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CBS cancels Guiding Light

JackPeyton

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MarkH Newbie

MarkH

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This was not Ellen's fault.

In fact, the GL experiment ("new production model") NEEDED to be done.

Soaps started as dimly lit things where most of the sets were black velvet curtains. That was when they were most cost effective.

GL tried to take that "cost effective" thing (which Brad Bell has also said is essential for viability), and update it. Moreover, they used a production style that has worked well for other shows (e.g., The Office, Friday Night Lights). Concretely, it bought GL another year. Mileage will vary regarding whether that was a "good" or "bad" thing.

Other parts of the GL experiment (like the cast cuts and low-veteran-use) are being widely practiced on ABC and Days and P&G shows. So that is nothing special.

Finally, GL is roundly accused of having bad writing for a long time. Yup. Find me one -- one -- soap that hasn't gone through a fairly recent spate of that? Those shows aren't being canceled...yet.

The reality is that factors unrelated to any of this...related to CBS, affiliates, changing demographics, desirable demographics, a shrinking economy, new media...THOSE are the factors to blame.

I truly believe that GL's age was part of its' liability. A 72-year old show (including radio) is "Grandma's stories". Say that to someone on Madison Avenue, and they're gonna cancel you as quick as they can. Given how old it was, in an industry that values youth, it is shocking -- shocking -- that GL was saved as long as it was.

When people say "7 more to go", they're right. The game is rigged so that these shows MUST fall. And no -- none -- kein -- human being can save or kill them. It cannot and will not be done. Ellen Wheeler probably deserves blame...but not one iota more blame than you or me. We're all part of the system that got us to this point.

Every day older our soaps get, and every day older the audience mean age gets, is another day closer to extinction.

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Cat Mentor

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Daytime is too littered with failed Primetime pilot writers/execs.

They need to turn the shows over to people who actually like soaps. Not people who want to turn them into something else.

Wheeler... Goutman... JFP... Guza... I'm looking at you.

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Adam Newbie

Adam

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Guess you arent feeling the Jeff Branson love..... not that it would happen anyway..... both of my items....

Umm..... so is there going to be a bidding war on some of these unemployed actors? I think Gina will definitely get some calls....

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Vee Grand Master

Vee

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Oh, little old me? I didn't make the actors change clothes in the back of a family sedan, Mark.

Calling the game rigged and impossible is promoting the kind of apathy the production staff expects from itself and from its audience. As long as everyone stays lethargic, they'll be able to move on to the mythical fantasy land of primetime or film work that much sooner. Daytime has always had a hardscrabble road. But the format, the serial doesn't die unless people want it to, unless they don't want to do it.

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Vee Grand Master

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There were ways to retool the production model that did not simultaneously alienate and demean both the audience and the cast and crew. Ellen Wheeler was also the wrong person to do the job. But more importantly, GL would not have gotten to a place to have to retool without years of bad management by a variety of people.

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MarkH Newbie

MarkH

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I hear you...I believe a part of what you say...but in the end, I do not agree. Which is irrelevant, because I could be wrong :).

When I step way back, I see no form surviving this long. Games shows...pretty much dead. Certainly the daily daytime ones. Westerns...pretty much dead. Hell...network nightly newscasts at 6:30 pm...dying fast.

What I believe is that what you write could have influenced GL's RELATIVE POSITION. That is, GL COULD be the number one soap now, and the last to go. That DOES lay at the feet of the showrunners and the network and the affiliates, etc. So, GL could absolutely have been positioned as the last to go!

But go, it would...and sooner than later.

Maybe, though, I'm just a whack job apologist who fails to assign proper responsibility. Seriously...I'm not being ironic...I don't know....but I deeply believe GL's cancellation is ultimately about the state of the genre (daily daytime melodramas), and not about GL.

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Sylph Newbie

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I think there was a board meeting or something and one of the members asked: Bloom, what's this cr*p you're supervising that has a 1.0 rating? Cancel it.

Or something like that. I think they only noticed this show existed right now.

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