I emailed SfM Entertainment, which owns syndication rights for The Doctors and got this response!

Thank you for your interest in SFM Entertainment's video product.

Yes, we do represent "The Doctors". There are close to 5000 episodes that we

will be bringing to cable television within the next 18 months. They will

also be available for home use on DVD. The tranferring of that many episodes

is a herculean task, as you can appreciate, but the shows are timeless and

should bring many hours of enjoyment to the viewers.

Our latest video release of "The Real McCoys" is doing very well and you

might want to pick them up at Best Buy. All 6 Seasons will be released with

a new Seeason being released every 3 months.

Stay tuned.

Happy Holiday Season.

Best.

Stanley Moger

President

Isn't that FANTASTIC?! The Doctors (1963-1982) was an NBC soap which starred Elizabeth Hubbard, Kim Zimmer, Kathleen Turner and Alec Baldwin throughout the years. It also won two Emmys for Drama Series.

Shocking to me is that they have anything close to 5,000 episodes, with all the talk that soaps have destroyed most of their episodes. The Doctors only has 5,280 episodes, so that's pretty good! It gives me hope that other soaps are out there, we just don't know it.

Here's Wikipedia's page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Doctors_%...63_TV_series%29

You're kidding! They are releasing the episodes???!!! That's so great!

I have never seen DOCTORS, but I think episodes are available on YouTube. Plus, I'm glad for ANY soap being available on DVD and I hope this opens the door for future releases of other shows!!!

Edited November 20, 200718 yr by YRBB

Thanks, that's great news. What a collection that would make! I'm up for anything that showcases a younger Elizabeth Hubbard. FYI, when I was in 1st grade, one of my classmate's parents was on The Doctors.

Edited November 20, 200718 yr by stenbeck212

SWEET! I hope they find a taker... there are enough niche channels out there to support this show and more like it.

As much as I want this to be everything I've dreamt of and more, something just seems a little bit "too good to be true" to me." Cable and DVD? Last I heard, Hallmark has the rights to air it, but that was like...5 or 6 years ago. I wonder if they still have the rights...wherever it shows up, I sure as hell hope it doesn't end up on SOAPnet. It's hard enough for me to not care about not having that channel with "Ryan's Hope" and "Dallas" on there. Adding DOC would make me want it like crazy again.

5000 episodes..hmm...I wonder if he was referring to actual episodes owned or just using the number because of the number of episodes the show has altogether. I talked to Matt about DOC's surviving episodes when the whole Hallmark thing happened, and he told me that since it was produced by Colgate-Palmolive for a good bit of its run, the surviving episodes could go back as far as around 1973-1974. 5000 episodes would definitely be about most of the show's run, save for about a year and a half.

But good lord, I hope that it's all true! I could actually imagine it on Hallmark, really. They specialize in programming deemed to be for "old people," so I don't think they'd have any reservations about adding it. Can't wait for more news!

Awesome!!

That would be awesome. Who knows? Maybe we'll get to see all the eps available this time. Lord knows, I'm sick of watching the same damned RYAN'S HOPE reruns over and over.

Have never seen an episode of The Doctors but as a big classic soaps fan, am totally willing to get behind this. I sure hope we get a date on when that DVD is coming out. I want to place my order now!

Psyched about seeing Elizabeth Hubbard and Kathleen Turner in this. It was a NBC soap, wasn't it?

Yes, it ran on NBC from 1963 to 1982. It premiered the very same day as "General Hospital" did.

Elizabeth played an doctor named Althea, was that right?...

Elizabeth won the first Daytime Emmy for Lead Actress for The Doctors. I actually think it will happen since the company gave a time frame.

I'd love for this to happen! From what I've seen of the show on youtube, it's very interesting and had me gripped, even though I didn't know all the characters. The show is widely considered the best soap opera of the 70's

Edited November 21, 200718 yr by Y&RWorldTurner

Elizabeth played an doctor named Althea, was that right?...

Correct. She played Dr. Althea Davis.

The show is widely considered the best soap opera of the 70's

Actually, I think that distinction goes to ANOTHER WORLD, although, the whole NBC lineup at that time was pretty good.

It would be hard to pick one soap and call it the "best of the 70s." All of the soaps were at various states of greatness, and I still stand by the idea that the 70s was the greatest period in soap opera history.

As far as DOC is concerned, a long, long time ago, someone e-mailed me a good little summary of some of the bigger stories from the show's entire run, and it seems like some really good stuff. I really want to see the romance between Althea and Dr. Nick Bellini...

I want to see whatever's available of Doug Marland's brief run as HW there. Especially, the introduction of the Dancys.