The Tates live in a wealthy neighborhood (the announcer calls it the neighborhood known as "Rich"). In the opening sequence of the first installment, the announcer says "This is the story of two sisters-Jessica Tate and Mary Campbell". Soap is set in the fictional town of Dunn's River, Connecticut. Seated: Billy Crystal, Cathryn Damon, Katherine Helmond, Jennifer Salt. Back row, L-R: Robert Urich, Ted Wass, Richard Mulligan, Robert Guillaume, Robert Mandan, Jimmy Baio, Diana Canova, Arthur Peterson Jr. John Ruthledge in the radio version of Guiding Light.Ĭast of Soap (1977). Robert Mandan (Chester Tate) had previously appeared on Search for Tomorrow as a leading man for Mary Stuart, and Donnelly Rhodes (Dutch Leitner) had played the first husband of Katherine Chancellor on The Young and the Restless. The cast also included three former soap opera actors. The show starred Katherine Helmond and Cathryn Damon as sisters and matriarchs of their own families.
#Soap opera weekly.com series
The series has rerun in syndication on local channels as well as on cable. There is a box set of Season 1 on Region 2 DVD. All episodes are available on Region 1 DVD in four box sets. Like most sitcoms of the era, Soap was videotaped rather than filmed, but this coincidentally helped further its emulation of the daytime soap opera format, as most such productions were also videotaped. These hour-long episodes were later split in two, yielding 93 half-hour episodes for syndication. Of these, 8 (including the final 4) aired as one-hour episodes during the original run on ABC. The show aired 85 episodes over the course of four seasons. Two of these retrospectives were made available on VHS in 1994, but were not included on any DVD collections. Each returning season was preceded by a 90-minute retrospective of the previous season. The show was created, written, and executive produced by Susan Harris, and also executive produced by Paul Junger Witt and Tony Thomas.
#Soap opera weekly.com tv
In 2007 it was listed as one of Time magazine's "100 Best TV Shows of All- TIME", and in 2010, the Tates and the Campbells ranked at number 17 in TV Guide 's list of "TV's Top Families".
#Soap opera weekly.com serial
Similar to a soap opera, the show's story was presented in a serial format, and featured melodramatic plotlines including alien abduction, demonic possession, extramarital affairs, murder, kidnapping, unknown diseases, amnesia, cults, organized crime warfare, a communist revolution and teacher-student relationships. The show was created as a nighttime parody of daytime soap operas, presented as a weekly half-hour prime time comedy. Soap is an American sitcom television series that originally ran on ABC from September 13, 1977, until April 20, 1981. The way they cut pineapples! I never saw that coming! It's amazing!!! Not! Just kidding.Columbia Pictures Television (1982-1986, 1988-1995) On a lighter note, when can we expect a discussion thread of TheĬhew? It's been riveting lately. It's sad to those who really were/are die hards of the era. The age of the grandmother, the old house, the smell of the magazine with Deidre Hall and her big hair, the great telling of em to be disappearing. I'm 32 years old and apparently old fashioned. While these magazines and shows may find new life online, it just isn't the same. The notices I used to get were not there this last time. Because I've had a subscription so long, I knew when it would expire. Someone posted something I've noticed as well.I'm getting mine a few days late and when I renewed last time, I had no notice or warning. I would get her Voldemort's after she read them and in 1995 I got my own subscription and I still get it every week. We would talk for hours about the characters and story. She watched Days, Santa Barbara and her favorite.Another World. Those magazines actually helped me catch up and understand the show I had just discovered. I'd go over to my grandmothers house (where in that living room thatONE day actually paid attention to "her story" and got hooked), she had Voldemort's and SOW's everywhere in her sewing room. I remember when I first got sucked into the web of soap opera, how I'd slip a copy of SOW in the grocery cart while shopping with my mom. This really is sad because it reflects the state of daytime and look at all the people out of work.not only on the shows but the magazines too.