AMC and OLTL Canceled! Part 2!

[marceline]

LMAO! I watch that commercial mainly for Sean Ringgold. I love that guy but he's no dancer.

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[Khan]

You sure about that?

[JaneAusten]

Interesting Post from Cady McClain. Take it for what its worth

http://www.facebook....146769665427908

Well this is all very interesting.

I want to share with you that I knew about the union negotiations intimately. The fact PP blames the unions is simply ridiculous and typical for our times. Many corporations love to blame the unions. Let me give you a metaphor as an example:

Say you work 5 days a week, and are limited to working 8 hours a day per your contract. After that your boss has to pay you overtime or else he could and would work you 18 hours a day. Despite this, you tend to work 10-12 hours a day. You are generally exhausted all the time. Now a new boss comes in. He says, "In order to keep your job, you have to give up your overtime fee. If you don't, you aren't being a good soldier."

Would you give up your overtime when it's the only thing making sure you aren't worked to death?

There is a reason unions exist. Anyone see the movie Norma Rae? Unions protect our basic human rights- the need for sleep and adequate rest, adequate protection from harmful circumstances, fair compensation, child worker protection, etc. The degree to which a business treats it's workers fairly is the degree to which you respect the product they produce, or at least that's how it used to be.

Many of these important issues were being put on the chopping block in a rather concerning way. In fact, one of the guys at PP was heard to have said, "I thought we were buying Judge Judy." Now nothing against Judge Judy, I love that show, but clearly it is a very inexpensive show to produce. It's one set, two contract players and a rotating cast of real people. No stunts, no 18 hour days, no dialogue to write or memorize, one set... C'mon. Really? Soaps=Judge Judy??

A soap opera is a scripted drama with a cast, crew, writers, directors, producers and a series of sets. Cutting overtime or your lunch hour, for example, is not going to suddenly make your budget half of what it was. It's going to give you a tiny bit more money and some really exhausted actors and crew members. You can't drive a horse until he's dead. It's just wrong.

Everyone in the business I have talked to has said that PP would barely listen to the very helpful ideas of how to make these shows for less. Here are some ideas that I have heard, ideas that would keep these productions union:

1) Have a smaller contracted cast, say 10 actors.

2) Have one studio with permanent sets, NOT in Manhattan.

3) Have longer scenes.

4) Shoot only one show a day.

5) Pay everyone their union scale rate plus 10% for their agents.

6) Use a smaller crew.

7) Don't go over schedule.

8) Make the contracts short, only a year, in order to allow for re-negotiation up or down, as necessary.

etc, etc...

Now you might lose a lot of the big name actors at that amount of money, but you would have a union, serial show you could afford at maybe 20-30 mil a year. If it was successful, then the actors could re-negotiate up at the end of their contract. The audience might protest initially not seeing all their favorites, but if the quality of the show was high, then perhaps they would stay, which would raise the ad rate, which would raise the budget, which could allow for paying the actors more... you get my drift.

But PP needed to have this plan, or A PLAN in place, not go picking at the basic union rights. Trust me, the actors union contract (also called the Network Code for television) is not exactly gonna break anybodies bank. It's the least amount you can pay- that is what it represents. The fact that some networks are trying to challenge it is just another sign of how so many businesses these days want to push as much money as they can to the top, making their profits off the backs of others. This is not fair capitalism, or good business, it's just wrong. It's immoral. Tragically- it's happening everywhere. "Greed is good" has become ingrained in the corporate psyche. In order for our country to get healthy again, change needs to start at the top, and that means practicing fair pay for a fair day of work. This practice of exec's giving themselves bonuses for slashing jobs simply must stop.

In another article I read that "someone" at PP stated, "we just thought they'd just be happy to have jobs." I can barely respond to that. All I can do is point out that there is an enormous amount of condescension inherent in that statement. A statement like that suggests they had absolutely no respect for the show or the people who worked their butts off on it.

Look, I know All My Children could not continue at the financial level it was at. It was really top heavy. That doesn't mean that those at the top weren't worth what they were being paid, it means that a total overhaul of the idea of the show was required. I know that AMC and OLTL had done major, major cuts in order to keep the show on the air with the cast they had. I know the executive producers were trying everything. If PP wanted to move the shows "AS IS" to the internet, AS THEY PUBLICLY STATED, then they really needed to have 90-100 mill in place to finance one year of the two shows. If they didn't have that money, they shouldn't have made that claim.

I get that it was a sales pitch, a hustle to try and raise the rest of the funds, but that's a gamble. Gambling with the future of a 40 year old show and it's historic 40 year value to an entire country is pretty cocky. I am in shock they did not have it in them to call Agnes Nixon directly and admit they were not going to continue. That is another arrow pointing very clearly in the direction that PP as it stands is not a class act.

As you can see, there are much bigger issues at hand than the unions demanding "too much," a claim which is patently untrue. The truth is, PP was not able to get their financing and they are trying to save face by sending blame elsewhere. Remember a few weeks ago when it was all the actors fault? I'm sort of shocked to discover they were able to come in and have as much control over the ending of the show when they weren't 100% solvent and ready to produce, but that is a sign of how willing both the shows were to "make things work."

