AMC and OLTL Canceled!

[Khan]

Maria Arena Bell (Y&R EP/HW): "They really needed to get that BET storyline up and pumping!"

[Scotty]

[difficultdiva]

Deep Soap's Sara Bibel's article:

"Should Fans Try to Save AMC & OLTL"

http://xfinitytv.comcast.net/blogs/2011/deep-soap/should-fans-try-to-save-all-my-children-and-one-life-to-live/

[marceline]

When you add this to the interview that Tim Stickney did with WLS a few months back it only confirms the worst things we've been saying about ABC all these years re: diversity.

My question is this: what was going to happen to Cara/Lindsay and Griffin/Jordi when millions of Latino viewers didn't flock to AMC? More importantly, was was going to happen to them when your "mainstream" audience complained about hearing all that Spanish on "their" show?

[Khan]

If they really wanted to get it all over with, they should have canceled GH at the same time they canceled AMC & OLTL. Because, that (GH's cancellation) is gonna be the real shitstorm.

[DRW50]

That says more about the other channels than CBS. CBS has actually had a number of significant drops on more than one night. While that isn't down to ATWT/GL being taken off, it's kind of silly to just gloss over CBS' losses if she's going to bring up their primetime shows.

Most people didn't threaten to boycott CBS primetime anyway.

She also glosses over the ratings losses Y&R has suffered in the last year.

And so far it's been a PR fiasco. So apparently it wasn't the best idea after all, because they are so damn incompetent that they cannot even stop themselves from doing a little jig in front of the cast and crew of the shows they canceled.

[DeeeDee]

We've?

[DRW50]

Exactly. They didn't just go all in, even though Sweeney reportedly wanted to. Bibel not mentioning that makes it seem more like ABC spin.

[DeeeDee]

+1.

[Days22]

Dare I say soap fans affected Dancing with the stars....well not really but perhaps. It still won the night but...

"ABC easily won the night among adults 18-49. Dancing was down 13% to a 3.9 adults 18-49 rating, its lowest-rated Spring performance ever. And most dance fans did not stick around for Cougar Town which returned to a 2.3 adults 18-49 rating. That’s down 15%"

Just sayin.

[marceline]

I would VERY much like to hear from some of the people who were in this talent development program. What were they taught? Who did they work with? Was creative thinking encouraged or was it just a place to indoctrinate now people in the same bad habits?

That was more likely the effect of Passover. That was Elijah, not Luke and Laura.

[LoyaltoAMC]

Gimmicks and stunts. WTF. These are the very things that turned many viewers OFF from these shows. I don't want to see tornadoes on AMC. I don't want heavy-handed melodrama. These things are not AMC. I want to see humor, thwarted young romance, and sensitively handled social issues set amid a background of family and community. That is what AMC is to me at least.

These people need to hop onto youtube and watch some of the 1983 episodes of AMC. They are magic! Light-hearted melodrama, youthful romance, huge dollops of comedy, social relevance, family, community. That is the AMC recipe for success, and I can't figure out why TPTB felt they needed to tinker with that over the years. If "it ain't broke, don't fix it" ever applied to anything, it's AMC in the early to mid 80s. Things actually began to change when Cap Cities took over ABC in 1987. There had been some defection in viewership at that point. Agnes had stepped away from the day-to-day dealings with the show, leaving it to Wisner and Lorraine. Yes, there were some problems, but nothing insurmountable. I remember an interview with Agnes around this time, probably soon after Jorn Winther was fired at EP in late spring 1987, that the decision was made to create higher-stakes stories, more "drive through" stories, as she termed them. I think that was a result of them running scared over the ratings drop. That type of storytelling seemed to go into full mode when FMB took over a couple of years later, and then just got more and more out of control. So you get all these tornadoes, endless back from the dead nonsense, insane history rewrites, characters with no connection to the core...not to mention the decision to hire models rather than actors...and bada bing bada boom, you have a show nobody cares about.

[SFK]

Ha! Happy Pesach my Jewish brothers and sisters!

[Khan]

All AMC really needed to do in the late '80's was reconnect with its sense of humor. That's it. The canvas, IMO, was tight, w/ a near-perfect mix of vets and newer characters; so, no need to make significant changes there. And yes, perhaps some stories were connecting w/ fans better than others - but that's been true of most soaps practically from the beginning. The one thing - the one thing - that was lacking during that period of time, that AMC fans were missing most was its unique sense of humor.

[LoyaltoAMC]

I think they were afraid to do humor. There were still some cherished comedic moments (Palmer and Myra's bickering, Tad's quips, anything with Cecily, Phoebe and Langley, though the characters' importance and airtime began to severely reduce by the late 80s), but it was tough to mine humor from all the dark stuff they were suddenly doing a lot of. There was just too much seriousness. Those were the high stakes drive-through storylines that Agnes was talking about. Yet, during this time, AMC still retained its identity thanks to the slate of characters, solid relationships, and long-time sets that remained largely unchanged. The foundation that helped to define the show was still in place. FMB actually brought a lot of the humor back initially in the early 90s, with the returns of Opal and Billy Clyde and all the fun stuff they were doing with Tad and Dixie, and of course Trevor and Janet. Although Palmer and Opal and Chicken Shack I could've done without. Agnes was back full time at that point, so that was probably the reason.