Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Daytime Emmy Update: ATI Visits ATWT/GL

As previously mentioned, ATI president of Worldwide Media and Entertainment, Jim Romanovich, who was the key player in bringing the Daytime Emmy Awards to The CW, plans to visit the sets of all eight daytime dramas before the final nominations are announced. On Tuesday he visited the sets of AS THE WORLD TURNS and GUIDING LIGHT and shared his thoughts with We Love Soaps.

Well, here I am in one of my favorite cities, New York, and I was told that I brought in the good weather with me. I really love this city and miss just walking. Living in LA you use a treadmill for that. It’s also nice being on an expense account!

My day started on West 57th with GUIDING LIGHT. This and AS THE WORLD TURNS were actually my mom’s very favorite soaps. More on ATWT later. I spent almost an hour with Ellen Wheeler and the first thing I did was praise her on her ground breaking AIDS story on AMC back in the 80’s. I think part of what makes her a great producer is that she is a great actress. She brought Brent Stanton and Frank Radice from NATAS and yours truly into a private room and really got into how she went about revolutionizing GUIDING LIGHT. I was captivated by her vision, energy and passion. Even now. Especially now. I have to give her a tremendous amount of credit for shattering the ancient rules of what a soap should be and trying to do something different. By the way, those sets were immaculate! You think you’re in a real house? No, it’s a set. And they were just hitting their stride, too. It is a shame that they won’t be able to see it fully realized on broadcast TV as I have been told the final story has been written. But the door to other options is very much alive and wouldn’t that be something to see it go on. I had a long chat with Frank Dicopoulos and he is man with great insight with obvious love and respect for his fans. In watching the taping, everything was so streamlined and efficient yet the quality was brilliant. If you saw what I saw, you’d think that they were in the World Series because they were definitely on their A game. To be continued…

We took the ride to Brooklyn and I found out that JC Studios, where AS THE WORLD TURNS tapes, was one of the very first and one of the busiest film studios ever built before the expansion to Hollywood. Once here, I met with Carole Shure and Christopher Goutman. What surprised me was that they said no producer has ever visited them before. It just would never occur to me that nobody would. That nobody asked them what they felt was important. I find this to be the case everywhere I went. I also met Kathy Hays and Noelle Beck and really had a great chat with them about their years on the show. I also asked them and the producers what they felt about the Emmy telecast. They felt that it was important and a big night, but they also felt that some moments from previous shows should stay in previous shows. We assured them that their opinions matter and we would do our best for the show. We can’t promise anything other than give them the voice they deserve and to do everything in our power to make the telecast everything it should be. It was my pleasure to be surrounded by so much talent and so much good humor. The boom operator in particular cracked me up before each take. I don’t think he realized I was observing him but never take for granted that what you do goes unnoticed. For me, I was observing everyone’s duties on the set, not just the actors as I truly have an interest in each show’s process. But it was a testament to the good feelings the crew had in being there. And thank you, Lisa!

Tomorrow I wind up my visit with AMC and OLTL. On Thursday, I will be at the TODAY SHOW when the nominees and host will be announced. Plus I’ll have a few more surprises to announce during the summer.

It's truly amazing that Romanovich is taking this time and visiting all the soap sets and collecting input. I am getting more and more excited about the telecast with each report.

RELATED:
- ATI visis DAYS
- ATI visis GH
- ATI visis Y&R

10 comments:

  1. "But the door to other options is very much alive and wouldn’t that be something to see it go on."

    We can only hope this becomes a reality!! The quality stories that Guiding Light is airing right now, like Otalia, have to find a new home! Congrats to Ellen Wheeler for keeping up the great work!

    Thanks Roger for sharing this story!

    Good luck to all the GL nominees on Thursday!!

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  2. Thanks for sharing this, Roger. I sure hope that Mr. Romanovich is right about GL's future. From his mouth to somebody's ears.

    This show is just too damn good to end in September.

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  3. Thanks for the news, Roger. It does sound promising that GL will continue on past its time on CBS.

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  4. Thanks Roger - this is encouraging that they are looking to find GL a new home. I'll do my part and keep writing, emailing, and calling. This show is so worth fighting for

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  5. "In watching the taping, everything was so streamlined and efficient yet the quality was brilliant. If you saw what I saw, you’d think that they were in the World Series because they were definitely on their A game."

    Made of awesome! I especially loved Romanovich's praise of Ellen Wheeler, on how she takes the classic soap rules and revolutionizes it. Brilliant!

    Thanks Roger for the article and thanks Jim Romanovich for the lovely words! Great article!

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  6. Wow..Thx again Roger...Keeping fingers crossed that GL will land a new home. Otalia rocksand I'd hate to see it come to an end...I vote for all us fans to go together and get our own network...TGLN = The Guiding Light Network!! How's that sound?

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  7. As a relatively new fan of GL, I personally feel like I have a strong sense of appreciation for what Ellen Wheeler has done over the last year, particularly the last few months (I'm still in awe over that wedding week), but I particularly appreciate when someone who has as more global view of the soap world shares their appreciation - I always love that. I sincerely hope that Ellen's passion and vision for GL can continue (to think that the last scene has been penned is both impressive, but also bittersweet). I'm praying that GL finds a new home, yep that's me praying, I'm calling up ever force possible to make this miracle happen. GL's too good, with too rich a tapestry of characters to meet its demise at this point. Let's hope we're not alone in seeing that.

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  8. Thanks for sharing this! It's wonderful to see such praise for Guiding Light, and once again the possibility for a future for the show on another network. Here's hoping for good news soon because this show is too good to let it end.

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  9. Thank you Roger for the update, as always. I, like so many other fans out there, are keeping our collective fingers crossed that GL finds a new home...and soon. Guiding Light is a truly magnificent show and it deserves to live long after September...the writing and acting has been amazing, especially with the Otalia storyline. We, viewers, just want to be entertained when we watch something, and Guiding Light is providing just that...and more.

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  10. Thanks for sharing, Roger! Ellen Wheeler is amazing and must head this show post-CBS. Great show of positivity!

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