All My Children-related stories
Posted Nov 21st 2009 9:02AM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: OpEd, Daytime, Celebrities, Reality-Free
Within a few weeks,
All My Children will be turning over a new leaf, officially making the move west to new studios in Los Angeles. Most actors are making the move. Some are not. And today
ABC informed the head writer, Charles Pratt Jr., that he's been let go. If he had his suitcases packed, well, sorry about that.
Chuck Pratt was hired with some fanfare in June 2008. He was a big hire because his resume is filled with flashy successes, including
Desperate Housewives, Melrose Place, Beverly Hills 90210, Ugly Betty, Santa Barbara and
General Hospital, among others. Pratt was supposed to revive
All My Children to its former luster, but -- alas -- it hasn't happened.
Continue reading ABC fires All My Children head writer Chuck Pratt
Posted Nov 13th 2009 9:02AM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: OpEd, Daytime, Casting, Emmys, Reality-Free
There's reason to be hopeful about
All My Children's move to Hollywood. Oh, yes, Thorsten Kaye has decided not to go -- bye, bye Zach -- but there's a list of stars lining up for the anniversary that's pretty spectacular.
In honor of
All My Children's 40th Anniversary, Julia Barr is coming back as Brooke English. Also
slated to appear are a bunch of other former AMC stars, including Eva LaRue, Taylor Miller, Laurence Lau, Eden Riegel, Leven Rambin and the previously announced Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos.
Julia's return is a big get because she was such big part of the soap for so long. The two-time Emmy winner was on
AMC from 1976 to her exit in 2006. This anniversary show will be a chance for fans to hear what Brooke -- Erica's rival for all those years -- has been up to.
Next in line is Eva LaRue. She's become a prime time star with
CSI: Miami. She did two stints with
AMC as Dr. Maria Santos Grey.
Continue reading For All My Children's 40th anniversary, Julia Barr and more will be back
Posted Oct 28th 2009 10:00AM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Industry, Programming, OpEd, Reality-Free
For the longest time, I've kvetched about the fact that the television industry has stopped programming for Saturday night. For years, Saturday was a great night of television. I remember
M*A*S*H and
The Mary Tyler Moore Show, not to mention guilty pleasures like
The Facts of Life and
Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman. Even NBC's thrillogy,
The Pretender and
Profiler were fun. All those shows were Saturday night hits (some bigger than others).
Well,
I'm not alone in missing Saturday TV; Oscar-winner Barry Levinson feels the same. Levinson is also a TV producer -- he did
Homicide: Life on the Street and
The Philanthropist -- and he thinks the networks are making a big mistake by not seizing on Saturday primetime. He knows the business pretty well and he's confused by the networks' strategy.
"I don't think the answer is to retreat," he told the New York Daily News. "When you give up Saturday night, you open the door for people to go somewhere else. Basically, they're shrinking their own audience."
Continue reading Barry Levinson urges TV to take back Saturday night
Posted Oct 22nd 2009 9:02AM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: OpEd, Daytime, Celebrities, Talk Show, Reality-Free
With
Diane Sawyer moving from Good Morning, America to
World News Tonight, ABC is reportedly hunting around for just the right person to become the new
GMA host. The names bandied about include George Stephanopoulos, Bill Weir, Chris Cuomo, David Muir and
Cameron Mathison. I am telling you right now,
Cameron Mathison would be perfect for Good Morning, America.
While the other men mentioned are all involved in news, Cameron is on
All My Children. He's an actor. But he's also an attractive performer and an ABC talent on the rise. He was a contestant on
Dancing with the Stars, and even though he didn't win, he won over a lot of non-soap viewers who'd never seen him before.
Continue reading Cameron Mathison would be perfect for Good Morning, America
Posted Oct 16th 2009 4:27PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: OpEd, Daytime, Celebrities, Reality-Free
With all the
tumult at All My Children lately, here's some good news. For the 40th anniversary in January 2010,
Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos will return to All My Children for a visit. On January 4th and 5th, Kelly and Mark will guest on the show, presumably as their
AMC characters, Hayley and Mateo.
This will be their first return since leaving in 2002. Both have achieved success away from the show, in primetime on dramas and sitcoms, and especially for Kelly on
Live with Regis and Kelly in morning talk. However, they both started on
AMC and, in fact, that was where they met, fell in love, got married and lived happily ever after.
