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http://beta.strike.tv/show/life-in-general

http://welovesoaps.blogspot.com/2008/08/ka...pital-fame.html

This looks pretty good! I'm excited to see how this will do, following the success of Imaginary Bitches. More and more I'm starting to see that soaps have a strong future online; like how GH:NS has its own online spinoff with Claire and Kyle, maybe we'll be seeing more of these in future. If it means soaps are opened up to a wider audience, then maybe they'll start watching the real thing. It can only be a good thing for the genre.

Edited August 21, 200817 yr by Toups

Looks fun!

Damn, I hate We Love Soaps! LOL. They are so much quicker than me.

This project looks great and even better because it is a Behind-the-Scenes look at a soap. We've all said that stuff is a lot more juicier than the actual soaps themselves

I've been waiting months for this! I love Karen Harris! She should be GH's HW or at least Co-HW.

Sadly... I don't like online soaps. I like them on an old-fashioned TV.

I've been waiting months for this! I love Karen Harris! She should be GH's HW or at least Co-HW.

Upon reviewing the trailer, I can't help but feel this might be very similar to the Echo Beach/Moving Wallpaper series that aired in the UK last year. However, while that was disastrous, I get the impression this is going to be a lot better. Who knows? If it runs for a while, maybe some soap stars will pop up in it.

Is Karen Harris out at GH, then? Or is this like a sideline project? Because if she's basing storylines on her experiences at GH, surely if she gets too close to the bone there will be some sort of conflict of interests, or something?

Upon reviewing the trailer, I can't help but feel this might be very similar to the Echo Beach/Moving Wallpaper series that aired in the UK last year. However, while that was disastrous, I get the impression this is going to be a lot better. Who knows? If it runs for a while, maybe some soap stars will pop up in it.

I never heard of those shows before.

I definiltely love "behind the scene" shows! I thought the trailer was pretty funny.

Is Karen Harris out at GH, then? Or is this like a sideline project? Because if she's basing storylines on her experiences at GH, surely if she gets too close to the bone there will be some sort of conflict of interests, or something?

She's still writing for GH. I think this was shot/written during the strike?

More about the show, again from WeLoveSoaps...

Karen Harris, the Writer, Creator and Executive Producer of the upcoming online soap, LIFE IN GENERAL, has blogged about the project.

"LIFE IN GENERAL' had first reared its head in the early 1990’s. I’d done my first tour of duty as a scriptwriter on GENERAL HOSPITAL. (P.S., the fact that both General Hospital and Greenville General both revolve around a hospital is the only thing they have in common). This was new territory to me. I’d spent fifteen years as a writer and producer of prime time shows, mostly action-adventure like The Incredible Hulk, and Knight Rider, Street Hawk, and a bunch of shows no one’s heard of. I did pilots for Universal and Aaron Spelling, and movies of the week for Fox. But my bread-and-butter shows were taking a break, comedy was king, and when a friend asked me to write GENERAL HOSPITAL, I took the leap.

The feature film, Soap Dish had come out, and I thought it was terrific. Then I discovered that the real behind-the-scenes was funnier, dirtier, sexier and way more dangerous. I wanted to do something realistic about the goings on at a Daytime Drama. I actually pitched it around – the story of the people who work on the second longest running serialized drama on US television…the beloved Greenville General. And Life in General was such a perfect title. But it was hard to get anyone to bite. Behind-the-scenes stories of movies and television series were considered a bad bet. So the concept got tucked away in my drawer. Besides, I was getting myself a helluva daytime education from the brilliant Claire Labine, and adjusting to the transition from a primetime career as a writer/producer/show runner to being a full blown, full-time Daytime writer. A few years later, after a year as co-head writer on GH, with the very talented Robert Guza, I went back to more traditional syndicated hour television. I was also pitching my own shows – and Life in General came back out of the drawer. I rewrote the concept, incorporating some of my more recent experiences and relationships. Still no sale. I couldn’t seem to get the real heart of it across. So I decided to write the script. Maybe that would better sell it. I wrote the Teaser and the beginning of Act I. 12 pages that I loved.

But the work was interrupted in 1999, when I went back to Daytime as a Headwriter on PORT CHARLES. This led to more Daytime, more syndication, then a year on ALL MY CHILDREN, then 3 years back on GENERAL HOSPITAL, which felt like coming home. I’d settlee into a very comfortable routine – perhaps too comfortable. And then, the Strike.

