Sony owns “Days of Our Lives” and “The Young and the Restless”. The entire runs of both shows are intact, and in color. CBS aired the first two episodes of Y&R today, as another poster pointed out above. SoapNet aired the first episode of DOOL a number of years back, and it was in pristine condition. For the network-owned shows (All My Children, General Hospital, One Life To Life) and the P&G shows (such as Guiding Light), most of the episodes from the late 1970s and before are gone - victims of videotape reuse, or live shows that had recorded kinescopes, which were later burned. A few independent producers (Labine/Meyer for “Ryan’s Hope”, Dan Curtis for “Dark Shadows”, Colgate Palmolive for “The Doctors”) saved the entire runs of their series, but that was very unusual.
When I was little I remember Mom watching Edge of Night. In later years it was General Hospital (during the Luke & Laura years) and Y&R. Then in her retired years it was Coronation Street. My oldest sister also became a fan of that British soap opera.
There are some As The World Turns on YT that go back to the 50s so you can see early Penny, Bob, Lisa, etc. and also some from the late 70s, early 80s but 70 to say, 78 are largely MIA. Too bad since I loved the early Kim, Dan and John Dixon stuff. Also got to see Michael Nader pre-Dimitri on AMC and post-Beach Party films. Of course, they're not in great shape but beggars can't be choosers.
I recall being shipped to my grandparents for a week back in the late 70s. During the day, my grandmother would have the soaps on I watched General Hospital every day. Quickly got to the point where I was curious as to what would happen next. Also made me understand the later Luke and Laura stuff a bit more than the average Joe. But I never stuck with it. I will admit to liking Dallas. With a character like JR as well as Victoria Principal strutting around, the appeal was obvious.
For many years i listened to the BBC soap 'The Archers', 15 minutes every weekday , on air from the early fifties reflecting changing times in a midlands farming community . When i moved to the USA some 20 years ago my American wife became addicted too . We were avid listeners until 12 years ago ,whereupon, we looked at each other after another could not believe it episode and decided there and then not to tune in ever again.
I've watched The Young and the Restless & The Bold and the Beautiful on and off since I was in school. My aunt would tape them and watch them with my mom. I would be there too, and I got drawn in. I still have some unwatched episodes recorded from before the virus hit. Debating on whether to watch them, or just start fresh when they come back on. Being a man, I shouldn't be watching them at all.
I always thought soaps were just dumb. But back in optometry school, we would all go across the street from campus to eat lunch at one of my closest classmates. She would always watch All My Children (circa 1978), and before long we were all hooked and never missed an episode.
And that was the genius of those shows - stealth and an ability to insinuate themselves to the point where you're willing to devote way too much time each week to the sorrows of fictional people. Case in point: I watched the Y&R show today just to relive the first two episodes which I saw back in '73 and if these were telecast every day, I could easily get sucked back in all over again. And I haven't watched an episode of Y&R in thirty years.
As a kid in the early 70s, I noticed my mom would watch soap operas any time she was home on a weekday. She had a full-time job as a librarian (first as a school librarian, then as a law librarian -- she graduated from Columbia University with a degree in Library Science). I couldn't understand why she liked them at the time, and a few years later I was puzzled at how (never mind why, but HOW) she could she could enjoy them, because she would miss so many episodes, sometimes going a few months between watching. She explained that the shows moved so slowly that she didn't have much problem following them, even weeks later. After short periods of somehow being drawn into watching General Hospital (during the Luke & Laura hype) and All My Children (mainly because I was drawn by the amazingly beautiful group of actresses that were on the show at the time, including Amelia Heinle, who later appeared in The Limey, one of the greatest films ever), I got sucked into watching the most gonzo soap opera ever -- Passions! About 20 years or so ago, I had to go to the hospital emergency department in the middle of the night (I don't even remember why) and would up in the waiting room. There was almost nothing to read, so I wound up reading a TV Guide from cover to cover, including all the bits I never would have looked at otherwise. There was a little box about Passions that piqued my interest, so I started watching out of curiosity, and found myself blown away by how crazy the show was, and couldn't stop watching (and like All My Children during the period when I was watching that series, Passions featured some incredibly attractive actresses). Passions did some things I never could have expected. For a few episodes, some of the characters got pulled into a cartoon universe, where they became animated cartoon characters. Another episode featured a montage segment without dialogue that showed where the various characters were in their disparate plotlines while bringing Gary Moore's Still Got The Blues front and center, and they used almost the entire song. That's right, they turned the show into a video for a Gary Moore tune. Since then, I've seen other shows do that sort of thing, such as Cold Case, but Cold Case did every episode, soap operas don't, and since I already knew and loved Still Got The Blues (which wasn't current at the time -- it had been several years since it had been released, so it obviously wasn't some record company machination to promote a new record), I sure enjoyed hearing the tune at full volume on my television! But eventually Passions started going in a direction I didn't want to go, so I stopped watching, and not too long after that, it was cancelled. Never would have watched if it hadn't been for that trip to the hospital! (which, now that I think about it, may have been for the time I got dehydrated at a Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers show at the Fillmore and got home afterwards with a temperature of 104)
Dallas till the Dream episode!? In the 60's and 70's my Mom loved "General Hospital" and I would be in her bed doing homework while she got enthralled . In the 1980's my wife was into "The Young and the restless" at 12:30 pm and I would join her. I liked it cause "Ape" Alumni Eric Braeden was in the show. When the family moved in 1991 a few miles east soap operas were done. But I do miss those times. John M.
