19 minutes ago, Vee said:

Not a dream, not an imaginary story, folks.

Like sands through the hourglass, another iconic TV title is switching to streaming: NBC’s Days of our Lives will become a Peacock exclusive starting September 12, Vulture has learned. The move will end the show’s 57-year run on broadcast television and also marks the exit of NBC from a genre it pioneered 73 years ago with the launch in 1949 of These Are My Children, widely credited as TV’s first-ever daytime sudser. It comes as two other major broadcast titles — Thursday Night Football and ABC’s Dancing with the Stars — prepare to shift to streaming this fall.

In the case of Days, there has been industry speculation about it jumping to Peacock for some time now. The series, produced by Corday Prods. in association with Sony Pictures Television, has dodged cancellation multiple times over the past 15 years, with Sony and NBC often engaged in very last-minute negotiations to hammer out deals which make financial sense to both parties. Days has been the least-watched of the four remaining network daytime dramas for years now, making it increasingly difficult for NBC execs to justify keeping the show around absent reduced license fees (which Sony has largely been able to deliver).

But while it may not be massive, the Days audience remains incredibly loyal, and NBCU/Peacock execs are hoping it will follow the show to Peacock. The streamer has made a point of targeting various fandoms as it tries to build its subscriber base, spending big to become the home of WWE on streaming, for example. NBCU has also decided to forego the not insignificant advertising revenue it gets from NBC programs appearing next-day on Hulu in order to move that encore window over to Peacock starting next month.

Despite a very strong first quarter — boosted by the Super Bowl, the Olympics, Bel-Air and Marry Me — the streamer’s growth stalled during the spring, bringing new urgency to NBCU’s effort to grow its subscriber base. Peacock has already tested the ability of Days to woo customers by airing a couple of exclusive Days-branded miniseries on the platform. There’s been no word on how the specials performed but presumably Peacock execs were encouraged enough by the data they saw to push to get the show as a streaming exclusive. They also may have been motivated by the fact that NBC’s contract for Days has just one more season left on it, offering a limited window for NBCU to explore whether the show is more valuable on streaming than broadcast.

“This programming shift benefits both Peacock and NBC and is reflective of our broader strategy to utilize our portfolio to maximize reach and strengthen engagement with viewers,” Mark Lazarus, chairman, NBCUniversal Television and Streaming said of the decision. “With a large percentage of the Days of Our Lives audience already watching digitally, this move enables us to build the show’s loyal fanbase on streaming while simultaneously bolstering the network daytime offering with an urgent, live programming opportunity for partners and consumers.” NBC will fill the gap left by Days with a new one-hour news program, NBC News Daily, anchored by Kate Snow, Aaron Gilchrist, Vicky Nguyen and Morgan Radford.

NBC’s decision to get out of the soap business means there are just three daytime soaps on American broadcast TV: ABC’s General Hospital and CBS’s The Young and the Restless.  The genre was a staple of network schedules between the mid-1960s and early 1990s, when there were never fewer than a dozen sudsers on the air; in early 1970, the number peaked at a whopping 19.

Great scoop Vee!! @Errol?? You got beat!!😂

So only three soaps left on air.

Maybe they'll get more money for the show on peacock and finally fire Ron Carlivati.

 

Could this be their way of just phasing it out at some point??

So Canadian viewers won't be able to see it?

DAYS has one year left - this is the trial period now.   If it fails, DAYS is likely done. 

3 minutes ago, dragonflies said:

Could this be their way of just phasing it out at some point??

So Canadian viewers won't be able to see it?

My thought as well. 

2 minutes ago, dragonflies said:

Could this be their way of just phasing it out at some point??

That’s my guess/fear. Things will get scaled back until it’s quietly cancelled altogether. 
 

we knew this would happen one day, but it seems too fast, especially considering the new fall season is just over a month away. Don’t local stations plan out their daytime schedule months in advance? Does this mean a bunch of NBC stations will have lame infomercials in their place? (Or just add another hour of local news) 

Just now, Toups said:

DAYS has one year left - this is the trial period now.   If it fails, DAYS is likely done. 

Ooo...did not even think of that as well. 

As much as I would love for soaps to continue five days a week daily year round on streaming, I think if they have a future there it will have to be seasonally-based, with blocks of episodes parceled out at a time. For me the ideal has always been (and I've been saying this for years) 6-8 weeks of daily half hour eps per season, take a break, come back and continue various long-running plot threads and storylines while closing out others with each arc. I think that's the future. It's something not totally dissimilar to what Linda Gottlieb experimented with at OLTL when she first started in '91, but it didn't work because of the nature of the daily medium on network at that time and because of the story choices.

Of course, if GH or DAYS could sustain themselves streaming daily I wouldn't complain.

Will it be free or will Days be on premium like Beyond Salem?

Of course this was the reason..

Days has been the least-watched of the four remaining network daytime dramas for years now, making it increasingly difficult for NBC execs to justify keeping the show around absent reduced license fees (which Sony has largely been able to deliver).

But it gets replaced by another cheap ripoff Today/GMA part 1 billion. These networks are clueless and lazy.

Just now, Gray Bunny said:

That’s my guess/fear. Things will get scaled back until it’s quietly cancelled altogether. 

It could very well be a Passions DirecTV situation. But I also think the Beyond Salem spinoffs have indicated a real commitment to giving it a try in a new medium, at least.

1 minute ago, Gray Bunny said:

That’s my guess/fear. Things will get scaled back until it’s quietly cancelled altogether. 
 

we knew this would happen one day, but it seems too fast, especially considering the new fall season is just over a month away. Don’t local stations plan out their daytime schedule months in advance? Does this mean a bunch of NBC stations will have lame infomercials in their place? (Or just add another hour of local news) 

Fast? How long has Ron and Corday had to fix it? He ruined his parents legacy.

4 minutes ago, Gray Bunny said:

Does this mean a bunch of NBC stations will have lame infomercials in their place?

DAYS is being replaced by a 5th hour of Today ... supposedly.

Edited August 3, 20223 yr by teplin

So I think they'll reduce the cast A LOT and could they even got to a HALF HOUR like BOLD?

DirecTV *shivers*

1 minute ago, teplin said:

DAYS is being replaced by a 5th hour of Today.

Ridiculous!  Its cheap that's why!

4 minutes ago, Soapsuds said:

Will it be free or will Days be on premium like Beyond Salem?

Of course this was the reason..

Days has been the least-watched of the four remaining network daytime dramas for years now, making it increasingly difficult for NBC execs to justify keeping the show around absent reduced license fees (which Sony has largely been able to deliver).

But it gets replaced by another cheap ripoff Today/GMA part 1 billion. These networks are clueless and lazy.

5 bucks I think