AMC and OLTL Canceled!

[~bl~]

The thing is with Hershey would they really be a good fit for the replacement shows? The Chew may want more high end (ie not junk food)...and Revolution is about weight loss. Hershey doesn't make diet candy.

[Vizion]

That's true, but let's be honest, could the reputation of soap fans get any worse than it already is? I mean really....

[trish672]

Right out of the shipper campaign handbook.

[dragonflies]

LOL I'm at the point I think it could get worse.

Some soap fans wonder why soap fans get mocked and not taken seriously......

[Scotty]

Advertisers must plan for soap opera's second act

By Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson

Published: April 20 2011 18:09 | Last updated: April 20 2011 18:09

"Beloved soap star" should rank high on the list of the world's most dangerous jobs. In few other professions is the risk of being killed off so high. Even by the standards of the genre, however, the body count is starting to look far-fetched.

Last week, Disney's ABC announced plans to cancel All My Children and

One Life To Live, each of which had been highlights of US daytime television for more than four decades. Their demise follows the untimely end of As the World Turns and Guiding Light, two Procter & Gamble-produced CBS soaps dating from the days when soap brands gave the format its name.

Read more...

http://www.ft.com/cm...l#ixzz1K705nfFV

[EricMontreal22]

Exactly. Even though I don't think it was a flawlessly done story--when was the only time OLTL got any real press (or I might guess even fans) in the past 10 years? Kish--yeah ratings didn't spike but to then kill that story just speaks of all the mismanagement and cluelessness (and Kish wasn't even all that groundbreaking in tv terms for 2010)

[EricMontreal22]

Although the ratings did briefly improve, more and more I think hiring Pratt really was the start of the spiral all the way down (even though I admit that spiral had begun long before). I liked some of the initial things he did, but to hire a man who was so proud of not writing in character, one that everyone involved with the show seems to have hated... S&K's main prob was they were just often pretty boring (and I think Feb sweeps was a trainwreck of boring ness where nothing seemed to happen or have any momentum) but personall I enjoyed, well, well enough, a big chunk of their writing.

They make it sound like she is but aren't very clear on that part... The prob is Agnes hasn't directly done any writing for OLTL since 1973--as hated by many fans as, say Ryan is, Agnes at least knows him, the only people from OLTL on from 73 are Vicki and a different Dorian. That said I'd love if they at least listened to her ideas (she does seem to have at least kept some tabs on the show) and doing a final scene for Vicki, or something similar, would be awesome.

[EricMontreal22]

There's that one Paley Center interview where someone mentions, from around the same time, about how great Nicki being back is and Agnes DOES seem to be aware of the story, but she freely says that she is not involved with the writing of the show anymore at all (although I believe she still held her ABC Daytime Consultant credit)--similarly when Ruach fired Ellen Holly it seems that Agnes couldn't do anything about it--so offered Ellen and her mom's scress to move them to Loving (which Ellen saw as a diss--as much as I loved Loving I can't say I am too surprised Ellen did...)

[EricMontreal22]

Absolutely--in fact ratings have been lower on average since, right? And if there were bad ratings during the Kish "climax" (so to speak) the fact that the show was a MESS with Stacey, Mitch, etc, at the time obviously played some part.

+1 Michael Storm would especially be great, he has mentioned a lot how much he'd come back in a heartbeat and he is a good friend of Vicki's (and of course then it would make more sense for Judith to return too). And as DeeDee said it would be nice if some of the forgotten recurring vets--at the top for me would be Renee--returned.

[Scotty]

http://dealbook.nyti...to-pine-valley/

April 15, 2011, 1:11 pm Investment Banking

For Buffett, No More Trips to Pine Valley

By GREGORY SCHMIDT

ABC/Steve Fenn Warren E. Buffett in an episode of "All My Children" with Susan Lucci, whose character on the soap was wrongfully imprisoned for insider trading.

The decision by ABC to cancel two of its stalwart soap operas, "All My Children" and "One Life to Live," will put about 60 full-time actors out of work, not to mention the scores of part-time actors, producers, directors, writers and crew members employed by each show.

But the ax will also fall on a well-known Wall Street investor, Warren E. Buffett.

Mr. Buffett, 80, appeared on "All My Children" several times as himself, first in the early 1990s when he showed up with Thomas S. Murphy, the chairman of Capital Cities/ABC Inc., to provide business advice to Pine Valley's resident vixen and entrepreneur, Erica Kane, played by Susan Lucci.

He returned in 2008 when Erica was imprisoned after being wrongly convicted of insider trading, and she turned to him for help.

Despite giving a performance that prompted an invitation to return, Mr. Buffett — a friend of Agnes Nixon, creator of the two daytime dramas — concedes he's no actor.

"Tom Murphy and I were probably the only ones who ever needed cue cards and at times even these weren't enough to keep us from muffing our lines," he said through his assistant, Debbie Bosanek.

For his efforts, Mr. Buffett was paid the union scale salary as a day player, roughly $700.

But don't expect him to apply for unemployment benefits anytime soon. The shares Mr. Buffett owns in his conglomerate, Berkshire Hathaway, are worth more than $40 billion.

[EricMontreal22]

She was out at least a year before the purchase I think which happened in 96--but I do agree that bringing her on--someone who had both respect for soaps and innovative ideas was one of the last decent things.

[EricMontreal22]

What was the ES quote? Back when she came on the soap press overall seemed to be upset with this movie producer working on soaps, though manyof them came around. However I suspect she alwasy planned to be on only a couple of years--Carl posted that great interview with her and it sounded like she just got tired of other things and saw Daytime as an exciting adventure, but not a life changer.

And don't forget to give poor coHW Griffith some credit--those two men seem to only do decent soap work as a team (and even that was questionable last time around though when G left the show bottomed out).

I dunno, I agree and see your point, but he also did a lot to bring it back--in style anyway--to Agnes' roots which the show really needed. The last couple of years of the Rauch era were such a mess, and the ratings were bottoming out, I think while under Gottlieb it was always a middle rated show that that era did extend the life of the show.

[DRW50]

I still wish that Ellen Holly had taken the offer - I think she would have fit in very well at Loving, the ladies of that era, moreso than Rauch's OLTL. I can see her with Ava, Gwyn, Ann, Isabelle, etc.

For me it's not so much about Agnes not being in touch with current OLTL stories as it is the people at ABC Daytime/OLTL needing a reminder of OLTL's initial concept. If she could contribute that, and also perhaps some story for Viki, or Dorian, or some final moments with the Halls or the Woleks, and some reminder of the "relevancy" type of story she pioneered, then I think it would be a good idea. She doesn't have time for that on AMC.

[SFK]

Oh Lord, that happened here too?

[Soapsuds]

Yup