The Soap Opera Machine

Decoder Ring

Slate Podcasts

Documentary, History, Society & Culture

4.6 • 2K Ratings

🗓️ 15 June 2021

⏱️ 50 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Welcome to a brand new season of Decoder Ring! On this episode, we investigate the wild world of soap operas through the lens of one legendary, decades-long, ripped-from-the-headlines storyline. The rape of Marty Seabrook dared to combine the melodrama of soaps with a serious examination of sexual assault, and over time morphed from an award-winning story about believing victims into a redemption arc for the rapist at its heart. This is the story of those who made it happen: the producers, actors, writers, and the soap opera machine itself: the perpetually moving, forever-churning, complex system that create the miracle that is the daily soap opera. If you love the show and want to support us, consider joining Slate Plus. With Slate Plus you can binge the whole season of Decoder Ring right now, plus ad free podcasts, bonus episodes, and much more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Before we begin, this episode contains references to sexual assault.
0:11.9	On a dark foggy night in 1994, on the soap opera One Life to Live, a police car blows
0:17.8	a tire on a deserted two-lane highway.
0:21.2	Swerves across the median and sends an oncoming sedan plunging off the road.
0:31.2	After bashing its way down a steep hillside, the sedan skids to a precariously balanced,
0:37.0	teetering halt.
0:41.7	Inside the car are two children and the young woman you just heard, whose named Marty Saybrook.
0:47.8	These legs are bruised and bleeding and anytime the younger child moves, the car jerks
0:53.6	violently forward.
0:56.6	They're helpless and stuck, moments away from plummeting to a fiery end, and then Marty
1:03.7	spots help.
1:13.0	So when the cop appears into the driver's side window, Marty recoils.
1:22.4	Marty knows this man, and though he's wearing a uniform, he is not a police officer.
1:29.6	He's Todd Manning, her rapist.
1:42.0	One manning had arrived on One Life to Live as a villain, the malevolent sneering football
1:46.6	player who leads his two fraternity brothers in the brutal gang rape of Marty Saybrook.
1:55.5	Since the rape, there's been a trial, a mistrial, a prison sentence, a jailbreak, a hostage
2:00.6	taking, a near drowning and numerous additional attacks, all leading up to Todd's re-apprehension.
2:08.0	He was being taken to prison when the police car he was in blew attire, causing this
2:12.8	very crash.
2:14.5	He stole one of the officer's uniforms and headed out into the night.
2:18.9	Todd's on the run.
	...

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