Sara A. Bibel's Blog

[Jess]

I love FNL. I'm pleased to know that I can watch it online. I live in an apartment and can not get DirectTV. I think FNL could work daytime, but it would be tough. The show could really be a day-in-the life of the school and community. I don't think the young actors would go daytime and I know the coach, his wife and the other adult actors would not. I also think production would cost more than daytime was willing to spend. Finally, the only way it would work is if the storytelling was the same and I do not know that it would be with daytime writers. IMO, Michael Malone is the only "daytime" writer who could pull it off.

Personally, I think what Sara B. is talking about is something that could work. Giving a show some nighttime intro and then taking it days and hoping the audience would follow. Maybe the three-day a week model is the way to adopt, I do not know. But i continue to think it would require a change in the way daytime views itself and would certainly require a caliber of writer that is not there now.

But, regardless, if it went daytime and daytime did not change the way it does business to accommodate FNL, then it would just be the same poop we get now with the FNL name. OLTL Football would still be OLTL.

[marceline]

You're partially right. I've given up on daytime with its current format, structure, assumptions i.e. 5 days a week, never-ending, "core families" because I think it's out of date. If NBC wanted to show FNL one day a week during the day and follow the same seasonal calendar as primetime then I'd say "hell yes". But 250+ shows a year would turn it to crap. That's what I mean about trying to shove good product into a bad model.

[Sylph]

There's new stuff on DOOL, Y&R etc.

[MarkH]

Are you her press agent?

She makes good points about dumbing down in order to accommodate some of these plots. But...that is a historical phenomenon that extends well before the current climate. I'll bet we can think of copious examples on almost every soap.

Elsewhere in this thread, the universal reaction to her proposal (to move FNL to daytime) is that 'it could never work; daytime would ruin it'.

I guess I am not understanding the pessimism. I think what Sara is saying is: Import a show (like) FNL to daytime AS IT IS. And see what happens. This implies no more network interference than one would see in primetime. It also implies that the sensibilities and dramatic direction of the show would be kept similar.

For example, I see no reason why there COULDN'T be a "weekly Friday game"...with the whole week (during the season) building to it. What would be interesting is that the demands of a daytime show would insist that we also see the off-season. That would be interesting new territory for these folks.

If it was felt that a five-day-a-week-strip was not possible for this show (to maintain quality), I have always wondered about whether one-day-a-week scripted dramas could work...i.e., five shows sharing a time slot. I'm not sure the financials could sustain this. Of course, burying it in the DAY would be a failure. That early-evening slot we keep talking about would have to be used...likely with rebroadcasts late night and even during the day.

The question is whether a high quality show CAN be done on a low budget. But I see no reason why the "independent film" approach to doing this (which is, essentially, the GL model) couldn't work...as long as the writing and acting are on a high par.

[Sylph]

Yeah. Anything against it?

That cannot be done. That's the problem. The show is expensive and the current structure can't be replicated in daytime. It could, but the show would run for five weeks only.

[MarkH]

Nothing at all. I actually appreciate these reminders about blog updates, as I would likely check them less frequently.

With regard to FNL (as an example...because it is not a show I regularly sample...but I think any serial drama could fit here).

First of all, cost-wise, my understanding is that FNL is very cost-effective...much less than many other primetime dramas. If this is accurate, the digital video and the mostly young cast would seem to help keep costs down. This is also the formula (young cast) that I perceive many European soaps and telenovelas to use to keep costs down. That was my point about the "independent film": low cost production values. I think GL-style production values could work just fine, if the story was there.

Second, I am not talking about a "5-week" FNL. I'm saying that the story that now plays out in a single episode each week would be--soap style--broadened to fill a full five days each week. The question is whether this could be done.

I'm not talking about senseless padding. The question is whether more scenes of emotional moments between characters that are now implied and even off camera in the primetime show...more focus on fleshing out the incidental characters....more "buildup" scenes that would normally happen during the week but are not shown..

I, too, am not convinced that a show like this could be expanded to fill the week without diluting it and making it weaker. But I sure wish someone would try. The trick would be to use the extra time to make it richer and deeper....not to pad it.

[EricMontreal22]

Precisely. We could try but it would be such a different show--MAYBE it could be good on its own terms (though in the current climate I doubt that) but it probably frankly wouldn't--and either way it owuld be SOO different, why bother?

[JackPeyton]

FNL could soooo easily become a 5 day a week soap. So much stuff on that show is talked about, so much is missed. So many more scenes are needed. They have more than enough storylines to carry on 5 days a week. Bteween matt, Julie, Tyra, Landry, leyla, Tim, etc... they could also bring in a few more people, or focus on a few more football players. Then there is the conflict of tammy running the school and eric being the coach.

the way its filmed is amazing and ireally is what GL should have went for. FNL also can do so much more using less money because of where they film.

[EricMontreal22]

Well another thing is as quality as FNLights is--do we really think any daytime exec is gonna think that banking on a show that has made little mainstream impact in primetime anyway and moving it to daytime would make any commercial sense--even if it could make the move easily.

Anyway about the dumbing down of daytime--I agree. Yeah it's gotten worse, largely I think because of micromanaging and not trusting the writers more--bu tit's always been a problem with daytime stories to an extent--it's easy to look back on the past and act like it's a new thing but not really true. One prob I sometimes find with soaps is as the audiences have gotten more and more sophisticated--the shows haven't grown with them.

[Sylph]

Today, about virtual reality and live-blogging.

[EricMontreal22]

"I’ll call out my era of Y&R. We portrayed Daniel’s internet porn obsession as if it were a heroin addiction. It played like a 1950s social propaganda movie along the lines of Reefer Madness or Boys Beware. "

HAHA love it

[MarkH]

See, I didn't even get THAT cautionary part of it.

He was shutting his laptop all the time, and getting spammed...that made sense.

But he was watching the porn, fully clothed, in his living room that he shared with his wife, with his hands on the keyboard or mouse (not elsewhere). MADE NO SENSE. Didn't look like any kinda porn addiction to me. We were told he was late getting his class papers in...but we didn't really see that.

What also didn't make sense is that he seemed to be spending most of his time looking at Amber in lingerie. That's not porn. That's not a porn addiction. That's an addiction to Amber in lingerie. Which, by the way, makes sense given where that relationship has gone....

I find it odd that Daniel has no lingering resentment toward Amber where that is concerned, since she ACTIVELY hooked him (gave him the free password, etc.).

[miajere]

I thought that was the plot induced ending of Daniel and Lily- not a tale about internet porn....I'm surprised his computer wasn't shutting down with the amount of time he was spending. What kinda computer did he have.

[EricMontreal22]

It just seems so out of touch to do a story like that--when really to people of Daniel's generation--women AND men--for the most part internet porn is an accepted fact of life, and no big deal. Sometimes I wonder if this is a good thing how casually people take it now, but it just made the whole plot all the more of a farce

[Sylph]

James Reilly: An Appreciation has been posted.