Chew It Up and Spit It Out- The end of ABC Daytime
Posted on September 5, 2011 with 0 comments
Only a couple more weeks of All My Children on ABC. The network recently announced the longtime soap's demise; final airdate is September 23, 2011. One Life To Live, also a longtime soap on ABC, is set to go off the air in January of 2012. Word has it that an Internet company has bought the rights and properties of both soaps and will air them online. I hope it happens but I'll believe it when I see it. The thing is, even if the shows do make their homes in cyberspace, many of the cast and crew have made plans to move on.
A little history ...
Beginning at 9-years-old, I've watched All My Children since its inception in 1970 and One Life to Live shortly after that.
Boss of ABC Daytime, Brian Frons, set out to destroy Daytime TV years ago. He's never been a Soap fan and was a major player in creating bad storylines, poor writing and production, replacing seasoned actors with no-talent-model-actor-wannabees and pushing Agnes Nixon, Soap Opera creator and GURU, out the door. I think we soap followers have seen this for years and it's no surprise. But what cracks me up is that ... why cut only two of the three? If soaps are truly dead, why not cut General Hospital too and do it right now? I think those of us who want Soap will head to Y & R or one of the others on a different network. If we were watching cooking shows, we wouldn't be a AMC or OLTL to begin with. Now, I would like to see AMC and OLTL end up on the Internet/Cable TV (even though I wouldn't be able to watch it as often) but those of us who want soap won't be watching cooking shows. Heck, I don't even know where the kitchen is in my house!
The "wrap up" of All My Children has, in my opinion, been one of the better storylines in years and not just because of the "return of the dead" and previous actors making their final bows but because the show actually strived to create a good product. Frons would not let that happen before.
Yes, today's entertainment choices have hit the Soap Opera genre but soaps are not dead. I bet we see higher numbers for The Young and the Restless, the Bold and the Beautiful and Days of Our Lives.