'Days of Our Lives' Writers Are Back and Have Some Big 'Twists & Turns' Planned (2024)

Thanks to last year’s Writers Guild of America strike and Days of our Lives’ unique shooting schedule, head writer Ron Carlivati’s new material will only first begin airing on May 31. Unlike most soaps, which are filmed weeks ahead of the air date, the Peaco*ck-airing drama is seven months ahead, so when Carlivati and his team resumed their official duties in October, the stories were already written well into 2024. “The other shows were able to put it behind them quicker,” begins Carlivati. “For me, as of us talking right now, the [replacement writers’ material] is still airing, so that has been very tough. I’m just very anxious and eager for our stuff to start airing again.”

When the strike began in May 2023, Carlivati and his team had written through Thanksgiving. “I think some people think that I left some sort of road map that these people were following, and that is really not true,” notes the scribe. “I think at the beginning they benefited from the fact that it was the holidays, and they could kind of tread water a bit to December and play Christmas and they didn’t have to advance story all that much. To the credit of the show, I think what they tried to do was move things slowly in the hopes that the strike would end and respect where my storylines were so that I could play them off when we came back. Unfortunately, the strike dragged on, so I understand that the show needed to make story decisions. From January to May, those were not my stories. I had nothing to do with those.”

Carlivati, who was the head writer at One Life to Live during the last WGA strike, learned a thing or two from the last transition. “I lived through a strike in 2008, and there were many episodes, not as many, but many episodes of One Life to Live written while I was on strike,” he recalls. “I essentially came in and just played off everything that was happening and tried to start steering the ship relatively quickly back to my vision of the show. I tried to do the same thing here, which was just blow things up, jettison anything that I did not like, and get back to a show that I understand and can enjoy and tell. There are certain threads of stories that will continue that will take a little bit longer to play off than others, and certain things kind of go away right away. We jumped in with our own stuff as quickly as we could.”

After reading through the 120 episodes he missed, Carlivati was happy to discover that some of the tales he started — namely Sloan (Jessica Serfaty) secretly raising Eric (Greg Vaughan) and Nicole’s (Arianne Zucker) baby, and Alex (Robert Scott Wilson) not Xander (Paul Telfer) being named Victor’s (John Aniston) heir — still hadn’t come to a complete resolution. “I was sort of hoping that the big things that we had laid in would be stuff that I would get to play off when I got back,” he explains. “And for the most part, I get to do it, though as you’ll see from what you’re watching right now, the Nicole baby secret is starting to come out. So, unfortunately, I didn’t get to play all of it, but the part with Eric finding out he’s the dad, at least I got to do. And I got to play a Sloan/Nicole confrontation, which for some reason they had Sloan exit the canvas without ever having a confrontation with Nicole, which I thought was nuts. And Xander did not find out he was really Victor’s son and Alex did not find out he was not Victor’s son and Theresa [Emily O’Brien] was not outed. So that is something big I will still get to play.”

Look for some winks to the audience in Carlivati’s first episode back. “I did want to make it clear that this was the line of demarcation, that the writers were back and there was a change happening,” he previews. “We have a little nod or two to what was going on in the first day and I think it will be very obvious and clear to the savvy viewer. Luckily, story-wise, certain things were coming to a head already. There’s Maggie [Suzanne Rogers] and Konstantin’s [John Kapelos] wedding and we’re on the train to outing Theresa. As I mentioned, there’s the Sloan/Nicole confrontation, so look for that, and then you’re on the path to Eric finding out it’s his baby. Does it come out that EJ [Dan Feuerriegel] knew about it or not? What will happen there? The [replacement writers] did start solving the Li Shin [Remington Hoffman] murder and got the ball rolling on Gabi [last played by Camila Banus]getting out of prison, which was our plan anyway. I was able to pick up the story, so, look for some twists and turns and a new Gabi getting out of jail to shake things up, which I think will be really fun.”

There are also some big events coming up at the end of this year into next where the writers are putting their focus. “We’re already writing into the 60th year [in 2025], but as far as this year, we have the 15,000th episode coming up in November,” Carlivati reports. “So that was one of the first big things that we tackled when we got back. People are aware that Bill Hayes passed away [in January 2024] and that ultimately, we would write [his character] Doug Williams’ passing into the show and I decided to center our 15,000th episode around that. We worked hard to honor Bill and Doug and also use it as a way to celebrate the show and celebrate this milestone. I think it’s what Bill would have wanted. I know it’s what Susan [Seaforth Hayes, Julie Williams/his wife] wanted. So, it is a way to honor this one actor and this character but make it feel bigger because we brought back a lot of people to honor Doug.”

With so much happening on screen and off, Carlivati says he is thrilled to be back at the helm of the show he first joined in 2017. “I just want to thank fans in general for sticking with the show after so many years and especially with the move to Peaco*ck,” he concludes. “I’m just very excited to be back and there is a lot of great story coming up. It you’re watching, keep watching, and if you’ve dipped out a little bit, it’s a great time to dip back in.”

Days of Our Lives, Weekdays, Peaco*ck