Primetime Soaps

[DRW50]

I thought some of them were just done for the sake of being done, or to try to play with viewers. I remember one where they brought Ian Somerhalder back in a flashback just to sort of jokingly suggest Boone was gay. I don't know if that really informed the narrative.

[JackPeyton]

Damages is such a soap. Its set in the legal world, but its far from a Law & Order. Damages is everything good about soaps actually. Love it.

Vamp Diaries is a great soap too.

[Sylph]

Of course there is a difference. We're witnessing the transformation of what soap opera means. The classic, feuding families, happenings in a small apartment complex or what happens in a small town soap has become a thing of the past. Largely.

Various other types of TV series took elements of soap operas and used (transformed) them for their own purposes. So we have Heroes (a bad soap, but a soap), Lost, Brothers & Sisters, ER, 24, Fringe... Those are all soaps.

Genre studies is an interesting field. At least for a while.

They do that sometimes. But it is a part of the show and you just have to accept it.

[Chris B]

I missed this article on the previous page! Very interesting, thanks for posting Paul Raven. I love that the producer slapped Lana Turner back. I bet she deserved it. Now I want to see this show even more. Sounds very lavish and expensive and since they want to downplay the soapy aspects it's probably as camp as a row of tents. Interesting that the producer came from Peyton Place. Explains why there was another primetime soap yet it didn't become a trend. Since I'm assuming this one is an hour I wonder if it has more in common with the 80s primetime soaps.

[DRW50]

I think Turner claimed that the producer was drinking (I can't remember) and had been unpleasant to her and a costume designer.

[Paul Raven]

ABC was the perennial third place network until the mid 70's and from time to time a show would come along eg Peyton Place,Batman etc that would get a lot of buzz and the talk would be that they would finally climb out of 3rd place.

They were obviously hoping The Survivors would be the next show to do that.

It was placed Monday @9 up against Mayberry RFD and Doris Day on CBS and the NBC Movie.Like so many ABC shows it inherited a timeslot where the network was 3rd placed.Mayberry and Doris finished 4th and 10th that season.

It had weak lead-ins -Music Scenes and New People which each ran 45 mins to try and block the opposition(similar to what ABC did with GH and OLTL later in the 70's).

It lasted 3 and 1/2 months and was rerun in Summer 1970.

Some plot details:

Lana played Tracy Carlyle Hastings,struggling to protect her teenage son Jeffrey(Jan Micheal Vincent)from "forces that could destroy him". Among the major protagonists were Tracy's philandering husband Philip(Kevin McCarthy);her father,banking czar Baylor(Ralph Bellamy) and her playboy half brother Duncan(George Hamilton)

The Carlyles tangled with South American revolutionary Miguel Santerra(Robert Viharo),Tracy's old flame Riakos- Jeffrey's real father (Rossano Brazzi),Baylor's lingering death and everybody's attempt to get their hands on his millions.

Would love to see it on DVD!

[JackPeyton]

I just started watching thirtysomething.

[SFK]

Nolan Miller discusses Lana Turner and The Survivors in his TV Archive interview, it definitely sounds like this was his career warm-up to Dynasty as he provided several glamorous changes per episode for Turner. I'd love to see this series, I've only seen the promo on WoST. And what can I say, George Hamilton, I've loved that guy ever since Love at First Bite.

[SFK]

Now that's another show I've been considering giving a chance at my current age, I wasn't at all interested in it when it first aired. When I was younger, it was the butt of so many jokes on sitcoms, yet it was rather critically-acclaimed. And it drew inspiration from one of my favorite movies, The Big Chill, so I think it's worth a try. I wonder if it's on Netflix/Amazon On-Demand...

[EricMontreal22]

I adore thirtysomething--I got into it in reruns when I was 19 or something, lol. I still have it on VHS, but maybe I should get the DVDs now that I'm about to turn (gulp) thirty.

But... I'm not sure it's a primetime soap. 10 years ago, I would have argued it was, I've since changed my mind. There's a quintessential difference between something like thirtysomething and Knots landing--which deal with people the same age, with similar backgrounds and some of the same problems. That's why I call the Herskovitz/Zwick shows domestic dramas--also of course they next to never had cliff hangars although the episodes weren't fully self contained.

