This is fascinating.... I had never heard of any of these before!

Refresh your memory, we've discussed this before:

Just discovered that way back in 57,CBS had a soap called 'The Will to Dream' ready to go.It concerned the relationship between an atomic scientist and his wife,with the background being 'contemporary' and many of the problems 'topical'(whatever that meant)

But CBS daytime was doing so well that there was no need or room for this show.

Doris Frankel was listed as writer.She wrote for GH,SFT and AMC.

Years before Generations, O.J. Simpson (let me finish) had worked on a treatment for a new predominantly black soap opera, also called Heart and Soul. And years before that, the late Josephine Premice had worked on a similar idea, undoubtedly hoping to employ many of her talented colleagues who were part of the black New York theatre scene.

I guess O.J.(like all daytime writers) ended up recycling his proposed sweeps murder in 1994.

In 1952,NBC had a plan for 4 15min soaps under the banner 'Hometown USA'.The idea is that the shows would be cheaper to produce because common permanent sets could be used.The Brooklyn studios were planned as home for these shows.

I guess that is the same studio AW taped in.

They were to air 10.00 - 12.00 each morning.

Each 15 min show would focus on different residents of the town-the doctor,a female personnel manager in a local factory,a mother seamstress and the local grocery store.

This last segment would be patterned after the successful radio soap 'Vic n Sade' and was to be written by that show's writer Paul Rhymer.

NBC would not put the show to air until they had substansial sponsorship and obviously that never happened.

So,it looks like the 60 min soap could have happened in the 50's!

Roy Winsor created The Widening Circle for CBS in 1964, a spinoff of The Secret Storm. A pilot was shot with James Vickery as Alan Dunbar and Diana Muldaur as Ann Wicker. Winsor promised to get me a copy of the pilot, but he died before sending it to me. The soap would have gone to air sometime in 1965 or 1966. Agnes Nixon created All My Children at the same time, and Henry Slesar (pre-Edge of Night) had a proposed espionage soap called Cannon. CBS passed on AMC and The Widening Circle. Cannon was close to getting a pickup, but the espionage craze was shortlived. Slesar used the main character of counter espionage agent Cannon as the prototype for Edge’s Adam Drake. In 1967, CBS decided to go Love Is a Many Splendored Thing instead. FYI, CBS kept Widening Circle as a potential soap until Roy Winsor had a falling out with CBS in 1969 and sold Secret Storm and Love of Life to the network.

In 1971, Columbia Pictures developed a companion to Days called Doctors Wives that would have aired on NBC. NBC desired name recognition and bought Return to Peyton Place instead. Two popular soaps had proposed spinoffs in 1971. ABC planned a General Hospital spinoff set in Mercy, but GH’s ratings spike was shortlived, and the spinoff was dropped. Writer Ann Marcus was asked by CBS to create a spinoff of Love Is a Many Splendored Thing at the height of its popularity, but that was canceled too when the ratings for LIAMST didn’t hold.

Actor Fred J. Scollay of Another World, Somerset, and EON created a soap called Absent Without Love in 1971. He filmed a pilot that received really good buzz at the time, but none of the networks picked it up.

Fascinating! (said Spock)

Did the Doctors' Wives proposal have any connection to the trashy movie of the same name?

In 1951 as CBS was readying Search,Love of Life and The Egg and I,the long running radio soap Aunt Jenny was being tested for the switch to TV.

Kinescopes were used as pilots to see how the showmight look on the small screen.

That never happened and Guiding Light became the first radio soap to move to TV.

In 1952,NBC had a plan for 4 15min soaps under the banner 'Hometown USA'.The idea is that the shows would be cheaper to produce because common permanent sets could be used.The Brooklyn studios were planned as home for these shows.

I guess that is the same studio AW taped in.

They were to air 10.00 - 12.00 each morning.

Each 15 min show would focus on different residents of the town-the doctor,a female personnel manager in a local factory,a mother seamstress and the local grocery store.

This last segment would be patterned after the successful radio soap 'Vic n Sade' and was to be written by that show's writer Paul Rhymer.

NBC would not put the show to air until they had substansial sponsorship and obviously that never happened.

So,it looks like the 60 min soap could have happened in the 50's!

It kinda had a radio precedent didn't it? When Irna's shows were turned into the General Mills Hour or something and characters would crossover between all four shows?

In Feb 1955,there were plans for a syndicated soap based on the comic strip 'The Heart of Juliet Jones'.

Charles Irving was listed as producer and it was stated that 25 weeks of shows were planned initially.

That's the first I've heard of it,so I doubt it made it to air.

I have really not heard of any of these. Except for the "Young Loves of General Hospital" one, and I think I heard of a Passions one...

I wonder what would have happened if these had been launched...I mean, would that mean there would be a whole different lineup of soaps that survived, and different soaps that were still around today.

Also, do you think there will ever be a new soap????

A daytime one I mean...I know ratings are bad for a lot of soaps (most), so I don't see it happeneing...But if a new soap came about, would anyone watch it?

I would like to see one launched on FOX. They have bever had a daytime soap before (have they????), so if they launched one, they wouldn't have to deal with the "baggage" of past mistakes.

FOX nearly launched a new soap around 1996, 13 Bourbon Street, and then it fell through. I don't think they will ever have one. I also don't think we will see a new fictional soap in daytime, not for some years. I think we may eventually see one of those Hills-esque type "soaps".

Bourbon was a late night show--now daytime. It's sad to think how close it came to happening

I remember seeing an interview with Dolly Parton. It was her dream to do a soap based in the Smokey Mountains and based on people she grew up with.

I remember seeing an interview with Dolly Parton. It was her dream to do a soap based in the Smokey Mountains and based on people she grew up with.

My mouth waters just thinking about that, seriously. Oh, how I wished that somewhere along the way, someone would have gotten the guts to expand soaps out of just the big cities and "small Midwestern/New England towns" into other locales across the country. I've always wanted to see a more rural-based soap.

For what it's worth - and this came from one of Kathryn Leigh Scott's books - in early '82, ABC approached Dan Curtis about another go at "Dark Shadows" - which begs the question of how early was the cancellation clock ticking on EON? Assuming of course, that DS would've gotten the 4:00/3:00 central slot back.

My mouth waters just thinking about that, seriously. Oh, how I wished that somewhere along the way, someone would have gotten the guts to expand soaps out of just the big cities and "small Midwestern/New England towns" into other locales across the country. I've always wanted to see a more rural-based soap.

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