mikelyons

You're welcome! I debated for a long time whether to tell that story, but it felt like the right moment and the right space. One last thing: Every single script for AMC and OLTL have been archived and digitized at the University of Pennsylvania. If you call them and ask about they, they'll tell you that they don't have them. However, a ton of researchers quote cite them as did the 25th anniversary AMC coffee table book. If I ever get in, I'll be sure to document Erica's first moments on screen. Not bibles, but complete scripts (that I know of) exist in archives for: AMC* (see above) OLTL* (see above) B&B Y&R DAYS GH ATWT (Irna's archive has most of them thru 73 when the P&G Collection takes up the slack through the 90s) SFT (The majority of the first decade or so is in Irving Vendig's archive at Boston University, including Agnes' first thirteen weeks of outlines and scripts.) LOVING (I'd guess this exists, but the Nixon family has them as they many of them aren't in Agnes' archive.)

Here are the soap opera bibles I've either read, researched, seen, or know where they are: AMC: It reads like it was the original presentation bible meant for P&G. As I mentioned before, Erica isn't mentioned once, but the Martins and Tylers are very much established. It gives a wonderful insight into the world Agnes was creating in the mid-to-late 60s. This bible can be found in Agnes Nixon's Northwestern Archive and Bill Bell's UCLA archive. ATWT: This bible is well worth a read as it was for the first half-hour soap opera and you can see how Ted Corday, Irna Phillips, and Agnes Nixon really worked hard to elevate ATWT into something special. There's a ton of backstory on the original characters and the intention for the show is clear. This bible can be found in Agnes Nixon's Northwestern Archive and Irna Phillips' vast archive at the Wisconsin Historical Society. AW: To be honest, I found this bible slight and unimpressive. To me, it feels a bit thrown together for the network. This bible can be found at Irna Phillips' vast archive at the Wisconsin Historical Society and Bill Bell's UCLA archive. B&B: The language is beautiful and you're instantly drawn in, but if you know the early history of Y&R, it does read like a rehash of Y&R for the 1980s. This bible can found found in the Bell UCLA archive. CORONATION STREET: ITV keeps an archive of everything pertaining to the show and the bible hasn't surfaced. Interestingly enough, an early iteration of the show called SEVEN, BESSIE STREET which established the world of the show when Tony Warren originally pitched it to the BBC exists, but the contents of it haven't been made public. After SEVEN, BESSIE STREET was rejected it was re-worked into OUR STREET (which was rejected by the BBC) and FLORIZAL STREET, which was bought by ITV and renamed CORONATION STREET. DAYS: From what I recall, theme and intention were big aspects of the DAYS bible. It's worth a read to see how a simple family soap opera has morphed over the year. This bible can be found at Irna Phillips' vast archive at the Wisconsin Historical Society and Bill Bell's UCLA archive. EDGE OF NIGHT: This bible is thrilling to read as it was created contemporaneously with ATWT, our first half hour soaps. It can be found in the Irving Vending collection at Boston University. EMMERDALE: A small number of early scripts from EMMERDALE are in Kevin Laffan's archive at the University of Leicester. It is unclear if the original bible is part of that collection. GH: I haven't read it, but I believe it is in the Hursley/Dobson papers at the Wisconsin Historical Society. LOVE OF LIFE: This bible is in John Hess' archive at Dartmouth. It's a simple document which provides the bones of the show, which they kept to until Hess left the series. LOVING: This bible is quite clear on the show it is meant to be and the show it became. All of the major moving parts are here. I don't believe the Rescotts were included in the bible. It's a good read and not very long. This bible can be found in Agnes Nixon's Northwestern Archive. OLTL: This bible is missing in action. I do not know where it is as it hasn't shown up in Agnes' archives or anywhere else. RYAN'S HOPE: This bible is missing in action. As far as I know, Paul Avila Miller and Claire Labine's papers have not yet been entered into an archive. SFT: It took me years to track down the SFT bible written by Agnes Nixon because it is missing from her archive and you can't find it by searching online. I found it to be a wonderful document which P&G and Roy Winsor leaned on heavily after they fired Agnes. The SFT bible and ALL of Agnes' original outlines for the first 13 weeks are in the Irving Vendig Collection at Boston University. You cannot make copies or take photos of these documents...you are watched like a hawk. Trust me, they are there. I have read and touched them! How they got there is another story for another day. SUNSET BEACH: The first 29 scripts are in Aaron Spelling's archive at Boston University. I don't know if the bible is there. It could be and wasn't logged by the archivists. Y&R: Apparently, no one has seen the original bible for Y&R since it was pitched to Screen Gems and CBS circa 1972. Where it is, is anyone's guess? Kay Alden may have a copy or the Bell family. Maybe one of the executives at CBS took it home, put it in a drawer, and forgot about it. I'm hoping it surfaces one day at a rummage sale in Los Angeles. I hope this helps!

