Hollywood Reporter: Soaps Producer Ramps Up ABC Lawsuit: 'Mega Soap' Fraud Scheme Alleged

[Chris B]

All this stuff is so interesting! I love BTS soap stuff! I wish somebody would release ABC's documents. I want to know the other side to things as well.

[alexisfan07]

Damn, they really have some damning evidence here. Love that they saved all the emails and often refer "exhibits" which would be seen in the courtroom.

Two issues I saw though:

1) They refer to OLTL has the historically more popular soap between it and AMC. Ummm, just no. The document makes it very clear that they were expecting a lot more out of OLTL and its edginess and that makes sense with how much the ratings surged at the end. Still interesting to see which one they favored actually spelled out in print. And you have to wonder if OLTL not doing as well truly was due to the writing suffering from the ABC crap. Remember the writers' board that had the characters? It clearly said "Natalie + John" and had "Todd + Starr" crossed out.

2) Why is Kassie DePaiva's secret long-term contract only referenced once at the end when they had discussed the other secret contracts and the three actors in previous sections? Perhaps her inclusion there was a mistake? It doesn't make sense.

[cassadine1991]

well..

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/sites/default/files/custom/Documents/ESQ/soapslawsuit.pdf

[John]

If PP can prove Fraud, ABC's gonna owe BIG

[EricMontreal22]

Chris, thanks for breaking that down! I couldn't read all of it, but I agree the points at least sound more valid than they did before.

I'll concede that OLTL in its final years had a LOT more buzz and praise -- that is if we're talking about the soap, largely internet "press." I don't really know if that had any real relevance to the more mainstream soap world at all, but I could see PP being more excited about OLTL, especially since initially they had more of the cast signed on (and of course for a while they were threatening not to do AMC.) I don't really buy that the writing issues (which many now in the same soap press are exaggerating) had too much to do with having to do re-writes with the GH/OLTL characters, but...

[Vee]

IMO the brief is as melodramatic and over-the-top as it was before. But then, I don't read many of these things, maybe they're all like that. I do think some of the points in there have weight. I'm just not sure what good it's going to do.

[SFK]

I've often been curious about PP's relationships with these shows' histories. Like, how much did they rely on their own Internet research of past storylines, hard data of ratings and such, and how much did they rely on people they hired from the soap world who based on their own opinions told them the importance (subjective term) of certain characters and storylines. I guess the issue is that ABC used the OLTL characters period when they were still contracted to PP, but I began to wonder about such things when the big stink about the Llanview three (specifically John) began to be made.

[marceline]

OLTL was the one most affected by ABC's games so they've got to talk up OLTL in order to prove damages. Remember these are meant to be read by people completely unfamiliar with these shows so any claims about popularity are pretty much going to be taken at face value.

[Vee]

I have heard that a lot of PP's primary attention was on OLTL at the start - however transitory, the show had a lot of "heat" coming off its final year and weeks, RC and FV had kept stoking its fires on GH, and obviously for our esteemed soap press they could think of no one else. And allegedly, the head honchos at PP were also very focused on molding and shaping the new show's aesthetic and focus early on, which I suspect is why the focus on Shelter and its dayplayer staff was a little too intense in the first month or two. I think that meddling did more harm than good, though I do think the commercial music the shows had access to was fantastic - the club mixes at Shelter were great stuff, and AMC played Lorde with Celia and Pete in NYC a few months before Lorde was Lorde. It beats the generic unsigned soft rock I've been listening to on GH and OLTL 1.0 for years - FV gave up on playing much real music a long time ago, back when Malone was still there. But now I'm really off on a tangent that has nothing to do with this lawsuit.

The point is, they were fixated on OLTL and I think it was partly detrimental to the show getting its [!@#$%^&*] together early on. I think the other part of that was the OLTL/GH rewrites clusterfuck, and some of it was just plain writing choices. I didn't think the show was bad, but it was definitely affected.

[allmc2008]

I found this pretty interesting:

"Indeed, the parties did not even

formally execute the Licensing Agreement until the first week of December 2011."

[ChitHappens]

Seems to me PP relied very heavily on the 3 OLTL performers [or they will have you believe], and that was the biggest mistake. The lawsuit is no less frivolous than it was before and it reeks of desperation. The new evidence may prove breach, but in no way proves damages. Cole and Hope? KDP? GMAFB!

The bottom line is that PP went into a venture that failed, and as opposed to just admitting this, they are blaming everything else. The soaps didn't work online and ABCd had nothing to do with it!

[marceline]

Now that I'm finally reading the complaint, I have to say it's always hysterical when people try to seriously discuss the plots of soap operas. If this thing goes to trial the jury will be cracking up.

[Vee]

The soaps work online. The shows didn't fail. The money did.

[ChitHappens]

That's a politician's way of saying the soaps didn't work online. If the revenue didn't come in as PP had hoped, the soaps failed online.

[Vee]

It's not a politician's anything. The product was good, the upper management and the funding failed. If I was going to be political about it I'd do as the lawsuit does and blame it all on ABC - I don't think it's about ABC, though I do think ABC has some [!@#$%^&*] to answer for. I do absolutely think the soaps worked in an online medium and can still do so, but they need to have significant capital. And they're gonna have to, because that is the only future.