Continue reading All My Children's 40th Anniversary plans include Kelly and Mark
Posted Oct 8th 2009 3:15PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: OpEd, Daytime, Casting, Reality-Free
While a lot of ABC soap fans are flipping out about
Thorsten Kaye's exit from All My Children, and others are giddy about
James Franco bringing his movie star luster to
General Hospital, there's more big news coming about those soaps. First, the original Lucky,
Jonathan Jackson, is returning to General Hospital after 10 years off the show. And the original Greenlee,
Rebecca Budig, is coming back to All My Children after leaving the show in March 2009.
Both these returns are exciting... and fraught with drama. While Jonathan is a three-time Emmy-winner and a superb Lucky -- he originated the role -- his choosing to resume the part means that Greg Vaughan has been dumped.
To be really, really honest, Greg was a great looking Lucky, but he never had a good grasp on the character of Lucky.
Continue reading Big star returns for All My Children and General Hospital
Posted Oct 5th 2009 1:03PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: OpEd, Daytime, Video, Casting, Reality-Free
Ever since the announcement that
All My Children was leaving New York, moving from the studios where it's been shot since the premiere in 1970, the big question among fans has been
who will be staying with All My Children when it moves west... and who won't.
The good news is that
Susan Lucci has decided to stay with the show, even if she's not giving up her New York home. Susan, as well as costar Vincert Irizarry, have decided to commute to Los Angeles, with
AMC arranging the schedule to make it more convenient for the veterans.
There's bad news, however, and it involves three big
AMC stars. Thorsten Kaye, who plays Zach, has decided not to relocate. In addition, Beth Ehlers (Taylor) and Aiden Turner (Aidan) have been let go. In other words, they have
not been invited to go west.
Continue reading All My Children fallout: who's in and who's out
Posted Aug 8th 2009 7:02PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Industry, OpEd, Daytime, Celebrities, Reality-Free
First,
Paula Abdul walks away from American Idol (or was she shoved out by the producers a bit?), now comes news that
Susan Lucci's not sure about sticking with All My Children when the ABC soap relocates to Los Angeles in December. My thought was there's no way La Lucci was going to pass on the chance to keep on working, but she's saying it's a tough decision. "I don't know ... I love the show and I love playing Erica, but I'm just now going to have a couple of days off. It's a lot to think about."
Could Susan truly be thinking anything but, "Yes, I'm going"? Seriously,
All My Children has been her mainstay for 39 years. That's right, nearly four decades of continuous employment in essentially a starring role.
Continue reading Is Susan Lucci quitting All My Children?
Posted Aug 5th 2009 8:02PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Industry, Programming, OpEd, Daytime, Reality-Free
For nearly a week, ABC denied that there was any truth to the rumor that
All My Children was moving to the West Coast. Then yesterday the network just announced the cross-country relocation. ABC Daytime released a statement explaining that this December,
All My Children -- which has been produced in New York City for 39 years -- is going to Los Angeles. And
One Life to Live, also a New York soap, is getting
All My Children's studio. Yes, a hand-me down facility, but just don't think of it that way.
While the move for
AMC and
OLTL will mean better facilities and more space, what about the casts and crews? Will all the actors on
AMC make the move west -- or is this a way to cost cut and drop a few players along the way? Susan Lucci is a given; she'll go west.
Continue reading All My Children and One Life to Live on the move
Posted May 23rd 2009 12:01PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: OpEd, Daytime, Reality-Free
After weeks of hype, scoops and spoilers, message board fodder and threats against columnists to not reveal a thing lest they be flogged and embargoed out of the business,
All My Children's big murder mystery kicked into high gear when it turned out that the victim was not really one of the characters on the cover of Soap Opera Digest.
For the network, all this was great.
ABC Daytime got a bump in the Nielsens and it seems the post-murder intrigue, i.e. whodunit, is keeping viewers DVR'ing, Soapnet watching, or just planning on watching during their lunch hours (like the old days). But getting back to the victim,
AMC had a chance to do something really bold and dramatic. Instead
head writer Chuck Pratt Jr. played it safe. More on the victim, including the name in case you don't know by now (yes, that's a warning), after the jump.
