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Print Ads for Primetime Soaps
- Thread starter Carrie Fairchild
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Wow. How come we've never talked about this?There hasn’t been too many of them and they’ve all been pretty short-lived but I’m posting a few late night soaps this week, starting with one from David Jacobs.
Btw, is that Knots Landing's Chip on the phone?
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OMG, is this another prime time soap?As per this ad, Rituals timeslot was obviously moveable but I’d originally read that it was made for late night.
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Because it's not available. To my knowledge no episodes exist online or otherwise.
Not really - it was a syndicated soap that ran for a year in various timeslots depending on your market. The production company might've recommended a run later on in the night though.
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That is Chip. It also featured Michele Lee in a cameo as herself. As @tommie mentioned, nothing really exists of it online, which is unsurprising as it only ran for 13 episodes in a late night slot in 1981.
I must dig out the primetime TV encyclopaedia book that I have where I saw it mentioned first. I think it said there that it aired late night in most markets but I don’t think the show was particularly risqué, so it clearly could be aired anywhere.
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This Showtime soap was one of two raunchy (contained nudity) shows from the era, the other being Doug Marland’s A New Day in Eden (which I can only find articles one).
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That's no excuse to keep this information from me. We have discussed (or at least mentioned) other short-lived prime time soaps that are unavailable.
If Carrie Fairchild hadn't posted that image I'd still be none the wiser.
And another one from the creator of DALLAS! Where does all this stuff come from? I must see all of it!
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You’ll find some of it on You know where.
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Based on this promo, Rituals aired all over the schedule, as early as 10.30am on some stations and as late as 11pm on others.
It had an interesting cast including one time 007 George Lazenby and a post-Dallas Tina Louise.
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It’s International Women’s Day, so here’s some of my favourite female soap icons to mark it.
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It’s Mothers Day in my part of the world this weekend, so here’s a few ads on the soapy mama theme.
Young Americans had some behind the scenes interference.
Originally the show was to air after Dawson's Creek given both were produced by Columbia-Tristar Television (now Sony Pictures Television) but the WB had a change of heart and pushed back the premiere.
To add, Columbia Tri-Star got Coca Cola in as sponsor (Coca Cola having owned Columbia Pictures) which explains all the plugs for Coca Cola. (The original pilot had to rehoot scenes to feature characters drinking Coke).
ABC learnt no lessons from how they scheduled My So Called Life, as they programmed this on Thursday nights against CSI and The Apprentice, which contributed to the low ratings.
Ireland aired it in early morning 3 years after it was cancelled, while TV2 in New Zealand aired the show in primetime a year later after it was cancelled (Friday at 7.30pm) against America's Next Top Model. Kelly Osbourne was unable to compete with Tyra Banks though, and TV2 rescheduled Life As We Know It to post midnight slots on Saturday.
Life As We Know It was aired on Living TV in the UK also a year after the cancellation and made no impression there either, despite the success of The Osbournes (and Sharon on The X Factor).
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I love these sort of misleading promos - you'd think Linda Gray was playing a massive 80s type of super bitch, when she's basically a mother who wants to reconnect with her daughter. I don't think Hillary was ever really "bitchy" as such either.It’s Mothers Day in my part of the world this weekend, so here’s a few ads on the soapy mama theme.
Having watched The Heights and Class of '96 where some of them have commercials has been interesting - in the episode where Alison ends up helping Jake with getting his GED was promoted in a very serious tone as "Alison has gone missing". If you didn't watch the show you'd assume she was kidnapped or something, not the actual comedy routine of Alison ending up sleeping over at Jake's place and leaving everyone speculating if they did it...
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I had a glance at the first episode and it’s less than 90 seconds before they crack open the first bottles of Coke. I remember watching it when it aired on youth channel Trouble here. I don’t think I even realised it was a Dawson’s Creek offshoot at the time. The main draw was that British actor Charlie Hunnam (who’d recently starred in the original Queer As Folk) was in it as a guest character.
I never watched the show, even when it became a bit more accessible when it aired at a regular time on Living. I know it’s commonplace these days but I remember thinking that the casting of a reality star (Kelly Osbourne) cheapened the show, in my eyes at least, so I didn’t bother with it.
Some Australian TV channels used to always do this too. They’d have these hyper melodramatic promos for Home and Away along the lines of “what happens tonight, will change their lives forever”. Then you’d watch the episode and it’d be something trivial like two characters having a disagreement.