forcing on new one. They tried with Rey and Lola but sadly gone.

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General Hospital definitely has more actors.

If they had gone about introducing the Rosales family differently than they did, most if not all of them would still be around.

The way they were brought in one after the other reminded me of the scene in The Hobbit where a dwarf showed up at Bilbo’s door one at a time. First there was Arturo. Then Lola’s bra. Then Lola. And then Rey. Followed by Mia. Then Mama Rosales and then Papa Rosales.

Within a hot five minutes of being in town, each had befriended a wealthy person and either started dating them, slept with them, married them or moved in with them. The exception to the rule was Mia and they turned her into a total clown.

They were pushed into every single storyline at the expense of other characters. They were in practically every scene in every episode.

It was too much and too fast.

They were supposed to be a working class family. Well, they weren’t working class for very long. Soon everyone but Mia was involved with the wealthy. She tried but because they cast her as a clown nobody really wanted anything to do with her.

This soap desperately needs a working-class family along the lines of the Williams. They were a true working-class family.

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I’ve tried watching GH but there’s SO many characters and stories I gave up. Maybe in a couple years when I’m “really” retired and my granddaughter (who I watch during the day) is in school.
When they had the classic episodes on 2 years ago it noticed that some of the Y & R sets had not changed in 20 - 25 years. Same furniture in Victor’s living room plus that Asian-looking chest in Nate’s/formerly Adam’s/formerly Neil’s (etc) penthouse. Must have come with the building.

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@Kristabell76 helped me find my feet with General Hospital.

If I had questions I would post in the following thread and she would answer them for me.

I am successfully navigating the storylines, for the most part anyway. There are a couple that I’m still confused about.

It’s now trying to figure out some of the character names because closed captioning doesn’t say who is speaking, I have to Google The General Hospital cast and look for a picture of the actor to see the name of their character.

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The difference is shocking, especially considering Y&R has been the top rated soap for years. Yet they are the worst for sets. Even Days does better, although many sets are cheap.

GH sets arent just big but really nice. As someone already mentioned the sets like the Abbott and Chancellor homes havent even had any new furniture.

Characters go from CL to Society in contrived plot points just to run into their enemies. Victor owns TOTT but he and Nikki are always at Society.

And the social event of the decade, the HWC merger party, is happening in the lobby of the GP.

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I don’t watch General Hospital, so I can’t compare, but I have been extremely disappointed with the sameness of sets on Y&R for some time. Is it a COVID thing? Along the same lines, where are the extras? I think it’s been at least six months since someone not in the cast who was a customer at Crimson Lights or Society. Same with the park, hotel, etc.,

Maybe it’s just me, but I find it very depressing/distracting that there are no other people on this show except for the cast… and maybe the guy who diligently dusts the counters at Crimson Lights.

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disappointed with the sameness of sets on Y&R for some time. Is it a COVID thing? Along the same lines, where are the extras? I think it’s been at least six months since someone not in the cast who was a customer at Crimson Lights or Society. Same with the park, hotel, etc.,

Welcome to the forum!!

Sadly the reduction of sets is not explicitly due to COVID. It started before that.

The Newman Ranch set was downsized before COVID to that one small room that they have now.

Victoria’s house used to have an entranceway, stairs, living room, and dining room. That was downsized to a couch, chair and a doorway leading into a dining area.

When Lily was living in her house, it used to be a huge big set with a gargantuan living room, kitchen and dining area. It was downsized to just basically a kitchen counter and table.

The Grand Phoenix hotel room has always been the only room in use there. A new painting gets hung over the couch and a few knick-knacks changed around for different characters.

More people moved into the Grand Phoenix because of COVID I think. All they have to do is clean one set and change a few knick-knacks here and there. Most of the time when somebody’s in that room they don’t touch anything so the cleaning crew really doesn’t have much to do to clean that one set in between it being used by a different character.

The GCAC seemed to go bye-bye when the Grand Phoenix opened. The GCAC roof-top set also vanished before COVID. That was my favourite set. I just loved the Decor and the colours.

I read in a comment on this board at some point within the last year, that the Young and Restless moved stages and their new stage area is much smaller than the previous one. Whether there’s truth to that or not I don’t know.