Continue reading All My Children's murder mystery rip-off
Posted May 15th 2009 10:32AM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Daytime, Emmys, Reality-Free
They have feuds. They have babies (at least one of them). They have daily debates. But the ladies of
The View have no sway with
the Daytime Emmys. Well, that's not entirely correct. The ladies themselves, Whoopi Goldberg, Joy Behar, Barbara Walters, Sherri Shepherd and Elisabeth Hasselbeck, received an Emmy nomination in the category of Outstanding Talk Show host(s), but their show was snubbed.
Whether it's deemed a Talk Show/Entertainment or Talk Show/Information, it's not deemed worthy. But
The View's missing nomination is merely one of the many oddities of
the 36th Annual Daytime Emmy nominations. Something is really bizarre in the batch of noms.
Continue reading Weirdness in the Daytime Emmys nominations
Posted Mar 17th 2009 12:03PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: OpEd, Daytime, Reality-Free
There are many things the soaps do well. You know, things like lavish weddings, fancy dress balls, murder trials, even corporate boardroom shenanigans. On the other hand, there are more action-oriented story lines that just bring out the worst in soaps.
In the last few weeks, for instance,
All My Children staged the worst looking motorcycle/car crash I've ever seen on TV. It was riotously funny, and that was not the desired effect. When a wedding gown-wearing Greenlee (sans helmet) careened off the road into a frozen river, the sight of her veil flying in the wind as the tires screeched, with the headlights blinking and the actors pretending to be tossed around, was a hoot. All I was thinking while watching the accident was: "Could this be executed any worse?" (Also, what a waste of Rebecca Budig's return.)
Continue reading TV Squad Soap Report: Do what you do best... drama!
Posted Dec 6th 2008 1:37PM by Danny Gallagher
Filed under: Industry, Daytime, Reality-Free
You would think that with higher unemployment and more people spending more time at home during business hours that networks would be throwing money at their daytime TV divisions. (insert ominous organ music that implies trouble is ahead here)
You would be wrong. Networks are starting to scale back on their daytime soaps including some stars' salaries, according to
USA Today.
ABC has been doing the most axe-chopping to their daytime lineup. Long running favorites like
General Hospital and
One Life to Live have been ordered to make some serious cutbacks and
All My Children stars Susan Lucci, Michael E. Knight and Ray MacDonnell are seeing paychecks with George Costanza-like shrinkage.
Continue reading Could the networks drop the soaps?
Posted Sep 11th 2008 2:02PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: OpEd, Daytime, Reality-Free
Executive experience. We've been hearing an awful lot in the media lately about what constitutes executive experience and how important it is when a person gets the chance at an important position. Well, you know what I've learned while watching soap operas? Experience is overrated. Anyone can be a CEO or mayor or run a company, it's easy.
Take Donna on
The Bold and the Beautiful. Until recently, Donna was a model. She used her beautiful body, great features and dazzling smile to show the finest in Forrester Creations. Now, due to her husband's heart attack which resulted in a coma, Donna has taken over the company and appointed herself CEO. It doesn't matter than Donna's never designed a thing or knows how to mass produce, market and distribute a clothing line. Never mind that she couldn't balance her checkbook let alone the bottom line of an international fashion business. Because she had Eric's power of attorney, she took control of the company. Executive leadership was something that she absorbed from Eric, right? Like osmosis or transference. Yeah, right.
Continue reading TV Squad Soap Report: No experience necessary
Posted Aug 25th 2008 12:02PM by Kona Gallagher
Filed under: Programming, Celebrities, Dancing With The Stars, Casting
Dancing With the Stars is a show that makes no sense to me. I understand the appeal of it; I'm usually very interested in any program that involves celebrities doing ridiculous things on national television and I know that people love bright shiny costumes, but it still somehow manages to hold no interest for me whatsoever.
With that said, I know that the announcement of each season's
DWTS cast is heavily anticipated and rumored for months before the actual announcement. We heard that
Dan Marino may be a contestant; a claim that was
soon denied. 82-year-old
Cloris Leachman was another name floated, as was Magnum, P.I. himself,
Tom Selleck.
Kim Kardashian and
Kathy Griffin were also said to have been approached.
As with most rumors, some of these turned out to be false, but others had some truth to them. Follow me after the jump for the official (and completely insane) cast of
Dancing With the Stars' seventh season, along with some twists the producers have cooked up for this go-around.
Continue reading ABC announces new cast of Dancing With the Stars
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