It appears to me now that AMC and OLTL were used as bait to lure investors through the power of their incredible fan base. I think it is foolish of PP to turn around and say, "Oh now we realize that it's mostly people over 40 who aren't on the internet and don't spend that much money." NOW you think that's the case? What did you think when you put all that money down to buy the licensing? What kind of operation is this? Oh, I get it. Now it's the FANS fault.

There is a reason that soaps are going the way of the dinosaur, but it doesn't have to do with the fans not caring, the actors not wanting to work, the unions not participating or the productions not trying to accommodate tighter budget constraints. It has to do with a business model that insists on showing higher and higher profits for the shareholders, while compensating the execs with outrageous bonuses.

There are some who wonder if PP buying the licensing rights was all intended to quell the negative publicity that was created by ABC canceling the two shows in the first place. Was PP played as much as we were all played? Is there a "chess master" behind this whole thing or has this all been a sad case of a deal gone horribly wrong?

It seems to me that some businessmen wanted to come in and make a profit off a business without making the time to really learn about it. What ever happened to due diligence? Didn't the guys who invested in Facebook do their homework? I think they did. Why didn't PP?

All that said, I'm really sorry for you guys, the incredible, loyal fans of the soaps, who put in so many years only to be whipsawed at the end. Your attention and support is worth more and you should've been treated better.

[MontyB]

Jane, thanks for this great post by Cady. Love her!

[Khan]

Yo, boo, you misunderstood. He really thought he was buying "Judge Judy."

[dragonflies]

Damn, Cady is on FIYAH! I love every word of that!!!

[marceline]

Wow Cady. Just laying it all out there. I like that the actors have thrown away the filter and started to talk. I especially like that they've started to share specifics of what they saw, heard and experienced. In the end it's up to each of us to wade through the information and decide who and what we believe but, personally I like getting the input straight from them and not filtered through the press and "insiders."

[Khan]

Nah, they just paid the geeky shut-ins who lived in their dorm to take all their finals for them. (God bless the Ivy League.)

[Vee]

I just love her, I do, but here's a statement I generally don't get to make very often: Cady McClain is totally making sense, is totally in her right mind, and is absolutely right.

The sad thing is, at least 60% of what she outlined in terms of how to produce these shows for an online platform are things we were all playing out in our heads five or six months ago. How to chop the regular contract cast down to 10-12 people? How to rotate others in and out for 13 week cycles, or put them on recurring? How many episodes per week, per month? What length, what kind of sets and focus? This was not and is not impossible to do. It's simply not something PP understood how to do. She's right - they had no idea what they were doing, or the nature of the beast.

You want to know who I bet would've continued on with OLTL, either contract or in a rotating contract fashion, for union scale peanuts for that first year, with the possibility of their salary going up later, as Cady describes? Erika Slezak. Robin Strasser (actually, they could've just given her a stage and she'd come back). Bob Woods. Melissa Archer and Kassie DePaiva. Hillary B. Smith. Jerry Ver Dorn. Absolutely. They would have done it. And there would be probably be others who would come in and out for 13 weeks on and off. Hell, even Roger Howarth, from what I've been hearing, would perhaps not have been averse to the gamble if he'd gotten his time to do other things. He's getting older, he's got kids, and he's not setting primetime on fire. And then you could've had people on recurring. New actors from New York as a Joey, a Rachel, a new Starr, bring back old multicultural families and add new ones, whoever. It could have been done, absolutely. And most especially, you could've dramatically reformatted and reinvented the show, how it works, how it airs, how many times, with what revolving focus - there was so much to be done, to change the medium for the better, for the 21st century, six months off, whatever, and it could have been done. But these people were not the ones to do it.

I think these brands will be back, eventually. There is money to be made. I just hope the next person to pick up the standard read Cady's post, or something like it. Or has common sense.

[Khan]

Honestly? Keep it to a few permanent sets, focus the story where you have a handful of characters carrying the action (w/ "guest stars" as story dictates), and you could have something like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIPtX8V7Yc4

[Khan]

Here's what I think:

* No more than 10-12 actors on-contract at one time (with the stipulation that you'd need guest stars, extras and under-fives as storylines dictate).

* One studio space with a minimum number of permanent sets.

* Episodes at 30 minutes (or twenty-six w/ commercials).

* Produce and stream two episodes per week for 13 weeks, or 26 episodes per "season."

* Sponsors to supervise and manage productions (a literal throwback to the early days of this industry).

Do that, and I think you'd have something manageable.

Maybe.

[MontyB]

The best primetime drama ever. Just saying.............

Carry on!

[SFK]

Cady's post should be bolded and pinned and occasionally reread and referred to by those of us still engaging in this conversation.

She has affirmed our own ideas and answered our suspicions in an even-tempered and informed way. I find her post very satisfying.

[SFK]

What I find frustrating is that if PP had taken some of the above advice not only could they have kept AMC and OLTL alive (in sleeker, paired down form), but all of those other proposed PP serials could have seen the light of day.

I'm still wondering... is TOLN dead or is it just that AMC and OLTL are no longer the flagships?

[Vee]

I think it's probably dead. Or maybe just the soaps they tried to prop it up on, apparently assuming all they would need is a few ferns, a standing kitchen set, natural lighting, and operating hours of 4 AM to 1 AM.