The storylines of the soap opera The Young and the Restless have changed over the years since the show debuted in 1973. Originally examining the lives of the wealthy Brooks and the poor Fosters, a series of recasts and departures in the early 1980s turned the focus of The Young and the Restless to the Abbotts and the Newmans, including the corporate rivalry between their two respective companies. However, one basic plot that has run throughout almost all of the program's history is the rivalry between Jill Foster Abbott and Katherine Chancellor, similar to the show's sister show, The Bold and the Beautiful, regarding Brooke Logan and Stephanie Forrester.
The Brooks and the Fosters The Young and the Restless co-creator William J. Bell conceived the show to center around the class conflict between two core families: the wealthy Brooks and the poor Fosters. Newspaper publisher Stuart Brooks (played by Robert Colbert) and his socialite wife Jennifer (Dorothy Green) had four daughters: Leslie (Janice Lynde), a pianist; Lauralee "Lorie" (Jaime Lyn Bauer), an author; Christabel "Chris" (Trish Stewart), a journalist; and Peggy (Pamela Peters Solow), a college student. Meanwhile, Elizabeth "Liz" Foster (Julianna McCarthy) was a factory worker and single parent who, after being abandoned by her husband William "Bill" Sr. (Charles H. Gray), was struggling to make ends meet while trying to raise three children: William "Snapper" Jr. (played at first by William Grey Espy, then by David Hasselhoff), a medical student; Greg (James Houghton), a law student; and Jill (Brenda Dickson; later Bond Gideon, Deborah Adair, and currently Jess Walton), a beautician and aspiring model.
In the show's first story there was a love triangle formed between Chris, Snapper, and waitress Sally McGuire (Lee Crawford). Chris and Snapper were a couple, but Chris wanted to not have sex until marriage. Snapper had a sexual relationship with Sally. Desperate to gain an upper hand, Sally threw away her birth control pills and got pregnant by Snapper. Not knowing that he was the father, Snapper proposed to Chris. When they found out he was the father of Sally's child, Chris suffered a miscarriage. Eventually, Sally moved out of town, and Chris and Snapper reconciled.
Sisters, Leslie and Lorie fought over first Brad Eliot (Tom Hallick) and then in another love triangle with Lance Prentiss (John McCook). This love triangle stretched into four after Lance's sea captain brother Lucas (Tom Ligon) arrived in town. Although Lorie was little more than the bad girl who tormented pure sister Leslie, she became a lead in her own right as she battled her sister over custody of Leslie's son Brooks (Andre Gower), and then battled her psychotic mother-in-law Vanessa (K.T. Stevens) (who even killed herself just to frame Lorie for the crime).
Other stories included Bill, dying of cancer, returning to town and remarrying Liz; Jennifer planning to divorce Stuart and marry her former lover and Liz Foster's brother Dr. Bruce Henderson (Paul Stevens), who was revealed to be Lorie's biological father; and Stuart and Liz marrying after Jennifer died of cancer.
Jill vs. Kay The show's longest-running storyline was the rivalry between a young manicurist Jill Foster Abbott (Brenda Dickson, Jess Walton) and wealthy socialite, Katherine Chancellor (Jeanne Cooper). Cooper was introduced by Bell when the ratings were low; the storyline between Jill and Kay became popular, so Bell decided to exploit this popularity by crafting a storyline putting the two at odds.
Jill went to work as Kay's manicurist and assistant to help her struggling family pay the bills. Kay was a boozy matron trapped in a loveless marriage to Phillip Chancellor II (John Considine later Donnelly Rhodes). Jill and Phillip fell in love, but in 1976, after he returned from obtaining a divorce in the Dominican Republic, Katherine picked him up at the airport and, in an attempt to kill both Phillip and herself, drove the car off a cliff. On his deathbed, Phillip married Jill and bequeathed her and their love child his fortune. At first, Kay offered Jill $1 million for the baby, but ended up getting a judge to declare that Jill and Phillip's marriage was illegal since Kay was drunk when signing her divorce papers. Since neither Jill nor her son had any rights to an inheritance, the baby was legally given the name "Phillip Foster" instead of "Phillip Chancellor III". As a result of the ruling, an embittered Jill became a vixen and the two ladies began an intense rivalry, blaming each other for the death of Phillip II.
First, they fought over beautician Derek Thurston (Joe LaDue) in the late 1970s. In 1982, Jill married tycoon John Abbott (Jerry Douglas), but within a few years, Kay seized the opportunity to break them up after obtaining photos of Jill's one-night-affair with John's son Jack (Terry Lester; currently Peter Bergman); John suffered a stroke after seeing those images and divorced Jill. The two ladies also fought for custody of Phillip Foster (Thom Bierdz) in the late 1980s, with Kay being awarded temporary custody without the right to adopt. Eventually, Kay arranged for his name to be legally changed to Phillip Chancellor III.
In the 1990s, after Phillip III died from a car crash, and after Jill's second marriage to John ended, the two ladies went back to court when some of Phillip II's documents were found in the Chancellor mansion attic; the judge declared that Jill owned half of the Chancellor estate. Jill and Kay fought over this new arrangement as well as Jill's son Billy (David Tom/Ryan Brown/Scott Seymour/Billy Miller) dating Kay's granddaughter Mackenzie "Mac" Browning (Ashley Bashioum/Kelly Kruger/Rachel Kimsey/Clementine Ford).
