Daytime Emmys Downplay Soaps, Celebrate Las Vegas

By Ed Martin One could find worse ways to spend a lazy summer evening than watching a live awards show from Las Vegas featuring many current top acts from shows along the strip. But when I sat down to watch CBS' presentation of the 37th annual Daytime Emmy Awards on Sunday I was looking for a celebration of daytime programming -- and I didn't … [Read more...]

What’s That Smell?

By Marlena De Lacroix On Saturday,  my husband Moose and I were driving on a back road through the Pennsylvania woods to have dinner at a very good restaurant. Suddenly a familiar tell-tale putrid smell entered the car. Skunk! I gasped and a few seconds later my eyes welled up in tears.  No, the tears didn't come from the intensity of … [Read more...]

The Sadness of the Long Running Soap Fan

By Marlena De Lacroix When most longtime watchers get disenchanted or downright  disgusted with their old  soaps, they are usually angry.  We've all invested years of our lives and our deep feelings in this genre. Now, it's gotten to the point where I'm not angry anymore.  As we watch the final act of daytime soap opera, I just find myself … [Read more...]

All My Children: Daytime’s Brigadoon, But What Happens Next? Part 2

By Marlena De Lacroix In Part 1 of this column, I used that great 1947 Broadway musical in which a mythical ancient town full of joy and real human goodness reappears and vanishes once a decade as a metaphor for the brief return of Lorraine Broderick as headwriter of All My Children. Ms. Broderick's self-chosen short-lived return represented … [Read more...]

Kiboshing Kish: Betrayal and Malfeasance

By Marlena De Lacroix I've had a lot of problems with One Life to Live over the last two years, but Kish (Kyle and Fish) was never one of them. The shocking write-off of these characters is wrong, wrong, wrong on so many levels.  Of all the ways this failing soap could be improved, dumping Kish NOW isn't one of them. Goodbye Kish: Scott Evans … [Read more...]

All My Children: Daytime’s Brigadoon (But What Happens Next?) Part 1

  By Marlena De Lacroix When I was a young girl my mother took me to City Center in Manhattan to see a revival of the 1947 Lerner and Loewe musical Brigadoon.  In it, two American men on a trip to Scotland stumble upon a strange town, the Brigadoon of the title, from a Can Agnes Nixon, who brought us this revival of Pine Valley as … [Read more...]

Watching Sadism For Thrills: Soaps Are Not Snuff Films!

By Marlena De Lacroix Recently I was asked by a fan why I am not posting much anymore. Here's why: Today on One Life to Live I watched a woman who had just delivered a baby graphically fall through ice and drown.  Not three months ago I had watched a Does any TPTB on soaps, so desperate for ratings, actually have any moral sense at all, or even … [Read more...]

Happy New Year from Marlena, Moose and Nigel

Connie, Anna and the late real Mr. Moose at the Museum of Natural History (above); The Nige (right) ______________________________  By Marlena De Lacroix Happy New Year 2010, everyone!  Hope you had as joyous a holiday season with your family and friends as Moose and I (a.k.a. Connie and Ed) did. My beloved step-daughter Laura and … [Read more...]

As The World Turns: Love and Family in the Heart of America

My friend Ed Martin weighs in, too,  on the loss of As the World Turns in a new post immediately following this one. ___________________________________________  By Marlena De Lacroix I broke into tears when I heard that As the World Turns was canceled yesterday. I'm sure many of you did, too.  ATWT has been a part of all our lives for so … [Read more...]

As the World Turns Outrage: Another National Treasure Bites the Dust

By Ed Martin The ‘00s may be the new Golden Age of primetime drama, but for fans of daytime serials they have truly been the Dark Ages, right up until the very end. With only 24 days left until the turn of the decade, and just three months after the last episode of Guiding Light, a historic franchise that spanned 15 years on radio  I wonder if … [Read more...]