My grandmother watched The Doctors, and it had ads not just for soap, but also for Colgate toothpaste, Handi-Wipes cleaning towels, the Ajax family of cleaners, cleansers and detergents. No wonder announcer Mel Brandt would say "Colgate Dental Cream with MFB fluoride. Only your dentist can give you a better fluoride. " after the opening logo.
"Days of Our Lives" back in the 80's. The days of Patch & Kayla, Bo & Hope, and of course... Victor Kiriakis.
It's called "billboard" - a sponsor taking an extra bite of the ad avails usually would get a "sponsored by" tag going into the show, alongside just spot placement. Yo back in tha day (when we wuz kickin' it ol'-skool), the station announcer would have more than a few pages of billboard copy to get into the que of voicework in a broadcast day (in the short time I was working television, it could usually all fit onto one broadcast "cart", sit in the cart machine all day...and the engineer would hope he didn't hit the 'play' button too many times, and get the whole day out-of-sync). Sponsorships of local programs, show-opens with the correct weather guy's name working that day, and maybe a late-night promo to play over a show's end theme, plugging this weekend's Hollywood Big Deal Movie, or somesuch.
Just like Mexico and Venezuela, Brazil is soap land, so I've watched millions of them since the eighties, but since I don't have a TV for at least a decade, every single time I think of soap operas, this song comes to mind:
My grandmother watched The Doctors, when Kathleen Turner was on it. One day, Nola, the character that Turner played, her mom died, and Nola was so wrecked with grief. My grandmother started making fun of the crying.
I watched the ABC shows then. I was amazed that my grandmom would devote herself to watching substandard storytelling, cheap production values and soap commercials.
Gotta understand, they were conditioned for that. Even daytime radio was geared towards the needs of the everyday housewife, and they accepted less.
On The Doctors, those operating room scenes were sometimes dramatic. I mean like when a nurse "Matt, we're gonna lose her!" and dramatic music.
Speaking of The Doctors, there was a piece of music used while Mel Brandt said "The Doctors is brought to you in part by the Colgate-Palmolive Company" separate from the opening theme.
I grew up watching General Hospital (and a little bit of One Life To Live) with my mom. I've had on and off times with the program ever since. I was continually watching it for the past few years when I decided to get reacquainted with having a television in the main room. I can't see the reruns now due to Hulu not having them. I could put an antenna on my tv but I got fairly sick of seeing orange head on the screen. When I checked ABC.com, it didn't look like they were dipping back too far. If they were, it was the horrid Nurse's Ball episodes (never liked those). I'd prefer them go back or design some edits about certain characters from the past. Somewhere I have a 90's VHS about Luke and Laura and that's fun to pop in every so often. I did spend a couple years watching A LOT of Dark Shadows since I found nearly all the volumes on VHS for 50 cents each. I had to grab 'em all! I sort of stopped around Volume 130.
My grandmother thought so too...she was devoted to watching a bunch of characters in a hospital, doing their jobs, between commercials for products like Colgate toothpaste; Palmolive Dishwashing liquid and bar soap, Handi-Wipes cleaning towels, the Ajax family of cleaners, cleansers and detergents; Fab Laundry Detergent; Cold Power Laundry detergent; Dynamo liquid detergent, Irish Spring soap, etc. It amazes me that housewives were devoted to substandard storytelling, cheap production values and soap commercials.