In 2003, the Jill-Kay rivalry changed forever. Liz Foster, afflicted with a near-terminal illness, informs Jill she was adopted. After much investigation, it is revealed that Kay is Jill's biological mother. Learning the truth on their wedding night, Billy and Mackenzie have their marriage annulled (since they are biological first cousins). Since then, Kay and Jill have made peace and formed a genuine (though sometimes contentious) mother-daughter bond. Their relationship even managed to survive and grow stronger after the 2007 revelation that Jill's son with Phillip II was switched at birth by Kay. A series of DNA tests revealed that new Genoa City resident Ethan "Cane" Ashby (Daniel Goddard) was Jill's son and the mild mannered Aussie helped Jill and Kay come to grips with their feud and the events of the baby switch. Family and friends grew concerned when Katherine began suffering from "senior moments" and, later in 2008, they began to suspect she was drinking again. In fact, it was Marge Cotrooke (Kay's doppelganger) who was drinking and Katherine's cagey behavior was due in part to protecting Marge's secret while supporting her recovery. Everyone believed Kay died in a serious car accident but Marge was actually killed. Jill was devastated by the loss of her mother, admitting openly that she loved her former rival. The real Kay lost her memory, assumed Marge's life as a waitress and was later kidnapped until being reunited with her family.
Jill remained suspect of Katherine, even after she returned, thinking it was really Marge trying to con the family. DNA results proved the woman claiming to be Katherine was not related to Jill, starting a series of events that dramatically reshaped the Chancellor family. In 2009, the true paternity came to light that Jill was not Kay's biological daughter after all. This reignited the feud and helped Billy and Mac rekindle their love for each other. Kay's senior moments were revealed to be caused by lime disease which also caused her to imagine the whole baby switch. The true Phillip Chancellor III returned, revealing he had sent Cane to Genoa City to heal Jill and Kay's pain. Phillip III revealed he had faked his death to hide the fact that he is gay, a plot that did not make sense, and that was very negatively received by long-term fans. Phillip stayed in Genoa City very briefly, to try and rebuild his relationship with his son (Chance Chancellor), mother, and Nina, and then before soon being written out.
Later, Jill helped Katherine track down her real long-lost child. Mogul Tucker McCall was revealed to be Katherine's biological son even though Kay thought she had given birth to a daughter. Tucker had hatched a plan to take over Chancellor Industries while Katherine and Jill were preoccupied with their search for Katherine's daughter. As a result, Katherine lost her company and partially blamed this on Jill who was sleeping with Tucker. Tucker and Katherine have since started to develop a relationship while Jill and Katherine remain at odds.
The Abbotts and the Newmans By the early 1980s, most members of the Brooks and Foster families had been recast, and when The Young and the Restless expanded to an hour in 1980, many lead actors said they could not sustain themselves on an hour show and quit. Show creator William J. Bell told himself he would wait for one more major departure before making big changes. When Jaime Lyn Bauer, who played Lorie, quit in 1982 due to exhaustion, Bell took the opportunity to write out all of the Brooks and Fosters, save Jill. Gradually, the focus shifted from the Brooks and Foster families to the Williams, Abbott, and Newman families.
The Williams family was introduced in 1978. Police Detective Carl Williams (Brett Hadley) and his wife Mary (Carolyn Conwell) had their hands full with their promiscuous teenage son Paul (Doug Davidson). Paul had a fling with Nikki Reed (Melody Thomas Scott) and gave her a sexually transmitted disease. He then went on to romance prostitute Cindy Lake, as well as April Stevens (Cynthia Eilbacher), who had his daughter, Heather. April left town after Paul ended things with her and without telling Paul she was pregnant. Soon after, Paul marries Lauren Fenmore (Tracy E. Bregman).
Eric Braeden joined the cast in 1980 as sinister tycoon Victor Newman, in what was a short-term role that soon became a permanent fixture. Victor was so menacing to his wife Julia (Meg Bennett) that he locked her boyfriend Michael Scott (Nicholas Benedict) in a bomb shelter constructed in the basement and forced him to watch Victor and Julia's bedroom via closed-circuit camera. Bell saw something in Braeden's performance and since the show had few strong male characters, elevated him to star status. Soon after, Victor went to a strip club and met Nikki, who at the time was working as a stripper. She married Victor in a lavish 1984 wedding and their love-hate relationship has gone through the birth of two children, Victoria (Heather Tom/Sarah Aldrich/Amelia Heinle) and Nicholas (Joshua Morrow), as well as many divorces, affairs, and remarriages.
Bell also expanded the role of the Abbott family. In addition to John and his son Jack, daughters Ashley (Eileen Davidson) and Traci (Beth Maitland) were introduced. Stories were phased in regarding the corporate rivalry between the Abbott's Jabot Cosmetics and the Newman's Newman Enterprises. The personal lives of both the Abbotts and the Newmans also became a major focus. A four-way quadrangle became a major storyline in the 1980s-90s with Victor marrying Ashley and Jack marrying Nikki. Meanwhile, the insecure Traci became involved in a love triangle with her rival Lauren and rock star Danny Romalotti (Michael Damian), before marrying gardener-turned-business executive Brad Carlton (Don Diamont). The Abbott and Newman family rivalry is further put to the test in 2010 after Billy Abbott and Victoria Newman marry.
By the late 1980s, most members of the Williams family had been phased out.
Lauralee Bell