te.

3 minutes ago, Donna L. Bridges said:

Lots of fans say they want to see (or vote in polls) AW, EON, revisit GH 80s & 90s. 

I think the issue is that you're basing this on what people on niche soap forums (which in itself is a dying format) are saying, rather than would could concievably cross over at least a bit to a more casual audience beyond that. It's unfortunately obvious that "soap fans" aren't a big enough group to sustain these shows being uploaded, or else they would've been already.

In all honesty, the only old soaps that I could see being moderately "successful" on streaming are Passions and Sunset Beach; in Passions case it obviously has that cult factor going for it and the fact that it's very "meme" worthy (for better or worse) that could draw people in. Sunset Beach mostly because it was so popular in parts of Europe, again a bit meme worthy and had a limited run so that it doesn't feel like you're never going to finish it. 

The others... well. Maybe doing arcs could work, but then again would anyone outside the established fanbase want to watch those? I feel any few "casual" viewers would be turned off by the fact that they couldn't continue beyond it.

Saw these two actors supposedly stepping into the roles:

50 minutes ago, Antoyne said:

Shawn and Belle cheat on each other for sport it seems. They really should just divorce and be done with it. I’m intrigued by Shawn and Talia though.

Honestly, I wouldn't have minded if they had done a long-term arc for these two when they actually realise that they were more in love with idea of being Shawn & Belle, star-crossed lovers from two "supercouples" (though not use that actual wording on the show, it's cringe), rather than being in love with each other. It would actually make a good storyline, but this show can't plot more than three weeks in advance it seems.

Beverly Hills 90210:

Luke Perry as Dylan - Fox kept wanting to kick him off the show in season one and only wanted him to be a one episode character, but Aaron Spelling persisted and paid for his salary out of his own pocket to keep him on.

Melrose Place: 

Laura Leighton as Sydney was supposed to be a two episode arc, but was brought back in season 2. 

Marcia Cross as Kimberly was supposed to be a one episode character, but Marcia and Thomas Calabro ended up playing it somewhat flirty in outtakes and they took notice. 

3 hours ago, carolineg said:

Tony/Andre is really bad.  I am sure other soaps do have awful retcons like this, but not nearly as many.   Days seems to have head writers that want to retcon specific stories always and make them their own, so every regime takes on John's backstory or Hope/Gina or Tony/Andre and it will never make sense. 

Yeah, I mean, retcons have always been a part of soaps with secret children, forgotten marriages and what-not turning up from characters' past (I've never even watched AMC but Erica's non-abortion is kind of infamously bad), but I don't think any of the soaps are quite as bad as DAYS. As you said, the writers just can't seem to stop meddling with John's backstory, Hope / Gina and Tony / Andre for whatever reason. At least when they add Stefano's latest kid to the mix you can sort of believe it because he wasn't young when he came onto the canvas and spent a lot of time off it during periods.

The issue with anything that's of a certain "period" is that it's always inevitably more expensive due to not being able to just buy things like clothes off the rack etc. so I can see why ABC, if they were having issues with money, would ultimately back out, likely when the reality of the costs came back.

6 hours ago, Paul Raven said:

Les Damon went through 2 cigarettes in one episode.

That did make me laugh - I mean, come on dude, it's literally 15 minutes... how nicotine addicted can you get?

I guess @vetsoapfan

7 hours ago, Soaplovers said:

I also partial to his 3rd series he helped create in the late 80s called Paradise/guns of Paradise.  It lasted 2 full seasons and partial 3rd season.

It was a hybrid of self contained and hybrid stories that took place in California in the late 19th century about orphan kids coming to live with their single uncle..who had a love/hate relationship with the town banker (they became a couple later).

He had great ideas and sadly he wasn't always listened to.

Fun thing about Paradise - they had a young actor auditioning for the third season; they felt he was talented - too talented for a series that was probably getting cancelled, so they adviced him to take the other job he had lined up. The actor? Luke Perry. The show? Beverly Hills 90210.

Maybe David Jacobs had nothing to do with that audition, but from now on, I will imagine he had a part in creating the defining prime time soaps of the 90s.

9 hours ago, edgeofnik said:

Finally, she's been sorely missed. Is this just a brief drop-by or will she be around for a few months?

Brief drop-by I assume. 

She's been pretty vocal about not liking doing the show in the past (but maybe that'll change with Alan Alarr gone?), but also - she's 83, so she might just be semi-retired and not interested in taking on any long-term gigs at this point.

4 hours ago, GLATWT88 said:

I think it stayed on as long as it did, because NBC knew that once Passions was cancelled they weren't replacing it with another soap and that would leave Days alone while the other two networks still had a pretty full lineup. Whether or not NBC cared, I'm not sure. I think it outperforming Sunset Beach and showing growth initially was pleasing to NBC, but it never really left the bottom. 

Yeah, that's definitively a part of it, but to Passions' credit, it did grow in the first few years and showed promise, which is more than most soaps do (SuBe just fell and fell and fell... no matter how many stunts they tried); it just couldn't sustain it and even Passions fans seems to acknowledge that JER went completely off his rocker.

With that said, isn't there some sort of Passions convention going on occasionally? So those young fans did grow up and continue being fans of their soaps in a real life way (sort of like a lesser Dark Shadows I suppose). I guess the fantasy element helps it stand out among the regular soaps.

I'd assume the head writer change had to do with them probably filming the show in blocks to sell in syndication rather than doing long-term contracts; normally syndicators like to plan in three months blocks (65 episodes), so if that's how they sold Rituals then they only had two blocks with the same head writers.

It'd be interesting to know the filming dates.

38 minutes ago, Chris B said:

I seem to remember Fox developing a remake of Eastenders. I wonder if this is what they came up with. I found it to be very promising. It’s so shocking to see them attempt a US version of a UK soap.  

Indeed it was - Simon Fuller / 19 Entertainment produced it (aka the production company behind American Idol) so I assume that at least one edition of the show would've aired there, especially as they sometimes had 1,5 hours / 30 minute result shows. I'd assume the issue would've been to find another appropriate place on the schedule. And of course, Mal Young was an Eastenders producer.

I'd be interested to see ABC tackle something similiar though - especially as they have a lot of reality shows that might be cut down to pair it with - ie have a 1,5 hour version of American Idol / DWTS / Bachelor + a potential half hour results show of any of those and you'd have a decent pairing. Won't happen, but it would be the most ideal situation.

$55 just seems a bit too steep for a group that's essentially a covers band at this point; I'm sure they're having fun with it, but yeah, I probably wouldn't pay that much to go see them (especially not the VIP and beyond prices, but I'm sure there are some fans that would so fair enough).

On 8/21/2023 at 3:27 AM, j swift said:

Do we think these pictures of Bobby were created by The Enquirer (who had a history of doctored photos) or CBS/Lorimar?

I've always heard several scenarios / pictures were leaked to the press by Lorimar as to not spoil the "dream" resolution (it also looks like Patrick in the profile picture, though the face has obviously been photoshopped); one of those scenarios was that Bobby was going to be a lookalike imposter, which I assume these pictures were meant to convey. 

My understanding is though that these scenes were never shot and were just photoshoots (because why waste time to rehearse and shoot a scene they knew weren't ever going to be used).

There's been talk of other pictures / photoshoots being leaked to the press, but I assume those might be a case of chinese whispers. Considering how big Dallas still was at the time and what a furore Bobby's return created in the press, I don't think those wouldn't have been found by now.

On 8/18/2023 at 12:28 AM, Xanthe said:

Could there also have been an assumption that the audience was mostly female and would be interested in the love lives of the male stars in a way that they would not be for the female stars?  

I agree that it's a huge part of it, especially when you start looking at vintage interviews; women's interviews tends to focus more on personal interests, while their male counterparts, especially those who were interviewed for younger focusing magazines like Tiger Beat can get... quite intrusive. It would be far harder for male actors to dodge the questions without either flat out lying about their dating life or lying by omission, or just word answers in a "please Mary" kind of way. 

Having watched Dark Shadows during co-vid and also reading vintage interviews with people like Jonathan Frid and Joel Crothers is illuminating.

@Toups @Errol a soap pilot leaks online (how often does that happen?)

Pilot for Born in the USA (aka This Land), a proposed half hour soap for FOX in the 2007-08 season by Mal Young and was supposed to air a few nights per week if picked up, has leaked:

Interesting that this made it all the way to pilot stage to be honest. I'm not sure how Fox would've scheduled a half hour soap in that season.

Futon Critic development page: http://thefutoncritic.com/devwatch/born-in-the-usa/

@SteelCity lol don't know who else to @. 

42 minutes ago, ranger1rg said:

I know I harp on how bad DAYS' sets are, but here's an example. Look at the wall behind Wally Kurth. The flat is pieced just a foot or so to the left of the door. It's also pieced a few inches from the draperies on the left.

Who builds houses/apartments this way? This is standard on so many DAYS sets that I can't believe it -- and no other soap does it. It looks cheap and ugly.

I think they are trying (and failing) to create an optical illusion that the set/room is bigger than it is - in all honesty, they would probably be better off with just building two normal corner walls and just work with the camera angles (though ideally they'd just give them more room to build their sets). 

And yes, let's not even talk about all those patterns that are going on. I assume they're trying to go for "homely"/"personal" feel but it looks more like eye vomit.

2 hours ago, carolineg said:

I know Jen mentioned her religion in interviews since GH, but it also seems like it something she's progressively ramped up over time.  While I am sure she's a devout Christian I also think she's pandering to a certain fanbase that started with her Hallmark movies.  I don't think she has any particular qualms about taking roles to pay the bills, but also wants those Great American Family checks to keep rolling in.  She's found her niche and wants to keep her brand going.

I agree -  I get the impression that she is fully aware that she's playing roles and she has no real qualms about Teresa being a "bad person", because she can separate her work from herself. However, the audience she's currently pandering can not and expects you to basically live as a good Christian 24/7 and not accept "immoral" roles. So she has to make up how the characters she's playing are really decent people deep down who've been led wayward.

Not that I feel bad for her or anything - she's clearly doing this so that she can keep those GAC paychecks coming in and not be cancelled by the crowd that complains about people being cancelled.

On 8/11/2023 at 10:53 PM, Soapsuds said:

My grandmother died in her sleep and it was just as shocking as if she had died on a plane.

I still remember the shock finding her and receiving the phone call of her passing and all the confusion and pain.

I thought Days should've gone passing in his sleep version.

To be fair, someone like Victor dying quietly in his sleep just feels wrong for his character. I definitively want more drama than that for him, though a classic "plane crash, no body recovered" also feels wrong because it's a classic soap opera non-death and they can't (or rather shouldn't) recast Victor. I'm not sure how I would've done it though; I guess if they'll milk his body not being recovered for storyline purposes it could be ok. I doubt it, but we'll see.

Going by IMDB, it seems like most of (if not all?) this got VHS releases - each episode was 30 minutes and each "story" ran for 5 episodes. I assume the VHS releases got re-cut to be more like "movies" (but judging from the VHS release of the Hamptons I assume it'd be more like cutting out the opening and ending credits rather than more creative re-editing).