Is Passions being cancelled?

[R!ck]

They wouldn't have to after July 5

Outpost Farms Productions, Inc. aka James E Reilly's company can shop it wherever he pleases after that.

[LumiLove]

I live in Canada and I dont think I get the Today show ... or its early in the morning not even on NBC or Global ... so what would I get if Passions was cancelled? I dont see how Days would be jeopordized ... or how the ratings would go down for Days if Passions was cancelled?!??! I get DaysAhead @1pm, US Days @ 2pm and Passions @ 3pm ... and @ 2pm I just wait around, flip through channels or clean my house until Passions is on.

[PhoenixRising05]

Most fans don't put up with his bullcrap. I don't and only a few people on here do. I agree with you about everything especially it being too late to get fans to care about the payoffs to these stories. That is what is most concerning for Passions because even if they pull out all the stops and give fans what they have wanted it just may be too late to get those fans back. I am just hoping that it's untrue. As I said, the odds have never been higher that these rumors are true but the genre doesn't need this so I am hoping this is just a rumor or that NBC has a change of heart or something, for the sake of the show's fans and all of the soaps.

[KLN]

This is looking more and more likely.

http://boards.sonypictures.com/soaps/showthread.php?t=78895

Some of that info comes from TBTSNBN, so I'm only linking to SoapCity instead.

[nassaunew]

^Crap

[UKBoi]

It does start to look quite likely NBC will axe it but it's a stupid decision. Just get rid of JER (surely it's in his interests if the show does better because he owns it) and bring on someone to totally revamp the show for a while. It should at least get to live until it's tenth anniversary. Although if it gets to its tenth year with some plots still needing wrapped up from it's beginning then it is a bit of a joke

[Mason]

I knew eventually this would happen, but I'm still caught so off guard by it now that it is. I just don't know what to say.

[bellcurve]

I hope that's the case for you. But NBC Co-Owns the show with Reilly. Even if the show is cancelled, NBC would have to approve the sale, and I doubt they would.

Wasn't BET was interested in continuing GENERATIONS, but NBC wouldn't approve. Rather, they settled on airing the reruns?!

[KLN]

As I posted at SoapCity...

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. No soap opera can survive on a one-show lineup. Passions may be horrible trash, but at least it's a sister soap.

CBS has Y&R, B&B, ATWT and GL. ABC has AMC, OLTL and GH. If Passions is canceled, NBC would have only Days. One soap. It will never survive. NBC would sooner wash their hands of the soap business than keep just one soap on the air -- especially the soap that's one of the most expensive in daytime to produce!

If Passions is canceled, Days will follow right along behind them.

If Corday is smart enough to shop the show around to other networks (ABC/CBS), we can expect huge changes with the show. There's no way that another network will pick up the show unless they have ownership of it. It's too big of a gamble. So, Corday will be forced to give up his family's ownership of the show and sign it over to a network to have creative control. As soon as Brian Frons gets his hands on the show, it's toast. Veterans (this includes Dee, Drake, Peter, Kristian, etc.) will be backburnered in favor of young demographics. Good stories will be ditched in favor of stories dictated by demographics and young focus groups. Half the cast will he fired -- and it will be the older half. Imagine the teen invasion of 2001 all over again, but worse. Look at the creative mess that all the ABC Daytime shows have become. Veterans being fired right and left, young talentless newbies hired and tossed into frontburner storylines... weak, inane writing due to the fact that the networks make creative story decisions, NOT the headwriters. This has happened across the board, especially at ABC with Brian Frons in command (the network most likely to snatch Days). When all is said and done, the bulk of the audience won't know to follow the show to another network, the ratings will fall, the show will tank and it will die a slow, painful death.

Days viewers don't realize how lucky they are to still have a multi-generational show, with vets like Dee, Drake, Peter, Kristian, Stephen, Mary Beth, Ali, etc. all still featured regularly in frontburner story. That's unheard of elsewhere, except on Y&R, for the most part. It's really like a soap miracle, and I'm so grateful to Ken Corday for not just shipping them all off in favor of cheaper, younger actors and actresses. He might be an idiot, but he's a family-oriented idiot.

Days might have a chance if NBC created a new soap, or even re-introduced an old one (Another World, anyone?!), but that's incredibly unlikely. Ratings are EMBARASSINGLY low, across the board. Shockingly low. On every network. The ratings that soaps are getting today are the same ratings that soaps were cancelled for only 5 - 10 years ago. That's bad. It's SCARY bad.

