Paula's Soapbox

On Wednesday evening soap viewers received two rather unexpected announcements. The first came in the form of a tweet from OLTL's Robin Strasser (Dorian) who told her fans that she would have to end her run on the show sooner than expected, meaning she will not be there when the show ends early next year. Strasser said " I'll have to leave OLTL sooner than the cancellation date, for compelling health reasons. Unable 2 meet high standards I owe our great show." She then went on to say "BUMMER! Darn right. WISDOM indicates a GRACE-full exit, before I fall on my bum. "Always leave 'em laughin". With Tuc and luck, hope I will!"  So far no announcement has been made about when her last day of taping will be and certainly no final airdate has been determined, but I will keep you posted. In other, perhaps bigger news, Robert Guza, Jr. has been replaced as headwriter by Garin Wolf. Wolf, as you might recall, was responsible for the storylines we saw...

Early Tuesday morning I noticed several tweets regarding Matthew Ashford's DOOL return. And although I kind of suspected he might come back to the show one day, given that Jack has been mentioned in almost every scene since Melissa Reeves came back, I was still skeptical. This was partially because I could not and have still not been able to confirm that this announcement originated on Ashford's official facebook page, as many claimed. It would appear now, however, that it did considering that news of his return was reported by Soap Opera Digest  just hours later. DOOL also gave me reason to be skeptical of Ashford's return because for months it seemed like the show was trying to discredit Jack, implying that he abandoned his family to go find himself and never looked back. I assumed this was an attempt to get the audience to hate him so that they would be more receptive to the Jennifer/Daniel pairing, because as we all know Jack and Jennifer were among th...

The battle rages on in the fight to save the soaps. Tomorrow, May 17th soap fans will hold a protest rally outside Lincoln Center in New York City from 2-6pm. Several daytime favorites have expressed an interest in attending the rally and/or offering their support. The following is an e-mail announcement I received from the Soap Fans United website. It will tell you everything you need to know about tomorrow's rally. Also be sure to stop by and join the Soap Fans United site @ http://www.soapfansunited.com to stay up to date on everything that is being done to save the soaps. Dear Fellow Soap Supporter: A demonstration protesting the cancellations of the ABC soap operas All My Children and One Life To Live has been planned for May 17, 2011 outside Lincoln Center in New York City. The rally will be held from 2:00 pm-6:00 pm to target the advertisers arriving at Avery Fisher Hall for ABC's Upfront Presentation starting at 4:00 pm. Since advertisers will be present to see...

Nominations for the 38th annual Daytime Emmy Awards were announced last week. The following is a list of the categories that you will be most interested in, along with a few that you probably won't be and will likely never see announced during the Emmy telecast. For more information and to see a complete list of nominees go to http://www.emmyonline.org Outstanding Lead Actress Alicia Minshew (Kendall) AMC Debbi Morgan (Angie) AMC Colleen Zenk (Barbara) ATWT Susan Flannery (Stephanie) B&B Laura Wright (Carly) GH Michelle Stafford (Phyllis) Y&R Outstanding Lead Actor Ricky Paull Goldin (Jake) AMC Michael Park (Jack) ATWT James Scott (EJ) DOOL Maurice Benard (Sonny) GH Christian LeBlanc (Michael) Y&R Supporting Actress Melissa Claire Egan (Annie) AMC Julie Pinson (Janet) ATWT Heather Tom (Katie) B&B Nancy Lee Grahn (Alexis) GH Bree Williamson (Jessica) OLTL Tricia Cast (Nina) Y&R Supporting Actor Jonathan Jackson (Lucky) GH Jason Thompson (Patrick) GH...

Let me preface this by saying I don't really watch the cyber soaps, as I suspect many people don't. Even though shows like Gotham and Venice have managed to gather a respectable following, as well as Emmy nods, the Internet is still a new medium for the soap genre and it takes effort and commitment to regularly follow an online show, even a favorite one. In addition, for those who have a slow connection, online viewing may seem like a rather daunting task. In fact I'm sure many people think "who has the time?" or "why bother?" Enter the web series The Bay . I only became familiar with The Bay after reading an article about it on TV Guide's website. Apparently there is a distinct possibility that it will eventually land on television. Still, having heard nothing of the show, I thought how good could it be? As it turns out it is good...very good in fact. Created by Gregori J. Martin, the show stars some of daytime's most beloved actor...

It has been almost two weeks since Tamara Braun took over the role of Taylor Walker, replacing Natalia Livingston who had inhabited the role since late January. I never really understood the need for this sudden casting change, but being a fan of both actresses I kept an open mind. Sometimes these types of changes take a while to get used to, particularly when they are as ill-timed as this one, or as ill-timed as the switch from new Lucky to original Lucky on GH, or from Drew Garrett to Chad Duell in the role of Michael, but I digress. DOOL used the standard excuse of taking the character in a different direction to explain the Taylor casting change. To be perfectly honest I have never really understood this explanation. Soaps use it all the time and it never makes much sense. Actors act - if a show decides to take a character in a different direction the actor should, by definition, be able to act accordingly. If there is a chemistry problem between the actors and...