I remember Grandma watching one after another back in the mid-60s when there were dozens of 15 minute and half hour soaps on the air. I also remember being terrified when the announcer intoned "The Edge...Of Night". Never could stand them and I actively avoided any soap, other than Dark Shadows, like the plague. Then in the early 70s, my older brother started watching All My Children every morning while we ate breakfast and before I knew it, I was hooked on Tara, Phil, Chuck and Erica.
I worked in Buffalo briefly in the mid 80s. One of the local radio station morning shows had a shtick All My Children report every morning. So I got to know the story line. On a day off I watched the actual show. My one and only viewing of a soap opera. (Other than the TV show Soap.)
My grandmom liked The Doctors, Another World, The Guiding Light, As the World Turns, The Edge of Night and beginning in 1970, All My Children.
MH,MH was a parody of a soap but a soap nonetheless. That reminds me, I really need to delve into the complete series set I bought several years ago. I've been putting it off because it means watching over 300 episodes but then again, I'm not getting any younger.
None of course, but this song brings back some childhood memories. I've played it for a few people my age and they all break down into hysterical crying/laughing nostalgia
When I was in junior high I briefly went through a phase of watching Guiding Light. It was when the freaky dwarf kidnapped some woman. Edit: I also babysat my younger siblings a lot on Fridays, and Dad wanted me to keep up with Dallas for him. And I'd watch the one after it, too, then switch it over to PBS, when Monty Python came on.
The box set comes with various extras including 10 episodes of the summer series Fernwood Tonight, not to be confused with the sequel/continuation series Forever Fernwood. Unfortunately, that one is not available on dvd yet.
My fraternity religiously watched Days Of Our Lives at lunchtime. Why? Unclear, it was a house tradition. It did kind of suck you in a bit, rather like the Jim Jones cult or something...
I tend to think of "soap operas" as stuff like was/is aired during the day. Minimal sets, no real shots in the outdoors, slow pacing of the plots, etc. Something like "Dallas" aired in the evenings and would probably be known as a nigh time drama series. Of course, stuff like "Melrose Place" et al is very much in the soap vein, but still different in terms of differences I mentioned above. "Dark Shadows" didn't air during the day time hours did it? I only vaguely remember it.
Dark Shadows was most definitely a soap. It's first year or so sans Barnabas was pretty slow and dreary, not unlike a lot of traditional soaps of the era. One of the earliest night time soaps was Peyton Place which aired two or three times a week and launched the careers of Mia Farrow, Ryan O'Neal and Barbara Parkins to name a few. Another such program which is largely forgotten is Our Private World. By the mid 60s, Eileen Fulton had become such a force as bad girl Lisa on As The World Turns that she was spun off to her own series that was broadcast at night. Yeah, I don't recall ever seeing it either.
One of my grandmom's lasting memories- was watching Missy and Bill get married on Another World, in Living Color, complete with the old NBC Peacock logo and the late Mel Brandt saying "the following program is brought to you in 'living color' on NBC.", followed by Bill Wolff saying "And now, the continuing story of Another World." Same thing with Lenore and Walter, Sam and Lahoma, and Alice and Steve-those weddings on AW preceded by the NBC peacock logo.
My mom got me into Guiding Light when I was in college (I commuted). She watched that show for decades.
Dark Shadows. I suppose Dallas was one as well to a degree. I followed it until we saw Bobby in the shower.
The Doctors had operating room scenes too. Like when Althea Davis(played by the same woman who was later on ATWT) had brain surgery after she fell through a glass window. That was one of the few times where announcer Mel Brandt(who was also known for his announcing the animated "Laramie Peacock" color opening in the 1960s and 1970s) did the opening announcement a bit more seriously than usual-" the Emmy Award-winning program dedicated to the brotherhood of healing."...
