The Edge of Irrelevance

It's a sign of the times, I guess. And some would say it's an encouraging sign. ABC has canceled two of its soap operas (at this point I would owe Rita Marshall, the daytime drama producer played by Doris Belack in the movie Tootsie, a quarter for calling them "soap operas" instead of "daytime dramas") and is replacing them with talk shows about food and lifestyle.

The two soap operas (fifty cents) in question are "All My Children," on the air since January 1970, and "One Life To Live," on the air since July 1968. Both were created by soap opera (75 cents) developer Agnes Nixon and set in fictional towns based on Philadelphia suburbs.

The reasons for these shows going off the air ("All My Children" this September, "One Life To Live" in January) are quite simple: No one under fifty watches them. Younger daytime viewers simply prefer talk shows, which are cheaper to produce, and they likely find soap operas (a dollar) stodgy. The ratings for these shows certainly bear this out.

Susan Lucci, of "All My Children," is probably the most famous soap opera (buck-and-a-quarter) star, known for her beauty and glamour as well as a role or two beyond "All My Children"'s Erica Kane. The show was also notable for featuring Peter Bergman (not the guy from Firesign Theater), who played a doctor (Cliff Warner) but was not one, and then did commercials for Vicks cough syrup pointing out this fact. Although the intent of the commercials's tag line - "I'm not a doctor, but I play one on TV" - was to illustrate the point that people played doctor at home by using the wrong medicine for a cough and that this was far different from just playing a doctor on television, viewers thought the idea was to trust Bergman as a spokesman because he played a doctor, missing the point entirely. But it did lead to memorable parodies, such as a cartoon of Ronald Reagan with the caption "I'm not a president, but I play one on TV."

"One Life To Live" was less of a cultural influence.

Indeed, soap operas (buck fifty) are not the cultural touchstones they were when the late Elizabeth Taylor made guest appearances on "General Hospital" (still on the air, thank you, and the last ABC serial left) in 1981 opposite the characters of Luke and Laura, whom everyone knew about whether they watched soaps (buck seventy-five) or not. But, to be honest, I never liked soap operas. (Two bucks!) I never enjoyed the hammy acting, the melodramatic storylines, and the tragedies that occur on a regular basis. Such schmaltziness is an insult to the (mostly) female audience that has watched them over the years. It only makes sense that daytime shows have their own Emmy awards. How could they win an Emmy otherwise? But with reality being more dramatic and sorrowful than these weepy serials these days, why should we care about them? As it stands, there are to be only three other remaining shows on CBS and NBC besides "General Hospital."

Soap operas ($2.25) will fade away just as other touchstones of American life - sweet shops, drive-in movies, Burma-Shave signs - have. They may already have. When cable news channels pun on a title of a soap opera like "Ryan's Hope," which went off the air years ago, in discussing U.S. Representative Paul Ryan's federal budget plan, how many people get the joke? For that matter, how many people know who Paul Ryan is?

Like sands through the hourglass . . ..

By the way, I owe Miss Marshall two dollars and fifty cents. :-D

$2.75 if you count the tag. :-D