But I really don’t understand how General Hospital can have 39 big and beautiful active sets (actually 40 because I missed one), and Y&R, the #1 soap opera for decades, seems to have an ever-shrinking number of sets.

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I just remembered another set from General Hospital. Actually I remembered it when I was making the initial post for this thread, but I didn’t know the character’s name.

#40 is Felicia’s house.

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Acadia_ca sats: I read in a comment on this board at some point within the last year, that the Young and Restless moved stages and their new stage area is much smaller than the previous one. Whether there’s truth to that or not I don’t know.

In 2018, CBS sold Television City to the real estate investment company Hackman Capital Partners while continuing to lease exclusive Y&R production space. Y&R didn’t move to a smaller stage, they are leasing fewer stage sets to produce Show.

A year before, 2017, Sony/CBS acquired Y&R from the Bell family. The Bell’s relinquished control of Y&R: advertising dollars are paid to Sony/CBS, Bell Dramatic Serial, Inc./Corday Productions before the Show production company, subsequently there were cost cutting measures instituted; fewer sets and cheaper decor (few characters have home sets, hotel room set repurposed for several character’s use), protracted contract negotiations, legacy characters let go (Paul Williams, Cane and the Twins, Esther, etc) or go on extended leave (Nina, Kevin, Ashley), killed off (Rey) or recast with unknown actors (Chance, Summer).

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Interesting information, thanks for posting. By the way I love your cat in a suit!

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advertising dollars are paid to Sony/CBS, Bell Dramatic Serial, Inc./Corday Productions before the Show production company,

So basically profits are paid out to the big boys first and what’s left goes into the show’s production (which apparently includes actors salaries)?

That is a really stupid way of doing business.

It should be the other way around. After the cost of the show including salaries, what’s left is considered profit and that’s what should be divided up.

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Thanks Lila.

My black cat got out of the habit of dressing for the office during Covid isolation. Pancho Barnes prefurrs her birthday suit for Zoom meetings.

Show off.

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The owners take the cream, and the skim is left. Y&R broadcasting contract goes until 2024.

At the rate Josh Griffith, et al are going, that should kill off Show.

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I completely agree with you. They wrote the family in such a way that it annoyed long time viewers. If they had been written slower and not so over the top with Mia, they could have been a YR staple. I loved having normal people portrayed on the show. Niki and …. What brother was it? It was hysterical. Arturo (sp?). That was his name. He was good with Abby. One of the few men she has had chemistry with! Mia had great potential. I liked the family and wish they had kept them on.

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If they had been written slower and not so over the top with Mia, they could have been a YR staple. I loved having normal people portrayed on the show.

Arturo’s introduction as Nikki’s boy toy-gigolo did nothing to ingratiate that character with the viewers. Not only that, but he was supposed to be Cuban and he sounded like he was from the Bronx. He was the middle child and he was the only one with an accent.

They went about introducing Mia all wrong. They shoved her in front and centre, with a pathetic backstory of being a stylist with some mysterious reason for Rey having left her.

The whole family was shoved at us so forcefully that it was like the writers were saying “We want this family and you’re going to like them no matter what! And we’re going to keep shoving them down your throats until you do!”

Mia was written as a loud mouthed, crazy, lying, manipulative, vengeful, dangerous, social-climbing, over-sexed psychopath. Over the top Day Dreams of hurting Abby with scissors and then ultimately going through with it, even though it was Lola that got hurt, was her claim to fame. She was nothing but a pot stirrer who lived to, and took great Glee in pressing people’s buttons and getting reactions from them. It was her full time hobby.

They could have done so much with her character. She was pretty enough. She had a fiery personality. And given the chance she could have probably been fun.

She was an attention Seeker and she would have been great in the role of a host of a gossip show.

Mariah has the on-air TV personality of a slug aka boring! Hillary was GC Buzz and Mariah was a sidekick for Hillary to insult.

They could have hired Mia as the stylist for GC buzz and given her a segment on doing makeovers and offering fashion advice to viewers, and maybe expand into home decor advice. They could have had some of Y&R’s “real” fans on to get a style makeover. Her introduction to the show could have been a new GC Buzz hire by Devon and didn’t know that she was Rey’s wife. It would have given her a reason to be in Genoa City other than trying to put her marriage back together.

That would have made Mia relevant and it would have kept her occupied with something productive to do other than being a pot stirrer.

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