Ken Corday(and others)talk about changes they'd make

[Cat]

FMB's comment about no more VCRs could apply to ratings for TV as a whole.

Jeanne Cooper's comments are crazily on point.

IMO, ratings are a problem in large part due to the timeslot. Nobody is home anymore at 2pm to watch ATWT or OLTL (two shows that deserve the viewership). So for [!@#$%^&*]'s sake, move soaps to between 5-8pm when people can actually WATCH. It's a no-brainer. Reducing them to half-hour shows might also relieve some of the daily stress on writers and actors.

[Paul Raven]

Michael Malone (former OLTL headwriter)

"Everyone is working as hard as they can to put on this beautiful,hour long drama five days a week,but you're constrained by time,as well as the physical limits of the studio,actors and crew.

It would be wonderful if we could find a way to take a breather.For example,maybe suspend production of the show in the summer,and use that time to reintroduce people to the show.I'm not talking about reruns.I mean figure out a way to recap what's happened the past year,so that when we start fresh in the fall,everyone is clued in to what's going on.It's necessary,because in many ways daytime isn't a very user friendly medium;you have to know what's happening with the chracter to enjoy it.Having some form of recap in the summer would allow people to find out what's going on with the show,and also has the potential to help hook new young viewers.

Another thing I would change is the fear that seems to be present when it comes to competing with talk shows.You don't want daytime trying to match the lurid .freak show horrows presented on these vile programs,but at the same time you don't want the medium to retreat into a safe kind of blandness,either.Soaps have always taken risks and they need to continue to do so.

One of the things I'd like to see in terms of risk is less reliance on the old literal conventions.One of the commandments of daytime is that the audience won't care about anyone they haven't known for a long time.This puzzles me.don't we walk into a movie and instantly care about the chracters up on the screen?One of the reasons primetime shows like NYPD Blue or ER are so successful is that they've managed totake the episodic form-which gives the audience the satisfaction of a beginning,middle and end=and they've embedded it within the larger arc of the emoyional lives of the characters.This is what daytime needs to do.

My feeling is that if daytime doesn't change it will die.ome people may think,'Well,why shouldn't it?Other forms of entertainment have come and gone as audience needs have changed.Look at programs like The Ed Sullivan Show.'But there's something about this genre that goes to the heart of why people love stories,and if it can find a way to express itself in a more contemporary way,I think it will be arounf for another 30 years."

Malone has some interesting ideas,but fails to show how they would work.His summer recap proposal is vague.Is he talking 3 months of best of scenes?Summer was traditionally peak viewing for soaps and I don't think the audience would stand for it.It might work for a couple of weeks where characters reminisced about the past year,but that wouldn't provide the break he feels is necessary.

I remember Sunset Beach did a weeks worth of shows like this early on as they regrouped after the first few months(and poor ratings)

As for his idea of a more episodic approach,again it's hard to make it workable.Would a specific story last a week,or a month?The risk is that viewers might turn off if the next story doesn't appeal.how would it work in terms of characters?For example,lets say the story was Viki dealing with a stroke.Would that story run every day for say 4 weeks,with every scene about that,or would there be 2 or 3 close ended stories at a time?

The thing is ,soaps are continuing stories.Otherwise,maybe they should try novela style shows.Say 4 a year,3 months each.However,that would be a much more expensive proposition.

[EricMontreal22]

It'sfunny he would say that since he and Gottlieb flirted with the short term, new character stories when he came to the show (like the Craig Wasson spousal abuse story) and they quickly realized they didn't work... 96 was when Griffith left him as co writer and he seemed pretty burned out though.

[Khan]

Michael Malone: "One of the commandments of daytime is that the audience won't care about anyone they haven't known for a long time. This puzzles me. Don't we walk into a movie and instantly care about the characters up on the screen?"

Not necessarily. Even with a movie, you still need the first act in order to introduce the main characters properly. Besides which, movies are not soap operas. God. Apples, meet oranges.

(No wonder I can't stand this man's work.)

[Paul Raven]

Stephen Schnetser (Cass AW)

"It's time for daytime to shake things up,really push the envelope.We need to look at what are the trends in television,and instead of sticking to the tried and true formulas,imitate what's popular.i think that's what AW has been doing since Jill Farren Phelps has come on board.She came in here and said,'Gee,we have a police station and a hospital-just like NYPD Blue and ER.how can we use this tio our advantage?

Some people might think it doesn't make sense to look for primetime for inspiration,but I think it does.Everything is derivatave anyway;we all steal from movies,and when you get down to it,there are really only 12 storylines in the world,and everything else that's done is just a variation of those 12.We should be experimenting more,trying to redifine our identity.I'm not sating throw out the past.But if daytime isn't pulling in the numbers it used to-and it isn't-then what's the harm in experimenting?We've got nothing to lose."

Well,JFP's time on AW hardly set the world on fire.The show became very contrived,with characters constantly hurt or in trouble to make use of the sets.The imitation of NYPD and ER went as far as people working in those settings,but there were no in depth stories of police or medical workers dealing with the stress of work and it's effect on their personal lives.

As for imitating what's popular,Avatar is the biggest movie ever,so let's have John McBain called by the government to go to another planet,where he falls in love with a native girl.

AW once had an identity,but it was trashed and never recovered.