‘All My Children’ facing cancellation?
ABC’s ‘All My Children’, the soap opera with deep roots in Philadelphia, is reportedly on the chopping block.
Rumors are swirling that after 41 years on the air, 'All My Children' is about to be cancelled. And soon.
The soap opera has strong Philadelphia roots. It's set in the apochryphal Philadelphia suburb of Pine Valley (usually interpreted as Bryn Mawr). When characters went downtown, it was always to 'Center City.'
On the other hand, Pine Valley was a short drive from the beach. Geography be damned! There has to be some way to get these characters in bathing suits.
The show's creator, the legendary Agnes Nixon, is from this area. And Kim Delaney, who was part of the epic Greg and Jenny romance, is a homegirl, a graduate of the Catholic girls' school, Hallahan.
A perennial ratings dynamo, 'All My Children' has fallen on sparse times of late, a victim of a changing society and a cash-strapped television industry.
The image of a housewife sitting at home watching an afternoon soap opera seems quaint for a reason. And talk shows are far cheaper to produce than soaps. (Judge shows are even cheaper.)
Insiders are saying the ax may fall before the week is over. ('One Life to Live' may not want to take a long term lease on its studio either.)
Maybe Susan Lucci, who plays the show's scheming cynosure, Erica Kane, is jinxed. Remember the long string of years she was nominated for, but did not win, a Daytime Emmy? Now her show may be cancelled the week before her memoir comes out.
[Full disclosure: Agnes Nixon is my mother-in-law and for a time I was a scriptwriter for 'AMC'. But that's another soap opera.]
Farewell, Brooke, Myrtle and Tad. Goodbye, Opal, Dixie and Palmer. Fare thee well Trevor, Bianca and Greenlee. We will not see your like again.
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