I’m not kidding, when I heard about Strike.TV at this meeting, I leaned over to some of my GH colleagues and said 'Want to do a show?' They looked at me as if I’d lost my mind. I had. They had other things on their minds, but I knew what I had to do. I went home and pulled out the concept of LIFE IN GENERAL. It was still really fun. But I knew I had to do something to make this special for the internet. Something different, and unexpected. And it was obvious – tell the story of Life in General, and then follow it with episodes of the show they all work on…Greenville General.

Maybe that’s what it always needed. It suddenly took on a whole other personality. I polished up the teaser (which is now the entire pilot episode) and I wrote the soap scenes. I found a way to make the two thematic – to see the headwriter, Winnie, go through her day, and to see how what she experiences informs what she writes. And how what she writes translates to a daytime drama. In a perfect world, both elements of this concept will find a following. You don’t have to watch one to appreciate the other – if you’re a big soap fan, I hope we’ll create a show in Greenville General that will be must-see. I hope that LIFE IN GENERAL provides insight and humor, and real drama to the sometimes silly lives we lead. Both shows will have classic elements, of love, betrayal, envy, and obsession. Each feeds the other. I hope they’re both entertaining. And I hope that Greenville General will better introduce the world of Daytime Dramas, a world I have come to love, to people who think they wouldn’t be caught dead watching a soap opera.

I’m going to save some inside chatter for next time, but here’s a few tidbits. People who follow serialized dramas want to know if these characters are based on real people. Of course they are. Just like Winnie writes from her own experiences, so do I. But not in the way you may think. Winnie Marshall isn’t me. I’m not a ‘creamy skinned, willowy blonde with a trace of an Atlanta accent’ except maybe in my fantasies. But Winnie has my feelings, and my fears, and some of my experiences. I’ve never met Doug Marland or Agnes Nixon, but Greenville General’s creator, Raymond Kennedy, represents, in my mind, these icons of the world of Daytime Television. The executive producer of Greenville General, Mary Kate Walton, is not based on any one executive producer I’ve worked with. She is, in fact, based on every one of them. And some supervising producers, and a couple of directors I’ve worked with. As we move forward, these characters will become more well-rounded, familiar, and human. And I also plan to explore the changing world of Daytime in today’s entertainment landscape.

As for the making of this show -- I hadn’t produced a television show in a very long time. In Daytime Dramas producers and writers barely even intersect. But this was like riding a bicycle – all my instincts kicked in, and I knew what I had to do. Gather the best group of people around me that I could. Work with actors I love. Find crew who could be passionate about what we were creating. And make it good enough that we could do it again, and again, and again. With any luck, what you see on Strike.TV is just an introduction to what can become an ongoing series. I, personally, would love nothing more than to do it again.

LIFE IN GENERAL became one of the most joyful collaborations of my career. It would be my lifeline at a time when my world and my future, like all of ours, were uncertain. We had been given a truckload of lemons, but damn it, I would make lemonade.

LIFE IN GENERAL was an idea simply waiting to be born. I thank all who helped birth this baby. And I honor the work, commitment and talent of a great group of human beings in the cast, crew, and at Strike.tv for figuring out how to make dreams come true."

I'm EXCITED!!!

The cast in the show is awesome.

The cast in the show is awesome.

The fact that Arianne Zuker is in it has it sold for me. It will be nice to see her play something other than Nicole.

You'll love who else is in it

After reading that blog, I'm even more excited! She's such a talented writer who deserves better than writing Bob Guza scripts - it should be the other way around, Guza should be writing scripts for Karen!

This looks like a great show, but not a soap. More like a sitcom based around a soap. I could see it being a good cable show if expanded. I can't wait to see what Karen Harris plots on her own.

Don't read on if you haven't seen it yet.....I'll be talking about it below.

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I just saw the first episode and I already love it! The scenes are really quick and there's already instant drama - Winni being rewritten by Raymond (I couldn't help think of the DAYS/Y&R situations! LMAO!), Courtney's missing while her father wants her to be front burner, Rachel/Brian's bickering, Rod dumping Courtney and he's sleeping with a cast member, Raymond hiring a new young Consultant.

It's also so funny!

"Diva, my ass. These aren't even her own tits."

"I've been backburnered since you got me out of the wheelchair. I have nothing to submit to the Emmys."

"You heard him, I am a legend in my own mind."

LOL!!!

And the episode ended with a cliffhanger - soap opera style!

The cast is fantastic! I instantly knew John Ingle, Lindze Letherman, Scott Clifton, Arianne Zuker. It took me a while to recognize the actor playing Julian (Jordon Bridges who played Oliver on Dawson's Creek).

I can't wait for the next episode.

How do we get to watch it?