News Brief

"Daytime For Obama" photoshoot!
Underwear designer, Andrew Christian who recently unveiled his collection of “Obama 08” briefs, in association with Bridge and Tunnel Communications is producing a “Daytime for Obama” photo shoot featuring the hottest men and women from Daytime soaps. Both male and female talent are scheduled to be photographed in the men’s “Obama 08” briefs and boxer briefs as a group- men will be shirtless and the women will be provided with matching camisoles to cover themselves.

The list of confirmed participants include: Y&R's Vail Bloom, Christel Khalil and Melody Thomas Scott. DAYS' Kristen Renton and Blake Berris, and B&B's Heather Tom, Lesli Kay, Ashley Jones and Winsor Harmon. Participants from GH will be announced shortly.

The shoot takes place this Friday, August 15th. A portion of the proceeds from the sale of the briefs is contributed to Obama’s presidential campaign efforts.

TV GUIDE: Lau of Attraction
Michael Logan reports: Former ALL MY CHILDREN idol Laurence Lau (who can forget Greg and Jenny?) joins AS THE WORLD TURNS Aug. 18 as Brian Wheatley, who'll run Oakdale's new foundation for sick kids. Cougar alert: Look for granny Lucinda to get the hots for him.

Deep Soap: Another One Bites The Dust
Sara A. Bibel writes: "PASSIONS was an attempt to tweak the soap formula and attract a new audience. To an extent, it succeeded. While it was always the lowest rated show among Households, it was consistently number one among Women 12-34. Combined with DAYS OF OUR LIVES, PASSIONS made NBC by far the youngest skewing daytime network. As the soap with the youngest audience, the show should have been advertiser friendly. But NBC, claiming its affiliates weren’t enamored of the show, exiled it to DirecTV to be replaced with yet another hour of the TODAY show. Left adrift in a sea of non-soap syndicated programming, inconsistent writing isn’t the only reason DOOL’s ratings have suffered."

VIDEO: DALLAS reunion at Southfork has fans, cast excited
Grab your cowboy hat, pull up your boots and pour yourself a stiff drink — or two or three — it’s time to join the Ewings for a barbecue at the ranch.

DALLAS cast members — including Larry Hagman, Linda Gray and Patrick Duffy — will gather Nov. 8 at Southfork Ranch to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the debut of the show that transformed Big D.

Better yet, you’re invited. The reunion at the Parker ranch is open to the public.

“I may not be able to do the 40th,” Mr. Hagman, 76, said in a telephone interview from California. “Thirty years is pretty good, and the show is still very popular. [I’m looking forward to] seeing people that I know -- and I know a lot of people down there -- and having a lot of fun.”

Hinsey story making the rounds
From Melissa Hebert's "Everything Entertainment" column in today's Cleveland Plain Dealer: "Soap fans and journalists seem to be wallowing in the schadenfreude over the firing of Soap Opera Digest editor Carolyn Hinsey."

JOSSIP: Is Carolyn Hinsley Publishing's Most Hated Editor of All Time?
"More than 1,700 comments later, our exclusive story about the much-hated Soap Opera Weekly Carolyn Hinsley getting fired continues to draw heated responses."

MARK HARDING: A late weigh-in on Hinsey-gate
"By now, the whole free world seems to have visited Jossip and read the tale of the alleged firing of Carolyn Hinsey and the alleged reaction of her purportedly much-maligned staff. I was initially addicted to that thread until it became an ugly mess of forgers."

Red card for teen soap HOLLYOAKS
HOLLYOAKS bosses have been slammed for pulling out of a charity soccer match for sick children at the last minute. Stars of the teen soap were to take on actors from EMMERDALE at a celebrity event on Sunday in aid of the Acorn Children's Hospice.

But the match, at Halesowen Town's football ground West Mids, has been cancelled because the Hollyoaks team is too busy filming to attend. The "disappointed" charity will have to refund over 1,300 pre-sold tickets and somehow make up the £20,000 it hoped to make from the event.

"Paper Dolls" starring ATWT's Magnussen begins tonight

Lively Productions and Métropole Ink present "Paper Dolls" as part of the 11th annual New York International Fringe Festival, running Aug. 13-23 at the Players Theatre.

