Jump to content

Did US soaps used to be better?


Recommended Posts

  • Members

I add my yes as well.
 


I would say all of the above and then some.

As far as just the passage of time itself, you figure the longer something is on, the more repetitive the stories become, like how many times can a couple split then reunite, how many long-lost children can someone have, how many "back from the dead" and "who's your daddy" stories can there be...eventually, things reach a point where you've seen it all before and it can be mind-numbingly boring, especially if badly written. Also throw in things that have eaten away at the viewer base like more women working, the OJ Simpson trial, which preempted multiple soaps for multiple days (one article stated it cost the soaps 10% of the audience that didn't come back), more channel and viewing options. Soaps require a time commitment and a lot of people either don't want to or can't make that commitment anymore.(Look at now with weekly shows, how many people don't watch "live" anymore, opting instead for recording or streaming.) It was interesting to note that when Ryan's Hope (which started in 1975) was rerun decades later on a cable channel Soapnet, some viewers found the slower pace boring. Like if 2 characters had a conversation, you'd hear about it again and again because they would tell their friends and family and basically counsel one another about it. When that happens on a 22-minute show, stories take a long time to develop. People were now used to faster-paced, more action-filled storytelling.

As far as the quality, I think soaps had more of a niche or a sort of style about them that gave some of them a kind of uniqueness in the genre, even if, ironically, they tended to copy one another in some things, esp. in the late 70s-early 90s. GH was the action/adventure soap, Edge of Night was the mystery/film noir soap, Days of our Lives was on a roll in the 80s with creating multiple supercouples with amazing chemistry--even though they copied GH's whole anti-hero, supercouple, adventure thing, they did it quite well. Stories and characters seemed new and fresh then--a sexy "bad" guy with an eyepatch who falls for a nice girl (Days), a family of Texas cowboys in Pennsylvania (One Life to Live), secret agents with exotic accents (General Hospital)...it was all just loads of fun. But, as styles go, things eventually become outdated or shift their focus...and if that focus becomes so narrow, that can turn people off, too. (Heaven knows, I only took about a decade's worth, if that, of the Sonny/Jason mob infestation of GH until it (and uber-villainous Cassadines who don't stay dead) bored me out of the show for good.)

 

You know what they say about Hollywood now, that they don't make originals anymore and just keep remaking things? I think the soaps reached that stage a long time ago.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 22
  • Created
  • Last Reply
  • Members

 

That seemed to be a recurring theme for some of the P&G soaps during that time period.

Please register in order to view this content

 A few years ago, I saw a scene on ATWT where David Stewart was knocking on the door of the Stewart cabin and rushed in, I swear, I thought the entire wall was going to fall down! But I overlooked it because the drama was so riveting.

 

 

As for the passage of time issue, it's funny when you look at the timeline of soaps. There was plenty of innovation between the 1st Golden Age (which included the transition from radio to television) and then from the 1st Golden Age to the 2nd Golden Age (encompassing the late 60s/early 70s through the 80s), but after the late 1980s, the soaps seemed to be extremely slow to innovate.

 

I look at today's model of binge-TV watching. Well, I used to record the soaps for my Mom as a child (I taught myself how to program a VCR at a very young age, along with the manual) and sometimes, depending on my Mother's work schedule, I'd save episodes and she'd watch a block of episodes (usually no more than 3) on the weekend to catch up.

 

I am sure that soaps, who do plenty of market research for their advertisers, knew that women were in the workplace more. So why did they not try to all get together and advocate for delayed viewing to be given greater consideration in the Nielsen? I know how a Nielsen device works so, it could've been quite straight-forward to get a "Nielsen Family" to note how often viewers watched Live and how often they watched Delayed.  If they discovered that a significant number of viewers were recording their shows (and I believe there were) and watching at a later time, at least this knowledge would've put the onus on Advertisers to come up with campaigns that would prevent viewers from Fast Forwarding through ads as the soaps and the companies that produce them could at least have claimed that viewers were watching their soaps but perhaps they were skipping the commercials, so the fault would obviously not lie with the soaps.

 

Because of the great times of the 1980s, most soaps had become complacent and were very unprepared for the real life soap opera of the OJ murder saga and trial. 