That said all three of their major shows--thirtysomething, My So-Called Life and Once and Again (which of course shared a villain with thirtysomething--and how frustrating is it that the third and last season of O&A still isn't out) are some of my all time fave tv--even the lesser works they were involved in, like Relativity and their flop webseries 1/4 Life had stuff to recommend them. I'm still pretty upset their pilot last year wasn't picked up and that it's not back up this year, as people said it might be.

But the irony is when I was a fan of MSCL as a teen online, and people on the forums would tell me to wait till I was in my thirties to watch thirtysomething as I wouldn't relate to it--they were pretty much wrong--I got it (well when I was 18-19--maybe I wouldn't have at 11 when I was still trying to save "MSCL" in its original run lol) SFK if you are giving it a chance though--and I really recommend you do, keep in mind it took 4 or 5 episodes to find its voice. The pilot, is exactly what the critics at the time who hated the show described it--the characters seem whiny, self absorbed, etc. But by the fourth or fifth episode it's pretty much wonderful. (In hindsight Once and Again had a pretty annoying pilot too--with the meet cute between the parents, etc, but it found its tone soon after--only MSCL had a pretty perfect pilot).

I do remember being 7 at a motel in the rain with my parents and the only show they had on their tv reception was thirtysomething--and I thought it was the boringest thing EVER. LOL

(I like the Big Chill a lot but I actually think thirtysomething is far less self absorbed than Chill is, LOL)

Edited February 11, 2010 by EricMontreal22

[JackPeyton]

Its not on demand.

Its really good. I am only 22 and i like it. I dont relate to it really, but i like it. The actors are fantastic and the supporting caracters are wonderful.

[EricMontreal22]

I actually did relate to it a lot at that age. OKOK maybe not specifically--at least not to Mike (God Ken Olin was dreamy back then) and Hope, but I think you can still relate to the emotions, etc (if that makes sense) not to mention I could to Melissa's lack of direction.

[EricMontreal22]

So with my comment on not thinking of thirtysomething as a true soap--do people have any discussion/definitions for what makes a primetime soap and what doesn't? Would you agree with Sylph that any character based serial on primetime is a primetime soap? Or do you agree with me that there tends to be some other element that truly makes it fit the genre? or? I admit I go back and forth (I do hate that people who watch, say Six Feet Under which Alan Ball actually said in all seriousness WAS a soap and essentially Knots Landing in a funeral home, like to distance themselves from the soap label out of snobbism)

Also--to what degree have primetime soaps been written (or even created) by writers with prior daytime soap opera experience? It would seem, on the outside, a nobrainer to hire a daytime soap creator to write your primetime soap, but this doesn't seem to be all that common. Peyton Place of course used Irna Phillips early on to help setup the show, though she didn't do any writing once production began (and she came on after ABC turned down the first pilot). Some of the other writers involved with scriptwork, Mathilde and Theo Fero, Robert J Shaw, etc, all had background with primetime shows but also involvement (before and later) with daytime soaps.

None of the major late 70s-early 80s primetime soaps were created by Daytime soap people--David Jacobs created Dallas and Knots (and a number of flops) but never seems to have worked in daytime soaps, Falcon Crest's Earl Hamner was famous as a novelist and creator of The Waltons but not soaps, Richard and Esther Shapiro behind Dynasty, didn't have a soap background either. But I think a number of the writers on the shows did-the writers most credit for making Dynasty into a campy hit were Eileen and Robert Mason Pollock who essentially (as Chris Schemering points out) took every soap opera cliche they had used more subtly in daytime, and upped them to a ridiculous degree and at a ridiculous speed.

While the big 90s Spelling primetime soaps--90210 and Melrose were created by Darren Starr, it was the much loved on here (lol) Charles Pratt Jr who was known for Santa Barbara, who wrote Melorse's top years as well as creating many of Spelling's flop followups (Models Inc, Titans...)

Edited February 11, 2010 by EricMontreal22

[Paul Raven]

Rita Lakin,who today is a mystery novelist wrote for Peyton Place and later Flamingo Road wrote The Doctors in the mid 60's.I think she was responsible for the show's ratings jump at that time.

[EricMontreal22]

Interesting--I haven't seen her name in the era of Peyton I'm at right now. I know Dynasty's Pollock's biggest success was their ratings surge at Doctors in the 70s. (I always kinda forget that the Doctors had a few eras where it was VERY popular)