Thursday, March 22, 2012

Soap Opera Weekly Shut Down

In April 2011, Soap Opera Digest and Soap Opera Weekly cut staff and the magazines' operations were turned over to National Enquirer and Shape owner American Media, Inc. in a licensing deal. Now, what has been rumored ever since has finally come true: Soap Opera Weekly has shut down. Along with AMI's Pixie, Weekly is now a thing of the past.

At the time of the licensing deal, David J. Pecker, Chairman, President and CEO of American Media Inc. (AMI), said “This agreement is ideal for American Media as both soap opera titles fit strategically into our entertainment group, which includes Star, National Enquirer, Country Weekly and TV Guide, reaching an audience of 37 million people. Advertising clients will benefit immensely as we will now deliver the most efficient ad buy in the celebrity category for consumers.”

In honor of the magazine's glorious past, here's an interview we did with founder Mimi Torchin last May.



We wish the best to anyone impacted today.

7 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. My first and only internship ever. I learned so much from the talented journalists and would never trade my time there for anything. Another sad day in the soaps. Thanks SPW for all the great reads and the valuable experience!

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  3. This is very sad but not a surprise. When it seems all people crave are lurid and inappropriate stories in mainstream media about celebrities or criminals, our desire for creative serialized fictional storylines are a thing of the past. Now we have a constant barrage of stories about real people behaving in the worst possible way and we celebrate that?! Weekly's demise is a sad comment about what we find interesting these days.

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  4. Has there been any real reporting since Mimi? The magazine was a shell of its former self. I am sad to see it go but it was expected.

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  5. I'm completely blown away by this report. As a civilian, I did not know anything about this!

    Brian

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  6. Maybe AMI was able to move some of the production staff of SOW over to their new magazine, Reality Weekly, which, btw, they've been showcasing with full-spread ads in Soap Opera Digest.

    Any news on what Soaps In Depth has decided to do? They've been giving fairly extensive coverage to Days of Our Lives in the CBS version for quite some time. And the cover to the ABC version has added "CBS" and "NBC" next to the title for several issues now. If circulation continues to fall, they might merge as well.

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  7. So sad, but NOT a surprise.

    The Soap Opera Weekly I loved so dearly in the 90s died when Mimi was fired.

    I stopped buying it about 5 years ago when they quit having interviews. Would still glance through it occasionally while in line at the grocery store. A shell of its former glory.

    Wonder how much longer Soap Digest has?

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