If you take a look at some of the dismal writing in the months preceeding and proceeding pre-emption, it becomes clear that very few of these shows were at their best at the time of the trial and I think since they had taken audiences for granted that they would all return, didn't do what it would take to lure them back.

 

Once you lose an audience (and some were leaving before the OJ trial pre-emptions), it's pretty difficult to get them back.

 

In the soaps defense, it's pretty difficult to innovate and tell fresh stories when you are limited in the types of stories you can tell as soaps tend to either stay away from certain topics and subject matter or present it in a very 'lite' way.  At least by the 90s, it had become that way for most soaps. Certain subjects are deemed too edgy for the daytime.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

My two cents worth...

 

Another factor that contributed to soaps eventual downfall,was I believe,their popularity that came about in the 80s. The rise of GH and its action/adventure/supercouple approach was a change in direction and got soaps noticed in the mainstream. Money was being made but costs were rising because of salaries/location shoots/sets etc 

The pressure was on to compete.

 

In the process some shows lost their identity. Doug Marland in 1980 revamped GL using the Bauers and the Dobsons characters he inherited while weaving in the Reardons as the new core family that would take the show through the decade.But once he left subsequent writers dropped the Bauers and Reardons,introduced new families and the show became a mish mash of characters. Same with AW. Viewers dropped away because the shows no longer had that continuity.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members


I've always wondered about the whole validity of the "Neilsen" ratings. Never in my life was Neilsen tracking my viewing or that of anyone that I knew. Like, how much of the population were they basing their ratings on? It's like those polls where they say "90% of Americans" think this way and, in the fine print, you see that it's one publication surveying 1,000 people (presumably their own readers).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

 

I once housesat for a "Nielsen Family" so when I watched TV, I had to turn on the box. It's real but from what I know, it is indeed a relatively small sampling, that is supposed to represent a group percentage of the population. Sort of similar to a company like Gallup that conducts surveys.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

 

In the golden age of soaps (the 1950s to the early 1980s, or even into the 1990s with a few soaps), viewers were treated to the wprk of brilliant scribes like Irna Phillips, William J. Bell, Roy Winsor, Agnes Nixon, Henry Slesar, Claire Labine, Pat Falken Smith, and Harding Lemay (among others).

 

Now we have putrid dreck inflicted upon us from endlessly recycled hacks like Pissy and Smelly, Dena Higley, Ron C., Charles Pratt, etc.

 

So yes, without a doubt, soaps used to be better. And viewers took quality for granted because even when a long-running series slipped for a while, it would almost always bounce back. Nowadays, the most we can hope for is that the soaps might be "less awful" under newer regimes than they were under the previous ones.

 

Personally, I think the 1970s were the genre's halcyon years.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.



  • Recent Posts

    • Especially children who much more likable characters and are played by better actors 