Generally, nothing is scanned in by the archive. When you make a request for copies of documents (if the archive does it), they will charge you a nominal rate to scan each page and email it to you. In effect, researchers pay for the digitization of their archives. It's a bit archaic, but it makes plenty of financial sense. Why pay for it out of pocket when a researcher will pay us to do it? Additionally, the ALL MY CHILDREN bible is at Northwestern University and the Bell Collection at UCLA. In that iteration of the AMC bible, Erica Kane is never mentioned. Not once. Not even a character called "Susan". There may be additional drafts of the AMC bible with Erica in it, but it hasn't surfaced yet. The earliest mention of Erica from Agnes' Northwestern archive is by Tara in Episode 1. According to an outline by Agnes' Northwestern archive from Episode 10, we finally meet Erica. She has just received her car from her father and drives Tara and Phil home. This could very well be the infamous "Hollywood & Vine" episode, which we may have only seen edited for A DAYTIME TO REMEMBER, not in its unedited state.

I don’t know if Hulu or ABC has ever released GH’s streaming numbers. I do know that when Hulu announced they were going to remove Coronation Street years ago, people had a fit and they reversed their decision. I’d bet GH does just fine on Hulu.

I think the cancelation of AMC and OLTL in 2011-12 along with the OPRAH going off the air decimated ABC's daytime line-up. ABC hasn't recovered. I do believe that NBC and CBS halted whatever plans they may have had to get rid of their remaining soaps after seeing three legacy shows lost in the span of a few months. At this point, it's "cheaper to keep her". From the Sony leak, it seems that Y&R and DAYS' numbers go up by 50% or more when they factored in online streaming, SoapNet viewings, iTunes downloads, and the like. The shows are probably healthier and more profitable than anyone would care to admit. I don't see these four shows going solely to streaming - the networks will not want to give that time back to their affiliates and lose out completely - but they will be anchors in their streaming future.

Considering how hard it is for networks to successfully replace a soap, they'll leave them where they are. It was once said that once a soap falls below a 1.0 rating, it's out the door. Well, they continue to outperform most of their daytime compatriots, so as long as they make more money in ad revenue than their licensing fee, the four remaining soaps will stay on the air. It's too risky to replace Y&R or DAYS with a "celebrity" talk show or lame game show. They have a reliable audience in an age of deep fractures. Do whatever you can to keep it.

I know the title is long and awkward, but bear with me. I was recently telling someone how much I loved OLTL in the Labine era, but I was terribly turned off when Jill Phelps took over. I stopped watching for about a year or two, tried to get back into it, but I always felt like someone had ripped the heart out of the show. People would always tell me about the great things the show was doing in its final years, yet I never reconnected with OLTL. AMC is also on this list. I stopped watching with the rape of Bianca. When I tried to tune-in based on whoever was head writer, I'd see Bianca with that child and I just couldn't stomach it anymore. I've always loved Y&R, but the minute Kevin put on that chipmunk head, I turned it off. Ever since then, I'll try to watch Y&R if I'm home during the day, but it feels like watching someone you once loved acting totally out of character. It feels like nothing about the Y&R I once loved even exists anymore. At least we'll always have "Nadia's Theme". EMMERDALE was a soap I loved, but the influx of Dingles simply ruined the show for me. I tried to re-connect with the show, but the rape of Victoria Sugden was the final straw. Ugh. It felt like shock for the sake of shock. I turned it off after that.