Penned by New York Daily News columnist and playwright Patrick Huguenin, the cast features Allison Goldberg, Jen Jamula, Ashley Morris and AS THE WROLD TURNS star Billy Magnussen. Magnussen also made his Broadway debut last season in "The Ritz."

AFTER ELTON: The Best Gay TV is in Europe
"Pity the poor gay American television viewer. Subjected to barely there gay characters, characters who don’t kiss for months at a time, not to mention entire broadcast networks without a single regularly occurring gay character to be found, it is no wonder gay viewers get frustrated.

In fact, if it weren’t for ABC’s BROTHERS & SISTERS and CBS’ AS THE WORLD TURNS, it’s not an exaggeration to say that scripted television produced for American audiences would be a barren wasteland of rarely seen minor secondary characters (Oscar on THE OFFICE), don’t blink or you’ll miss them gay relationships (Calvin and Michael on GREEK, Marc and Cliff on UGLY BETTY) and witty assistants who get a few lines per episode and the very occasional secondary storyline (Lloyd on ENTOURAGE)."

EVENT: Walt Willey stand-up
Walt Willey might be best known as the bronzed Jackson Montgomery on ALL MY CHILDREN. But Willey also has a great knack for standup comedy. See Willey work his comic wiles at Zanies locations at 230 Hawthorn Village Commons, Vernon Hills, (847) 549-6030, and at Pheasant Run Resort & Spa, 4051 E. Main St., St. Charles, (630) 584-6342. Tickets are $25; $50 for a limited meet-and-greet before the show; zanies.com. 6 p.m. meet and greet; 8 p.m. show Friday in Vernon Hills; same times Saturday in St. Charles.

B&B's "Bikini Beach Employee"
Heather Nichols' name is very familiar to those involved in theater in the Barboursville and Huntington areas. Over the years she appeared in a number of productions by the Huntington Outdoor Theatre group, 5th Avenue Theatre Company. Now she's making her network debut on CBS's THE BOLD AND THE BEAUTIFUL.

"I only have a few lines, but it's still really exciting because even those smaller roles are extremely competitve to get cast in," Nichols says.

The official name of her character in Wednesday afternoon's episode is, "Bikini Beach Employee" and she's in the scene with two of the main characters of the show.

It's classified as an 'Under 5' role, which is hollywood talk for a person cast with under five lines of dialogue.

The end of TV as we know it?
Mark Harris at Conde Nast Portfolio takes a look at eight ways broadcast TV might be reborn.

Some interesting quotes from this excellent feature:
"The audience for daytime soaps, a profitable staple since TV’s infancy, has shrunk so dramatically that the form may vanish within a few years."

"Creating substance-free shows because you think your audience has no attention span is a sucker’s game. And streaming shows for free is, so far, doing a lot more for viewers than it is for a network’s balance sheet. Instead, the networks should try to make TV shows for people who want to watch TV shows. There seems to be no shortage of viewers out there: For all the hand-wringing about how new media are sapping television’s audience, the average viewer of online video in April watched fewer than eight minutes a day. By contrast, the average household has its TV on for eight hours and 14 minutes daily. That’s a record."

Ellen Dolan in "A Body of Water"
In New Ground Theatre's new production of Lee Blessing's "A Body of Water," Ellen Dolan wakes up in a rustic summer house, and has no memory of how she got there.

In this darkly comic drama, Dolan and Daniel Hagen play a couple who awaken to discover they have no idea where they are, or who they are, or what their relationship is to one another, and matters aren't clarified by the arrival of Kimberly Furness' mysterious Wren, who may be the couple's daughter, or their lawyer, or their tormentor, or ... .

Julianne Moore's terror love
The former ATWT Emmy winner claims she has always been drawn to dark films, and even loved feeling scared when she was a child.

She said: "When I was a kid, I used to watch this vampire soap opera, 'Dark Shadows'. I loved that show... and I was little! I can remember my sister going into the other room to fold laundry with my mother because she was so frightened. I guess it has translated into the material I want to do as an adult."