      Please register in order to view this content

      It’s a worse idea than her wanting to become a doctor Well, some of us Italians do prefer trumpets and saxophones over strings  
    • As requested by @P.J. the 1976 summary from Daytime Serial Newsletter. This was the Dobsons. I will be posting it in parts, as it quite lengthy. The Guiding Light premiered forty years ago on radio and now, after successfully having moved to television in the mid-fifties, it continues to chronicle the lives of the Bauer family of Springfield. Bertha (Bert) Bauer, the matriarch and guiding. force behind the family,has proved to be a source of strength and good counsel to all her friends and acquaintances as well as her own sons.  Michael, her older son, an attorney, recently married Leslie, who was formerly married to his brother,Ed, with whom she has a son, Freddie. Michael’s daughter Hope has always felt close to Leslie, but a recent conflict with Mike over her relationship with an older college professor has strained Hope’s relations with her father. Ed married Holly Norris last year but has just learned from her that their infant —daughter, Christina, is not his child but Roger Thorpe’s. Roger, who is deeply in love with nurse Peggy Fletcher, hopes the truth about Christina can be concealed, as he fears he could lose Peggy for good. Holly’s mother, Barbara, has recently married Roger’s father Adam and has no idea of the truth about Christina. Drs. Sara McIntyre and Joe Werner find their marriage is better than ever since orphaned T.J. became their foster child, and they are relieved that he is not the missing son of Cedars patient Ann Jeffers, who is searching for the child her estranged husband took out of town when she ran off with another man. Nurse Rita Stapleton, newly arrived in Springfield, aware of Ed’s personal upheaval, is solicitously offering him friendship and a shoulder to lean on. Dr. Ed Bauer has stunned the Bauer family by separating from his wife, Holly, soon after the recovery of their infant daughter, Christina, from pneumonia. Holly, exhausted by the baby’s illness and her own growing guilt feelings, has confessed to Ed that Christina is Roger Thorpe’s child, not his. Ed, learning that Peggy Fletcher has accepted Roger’s proposal,tells Roger to tell Peggy the truth before he does. Rita Stapleton, R.N., is taken aback when she meets Peggy’s fiancé, as she knew Roger when he worked in the oil fields in Texas. At the time, Rita was private nurse to wealthy oilman Mr. Granger. Roger, under pressure from Ed, realizes he can’t marry Peggy without telling her the whole truth. Somehow finding the courage, he tells her everything and begs for her forgiveness. As he feared, Peggy, stunned, breaks their engagement. Despite Ed’s later assurances that his own marriage was shaky before Roger, Peggy can’t forgive him; there’s no trust left. Holly, who has filed for divorce, goes to Peggy, explaining that she cared for Roger more than he ever cared for her, that she knew Roger loved Peggy from the moment he met her and became a better person for just knowing her. She assures Peggy that there has been nothing between them for a long time now. Leslie Bauer has returned to college to add personal fulfillment to her life as a housewife and mother. Her husband, attorney Mike Bauer, has undertaken a search for Ann Jeffers’s son Jimmy, whom she abandoned when she ran off with another man years ago. Jimmy’s father, Spence Jeffers, was a quick tempered drunk who cheated on Ann repeatedly. Mike offers Ann a job in his office, to help her meet the costs of the investigation. Spence and Jimmy’s trail seems to end in Alaska. Mike seems to resent Leslie’s involvement with school, and she is upset by his long hours and absences on the Jeffers case. Ann, realizing Leslie’s feelings, apologizes to her for causing Mike’s absences and tells Leslie how lucky she is to be married to a man like Mike.  Ed, unable to do neurosurgery after being wounded in the arm last year, decides to go ahead with highrisk nerve-root-resection surgery, despite the fifty-percent chance of total paralysis. In the operating room, Dr. Steve Jackson finds an excessive amount of scar tissue and refuses to continue the surgery, fearing that healthy nerve roots could be severed accidentally. Dr. Jackson closes, over young Dr. Tim Ryan’s objections, and later tells Tim his arrogance is becoming a detriment to his medical career at Cedars Hospital. Ed’s friends and family are upset at his reaction to this disappointment. His assignment as Chief of Staff wasn’t as fulfilling as surgery, and he now realizes that will no longer be part of his life. Rita Stapleton tries to cheer Ed by bringing groceries and consolation, but Ed’s depression isn’t lifting. His mother, Bert. Bauer,fears that Ed, a former alcoholic, may start drinking again. |  When Roger tells Peggy he’s leaving Springfield —for the sake of everyone he has hurt, Peggy, realizing also the suffering of her son Billy, who had grown to love Roger, tells Roger that even though it hurts to know about Christina, it hurts more to be without him. They agree to try again and plan to marry immediately. Barbara Thorpe, Holly’s mother, stumbles upon a