Before SEARCH FOR TOMORROW premiered, there was a big behind the scenes talk about whether or not to use cue cards or if they should only use actors two days a week to get them to rest. One of the producers from Compton insisted that ANY actor worth their salt could learn dialogue without cue cards because that's what they're trained to do! This producer went on to say that if theatrical actors in repertory companies can memorize three different Shakespearian plays to perform every day, a soap opera actor can memorize a few ten page scripts every week. Needless to say, SEARCH didn't get cue cards.

Which soaps did you try to watch multiple times, but you could never get into them? For me, it was GUIDING LIGHT (although I find the 60s episodes quite engaging) and CORONATION STREET. I know but shows are institutions, but halfway through an episode, I would get restless and turn them off. I'm still trying to watch CORONATION STREET, but it's never connected with me and I don't know why. It's well-written, well-acted, and perfectly produced, but it never sticks. I've tried to watch DAYS, but it never, ever stuck. I'm always think, "I must have missed A LOT!" What about you?

Eric Braeden uses cue cards. They cut around it.

They should've caught COVID in that "house". End of. Bring back the Sugdens. Bring back ANYONE else. They're the reason I stopped watching a show I loved.

Colleen's issues with food on Y&R circa 2004-5. They briefly mentioned it at Crimson Lights when she was spending time with Lily and some mean girls commented if she needed that much foam or whatever in her drink. It would have been a beautiful storyline involving Colleen, Brad, and Traci, but it was dropped without a second thought.

I completely disagree. From the time Erica discovered Mona's body through the funeral, it was a heartbreaking storyline. Erica took Mona for granted, screamed at her, brushed her off, and relied on her since their first episode together. Moreover, Lucci and Heflen were scene partners for 24 years. All of that was beautifully captured in Erica's grief. Over the top or not, Lucci's portrayal at Erica's loss of her beloved mother truly resonated with me. I'll take this over a demonic possession any day of the week.

I'm TOTALLY with you on this one! People forget that two of the highest rated scripted shows of our time, DOWNTON ABBEY and THIS IS US, are steeped in realism. And, guess what? They were runaway hits! Imagine, telling stories about real people who don't have memories implanted in their pinkie. Wasn't there an article that came out in the late-70s (maybe 78) that said the cost savings of an hour and a slight increase in ad rates really didn't seem to justify an hour? I believe one of the arguments was that by restricting ad revenue to a few half hour slots made the show more valuable in the long term. If Lever Bros. couldn't advertise on a P&G show, but could in the next half hour slot, it would be more money than them being locked out entirely from a 60 minute P&G show.

Third-ing making soaps a half hour. The hour hasn't worked very well. Half an hour is great; you're in and out. I also support mixing up the number of weekly episodes. The Archers produced six episodes a week pre-COVID and now they're doing four. Hollyoaks is five a week; EastEnders varies. It's doable. Your audience doesn't care. Just don't waste their time with crap.

One piece of realism that is missing from US soaps and is slowly fading from UK soaps are the celebration of birthdays, anniversaries, deaths, etc. I've always felt that marking those life events in terms of a daily story helps ground the soap in terms of place and time. Characters aren't vaguely 35 forever. Life happens. People grow and evolve. I suppose it's hard to say Character X is 35 when they've aged their child from 5 to 25 in five years.

I've often thought that the lack of realism on US soaps has allowed them to become odd relics of our times. They are often divorced from reality, science, or plausibility. As much as I love a good evil twin or baby switch, the soaps seem to have lost their way in terms of relating to their audiences. Upon watching a few old episodes of THE GUIDING LIGHT and AS THE WORLD TURNS, I had a feeling of community, being part of a larger world, and watching people you might know or see in town. I'm all for fantasy and escape, but isn't it possible to escape into well constructed realism, too? I'd love to know what you guys think, one way or another.

Many thanks!!!

Can someone provide the current link for The Vault? Many thanks!

The theme was featured in a very short video following ABC's broadcast of ANNIE on November 7, 1999. They changed the order of the "facts" to: "The Great and the Least The Weak and the Strong The Rich and the Poor In Sickness and Health In Joy and Sorrow In Tragedy and Triumph.... ...you are All My Children."

Would you mind reposting this PDF? Many thanks!

From the beginning, Pam & her agents were fighting with Screen Gems about how little she was used on Y&R. She was getting a lot of offers for primetime work, but she couldn't accept it because of Y&R. She was only appearing on Y&R once a week and making $350 an episode. The argument from her camp was she was being under used and underpaid which could have been averted if Screen Gems would let her do primetime work when she wasn't on Y&R.

I created my first soap opera, LIFE'S JUST BEGUN, in the 8th grade during lunch because my classmate said I should write one. After that, it was off to the races. I don't remember much about it, but I did use those characters again years later for a thesis project re-titled AFFAIRS OF THE HEART. I later turned AOTH into a radio soap opera pilot. We shopped it around to US radio stations, but not enough bit to make a financially viable. AOTH was much more in the vein of a classic ABC soap with four intertwined families. The richest family in town were the black billionaire Russ family who came from Beverly Hills to Bedford Hills, IL (a stand-in for Evanston). The old money family were the Livingstons, followed by the very middle class Greenfields. Sylvia Russ, Ian Greenfield, and Rich Livingston were all best friends who attended the same private school. Their friendship gave the show its thread of connection. Additionally, Alisa Greenfield worked as Jacob Livingston's assistant. A fourth family was to be added gradually over the first season. The other two soaps I created throughout my teenage years were DAY BY DAY (the first soap bible I've ever written), THE SWEETNESS AND THE SORROW. SWEETNESS was more of a nod to early-Y&R and THE SECRET STORM. DAY BY DAY was really a product of the mid-to-late-90s. I stopped creating soaps for a long while due to selling AOTH, but I hit upon a show I've been pitching on and off for years called SCIONS. It really uses the UK soap opera production model and their aspects of pacing and storytelling versus the US soap model. SCIONS is one show I can say is my very own in terms of tone, characterizations, plotting, etc. I made a very clear decision not to imitate any of the US or UK soaps and let this one have a life of its own. During the pitching process, I've written it as a web series, a standard daytime drama, a primetime drama, and then a three-day-a-week serial. In my opinion, the three day a week serial works much better for the format. As I told my boyfriend last night, there are times I really wish I didn't have this lasting affinity for soaps, but here we are!

Y&R's classic production model 80s-00s was very segmented. You wouldn't see or work with anyone other than the actors in your scenes. Everything is taped on one set before moving to another set, which means call times, arrivals, departures, hair and make-up calls, are all staggered from 7AM-7PM. For instance: 7AM Call: Newman Boardroom (Act 2, Scene 3; Act 3, Scene 1, Act 5, Scene 2) Victoria, Jack, Victor, Ashley, Jill 9AM Call: Crimson Lights (Prologue A, Scene 1; Prologue B, Scene 3; Act Four, Scene 1) Mackenzie, Nick, Sharon, Billy, JT, Brittany 11AM Call: Chancellor Living Room (Prologue B, Scene 4; Act 1, Scene 1; Act 3, Scene 2) Kay, Esther, Nikki, Jill, Mackenzie, Brock In this example, during the morning, Jill & Mac would be around for most of the morning, but if Victoria was done with her scenes after the Newman Boardroom scenes, she would CERTAINLY go home. ABC soaps would have everyone come in for a 7AM rehearsal (Y&R rehearsed on the sets and then shot), then do camera blocking, lunch, dress rehearsal, and then a final taping. So, yes, the cast were together all day, every shooting day. This is nicely illustrated in the All My Children behind the scenes video from 1993 or so. With soap eliminating rehearsals or whatnot, there must be zero time spent socializing since the producers want actors to nail a scene on the first take (which is impossible and needs to stop). Lastly, Y&R would used to shoot six episodes in a week. Monday was dark, but then they would strip a show across the week (shooting those scenes throughout the week when the director was working) to save a day and bank of vacations. The model of shooting eight episodes in a week comes from either ABC or NBC and the results are blatant on screen. ATWT and GL would shoot on this schedule around 2003 to simply save time on crew and studio space.

Ooo... Thanks for sharing! I’m still holding out that one day we’ll see Phillip Chancellor, III’s death and the aftermath.