Soaps make their money through advertisers. Commercials. It would be next to impossible to get advertisers to buy commercial time for a NEW soap, whose ratings would be even LOWER than those we're seeing now. Not to mention all the money that the network would have to spend on promoting the show, etc. And getting a 'great' writer? A great writer comes with a hefty pricetag that they would never be able to afford, unless the writer is willing to write for a cheap, cheap price, which is unlikely. Look at Hogan Sheffer! He's a multiple Emmy-Award winning writer, and he doesn't come cheap. Days is paying BIG BUCKS for him to write the show, and that's just because he was their last hope at not getting canceled during the last network negotiations (and even then, it was thisclose to saying buh-bye). Anyway, a new soap is just too big of a gamble for a network right now. I don't believe we'll ever see a new soap on the air.

Either way, if Passions is toast, so is Days.

[bellcurve]

NBC is purposely sabotaging DAYS.

I knew the writing was on the wall with the cancellation of PASSIONS, but the fact that NBC is putting out feelers that they will be done with soaps by 2009(or whatever year it is, I think it will be MUCH sooner), is very discouraging and upsetting.

I sound like a broken record, but NO affiliate will find DAYS attractive, ESPECIALLY if the network is leaking within the company that they want to rid themselves of soaps! NBC will probably force the O&O's to air DAYS at a weird time or not at all. Wasn't it a San Francisco Affiliate in 98 that dropped ANOTHER WORLD from its daytime lineup? Was that owned by NBC as well?!

When PASSIONS airs its last episode, I see some affiliates dropping DAYS as well, and maybe that is per NBC's request.

Send an hourglass to ABC or CBS. Tell them you want DAYS on their network. Because, as far as I'm concerned, DAYS on NBC is DONE!

[KLN]

I don't want Days on ABC. I would rather it just go out on the top of its game than die a slow, agonizing death on ABC.

I would prefer it on CBS, but that just seems so unlikely.

Either way, Corday would probably have to give up ownership of the show. To some, that might seem like a blessing, but it really isn't. I think that if it weren't for him and Days being a family-owned show, Days would look something like AMC today. And that's not a good thing.

[Mason]

Seriously, I'd rather DAYS just end now on a high note, than be destroyed beyond recognition on ABC. I wouldn't mind seeing DAYS on CBS, but I doubt they'd be interested in it, nor do I think they should cancel one of their soaps for it. NBC really just shot itself in the foot when it cancelled SUNSET BEACH, because if it were still on, the whole thing with DAYS might not be as much of an issue. Like others, I really don't see a one-soap lineup lasting long on NBC at all.

[Max]

A couple of you (if not more) have already stated that you are going to hate the fourth hour of the Today Show because it is Passions' replacement. Well, first of all, you are certainly entitled to this sentiment.

However, can any of you see your hypocrisy in this matter, when you have repeatedly claimed that AW fans hated Passions merely because it was AW's replacement? If indeed any AW fans hated Passions just for merely being AW's replacement, they are every bit as justified in their opinions as you are for hating the fourth hour of the Today Show.

In my case--and probably many others' as well--however, I don't hate Passions because it was AW's replacement. I hate Passions because of the terrible acting, hideous sci-fi plots, and because of stories that go in never ending circles. Indeed, I actually watched Passions--for the first couple of months it was on the air--to experience these things for myself. (How many of you are going to watch the fourth hour of the Today show for a couple of months before you start trashing it?)

The bottom line is that others should respect Passions fans' feelings of hatred for the fourth hour of the Today Show whether or not that hatred is based on the fact that it was Passions' replacement, or was based simply upon the fact that you hate the Today Show. To follow the same logic, you should respect AW fans' feelings of hatred against Passions, regardless of whether that hatred stems from the fact that Passions was AW's replacement, or from the fact that many former AW fans (as well as plenty of folks who never watched AW) hate Passions because they percieve that show to be artistic garbage.

[KLN]

There hasn't been a successful NEW soap since B&B waaaaay back in the 80's, has there? The City failed. Sunset Beach failed. Port Charles failed. Passions is about to be canceled.

[Mason]

If a new soap ever really is launched, I could only see it being something of the telenovela format a la MyNetworkTV. I can't see any of the big three networks investing in a brand new soap opera again, especially not NBC.