manuscript written by her son Andy and, putting the pieces together, realizes that the story of a young woman whose child is not her husband’s is about Holly. Holly makes her mother promise not to tell anyone, which puts a tremendous strain upon her, as Barbara is married to Roger’s father, Adam Thorpe. Barbara is unable to tell Adam why she’s suddenly suffering migraine headaches and constant depression. | Despite Rita’s increasing attempts to reach him, Ed continues to sink further into his depression, until finally she tells him he isn’t half the man she thought —he was. Stunned into taking a good look at what he’s become, Ed admits he’s destroying himself and shows up the next morning at his office ready for work. Dr. Tim Ryan has become annoyed at the number of dates Rita has broken to be with Ed, and upon learning he’s up for chief resident, he rushes to share the news with her, only to find she’s entertaining Ed for dinner. Tim leaves angrily but later returns to apologize and propose marriage to Rita. She politely turns him down and suggests they no longer see each other, for his sake. Tim bitterly accuses her of using him. Under pressure from Adam to explain her strange depression, Barbara finally tells Adam the whole story.She informs him that Roger and Peggy are not welcome in her home. Home from his honeymoon, Roger learns from his father that Barbara knows the truth and has told him. Roger can tell his father only that he regrets what happened and he is a changed man now. He hopes his father can one day forgive him. Adam later tells Barbara she’s put the entire blame on Roger and hasn’t considered Holly’s guilt in the matter, adding, “I can accept the truth, why can’t you?” Feeling that it’s best for everyone involved, Roger prepares to resign as manager at the Metro Restaurant and take Billy and Peggy out of town. Peggy bolsters his confidence by telling him they’ll stay and fight this out together. Tim, upset by Rita’s attitude and rejection, is letting his emotions affect his work. When Ed, unaware that Rita is the reason, warns Tim that his recent lack of efficiency may lose him the senior resident appointment, Tim smarts at his rival’s being his superior. Tim takes stock of the situation and resolves to put personal problems aside and concentrate on his career. More to come...
    • @Tisy-Lish Seems like the bulk of 76 was the Schneiders who I don't believe ever headwrote another soap. I think the Labine/Mayer structured the show well in the time they were there and succeding headwriters used that to their advantage but then began chipping away with their own characters/story. @Franko glad you're enjoying delving into unfamiliar territory And now Part 2.... When a missing person’s report on Ben goes out, the Connecticut state police respond with their unconscious John Doe. When Ben awakens after brain surgery he calls for Betsy, angering Arlene, who gets drunk and goes to tell Meg the truth. Meg’s housekeeper, Carrie Lovett, who is Arlene’s mother (she had no idea of ‘Arlene’s involvement with Ben when she took this job), manages to prevent Arlene from seeing Meg. Ben, still hazy from anesthesia, tells Betsy how sorry he is for the way he’s treated her. Betsy, misunderstanding, assumes he means the gambling. Diana is still feeling sorry for herself, despite Jamie’s efforts to convince her that they can have a full life with children by adoption. When he informs her that his divorce is almost final and they can plan their wedding, Diana refuses to acknowledge that she has any future at all. Arlene, drunk and despondent, starts a letter to Ben in which she refers to herself as his “real wife.” Ray finds it and takes it to Jamie, threatening to give it to Betsy unless Jamie gets his client, Meg, off Ray’s back. Jamie has already warned Meg that Slater is no small-time hood; he has big money and power behind him. Arlene, confronted by Jamie, insists she meant “first wife,” but Jamie gives her seven days to produce a divorce decree or he’ll prove her and Ben guilty of attempting to defraud Meg. Ben, learning this, orders her to get a quickie Haiti decree, but she refuses, reminding Ben that he has told her sometimes he feels happy being married to Betsy and expecting a child. Arlene refuses to be dumped. Ray comes to Ben’s aid with a phony divorce decree. Ben takes it to Jamie for verification while Ray tells Meg that Ben needed false divorce papers from Arlene. Meg confronts her son and agrees to help him out of this mess. She plans to expedite his divorce from Arlene and convince Betsy to renew her marriage vows on their anniversary. Learning that Rick has known about Arlene and Ben’s marriage since the beginning, Meg withdraws her support from their planned ski resort. Rick realizes his dreams have just gone down the drain but can’t fault Meg’s motive. Arlene decides she needs money now to get Ben out of town and sets out to blackmail Meg. Ben, realizing that the only thing left to do is to run away with Arlene, leaves a letter for Betsy explaining why he married her but that he later fell in love with her. At the edge of town, however, he realizes he can’t go through with it. He tells Arlene he loves Betsy and wants to be there with her when their child is born, and he gets out of the car and calls a cab. Arlene, furious, races back to Meg’s house, where she tells Betsy the whole story. Betsy, disbelieving her, rushes to her bedroom, where she finds Ben’s letter confirming everything Arlene just told her. In shock, Betsy calls her brother, Dr. Tom Crawford, to come right away. Ben arrives and is truthful with Betsy, who no longer wants anything to do with him. Realizing that Meg stands in the way of his being a man, Ben moves out. Betsy is unmoved when Ben and Arlene’s divorce comes through; she won’t expose herself to that kind of hurt again. When Meg cajoles her to live with her until her grandchild is born, Betsy tells Meg that in the eyes of the court this isn’t her grandchild and she’ll never allow her child to be corrupted by Meg’s money, as Ben was. Meg, full of self-pity gets drunk and manages to get Rick drunk when she tells him Skyler Mountain is out. She then reminds him of how their relationship used to be and renews his passions, now affected by liquor. After they spend the night together, Meg decides to go ahead with the Skyler Mountain project after all. Rick makes it clear, however, that he still loves Cal and his relationship with Meg will be strictly business. Betsy continues to refuse to see Ben and is determined to be self-supporting. When she inadvertently mentions Ben’s letter to Bruce Sterling, the mayor of Rosehill, he has to turn it over to the district attorney. Meg is furious upon discovering that her own brother in law is the one who found the evidence against Ben. Dr. Joe Cusack is quite concerned about a teenaged alcoholic patient at the clinic, Lynn Henderson, who is determined not to be helped. She tries a sob story on Vanessa Sterling, but Cal, Van’s niece, overhears and warns Lynn not to put the bite on her friends and relatives. So Lynn, who refuses to heed Joe’s warning that alcohol has so destroyed her stomach lining that she could die from another binge, steals money from Van’s fund-raising folder and takes off. She later turns up at Van’s to apologize for stealing charity money and explains she was the ugly daughter of a beautiful mother and grew up feeling unloved. Van persuades Joe to let Lynn stay with her instead of returning to the halfway house she hates. Bruce, Van’s husband, sees Lynn as another of Van’s strays and asks Lynn not to take advantage of Van. Cal. is concerned to learn Rick will again be involve in business with Meg. He assures her it will be okay and that Meg is his last chance to fulfill his dream of making it big. When Meg overhears Cal telling Ben that she and Rick are engaged, Meg tries to tell Cal that Rick’s not the marrying kind and she’s wrong for him. Seeing that Cal is serious and Rick apparently is too, Meg threatens to tell Cal everything, including their most recent intimacy, if Rick doesn’t call it off immediately; she gives him twenty-four hours. Rick, for Cal’s own good, he feels, tells her he’s not the monogamous kind and she’d be better off without him. Cal, knowing she really loves him, refuses to let  go easily. So. he uses Cal’s knowledge of the fact that his son Hank dearly wants his parents to reconcile and tells Cal he and Barbara are planning to try again, for the boy’s sake. But Cal later runs into Hank and mentions that he must be glad his mother’s coming home. Hank has no knowledge of this and is confused. Rick, therefore, has to tell the child he used this as an excuse to get out of marrying Cal. But Hank, miserable at having his hopes raised and dashed, spills this to Cal when she tries to cheer him up. He tells her it was all a lie. Jamie warns Rick that his Skylar Mountain contract with Meg has so many contingencies that if anything happens, he’ll be holding the financial bag. But Rick, wanting this success badly, signs the papers, and Meg releases the money.
    • I genuinely in my 20 year history of watching Days can’t recall a single Bo and Phillip scene though I’m assuming there had to be one or two? Phillip was always much more presented as Lucas’ brother due to Kate’s involvement in their love lives and closer age post SORAS. I will say my favorite thing about PR though is he made Bo the only Kiriakis to actually pronounce it like Victor/John Aniston despite Papa Brady obviously being the dad he was associated with.
    • OK 1976 GL coming up   As none of those shows aired in 1976...
    • Thank you, @Paul Raven! I chose Love of Life because it's a show I don't have a lot of familiarity with, so I thought it would be interesting to look at this period with a more or less unspoiled view.
    • 40 years ago this summer.  To me this is the GOAT CBS daytime promo and the yardstick to which all CBS daytime promos are measured.

      Please register in order to view this content

       
    • That would be a good plot point to add more tension to the situation.
    • Some hot sports guys from tennis and football.

      Please register in order to view this content

       

      Please register in order to view this content

    • Checked. Favorite New Couple & they beat out AW Cindy & Grant and ATWT Peter Parros & Lauren Martin
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy