"10 Rules on How Not to Wreck a Soap Opera" by Douglas Marland
Beaconboof
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Douglas Marland was a soap opera writer for several American daytime soaps, who passed away in 1993. He left behind this instruction guide for producers on how not to wreck a show.
http://www.welovesoaps.net/2008/09/douglas-marland-how-not-to-wreck-show.html
http://www.welovesoaps.net/2008/09/douglas-marland-how-not-to-wreck-show.html
How Not To Wreck A Show
* Watch the show.
* Learn the history of the show. You would be surprised at the ideas that you can get from the back story of your characters.
* Read the fan mail. The very characters that are not thrilling to you may be the audience's favorites.
* Be objective. When I wrote As the World Turns the first thing I said was, what is pleasing the audience? You have to put your own personal likes and dislikes aside and develop the characters that the audience wants to see.
* Talk to everyone; writers and actors especially. There may be something in a character's history that will work beautifully for you, and who would know better than the actor who has been playing the role?
* Don't change a core character. You can certainly give them edges they didn't have before, or give them a logical reason to change their behavior. But when the audience says, "He would never do that," then you have failed.
* Build new characters slowly. Everyone knows that it takes six months to a year for an audience to care about a new character. Tie them in to existing characters. Don't shove them down the viewers' throats.
* If you feel staff changes are in order, look within the organization first. P&G [Procter & Gamble] does a lot of promoting from within. Almost all of our producers worked their way up from staff positions, and that means they know the show.
* Don't fire anyone for six months. I feel very deeply that you should look at the show's canvas before you do anything.
* Good soap opera is good storytelling. It's very simple.
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Comments
Indeed. All the current soap EPs should be forced at gunpoint to read these rules 100 times until they get the message. >:(
Under no circumstances employ Stuart Blackburn to be a Series Producer!!:p
I think Kate Oates has it pretty right.
Rule 12:
Never couple cot death and baby swapping.
Oh maybe that should be the first rule :D
woah! I think you need to come through to the back and talk about this.
Failing that, can Blackburn be employed by the BBC to produce EastEnders?
I think most can think of an actor in a soap that although popular needs an extended break - or axing - as they are just going around in circles characterwise.
Can someone please send this to Stuart Blackburn at Granada studios please.
You're right. It does matter. Though I think many of us here have complained about inconsistencies in characters, such as the behaviour of Tina at the moment in Corrie. The audience seems to understand better what a character simply would not do.
Follow a story through to the end, even if it's garbage. I'm talking about Billy Mitchell, post-thief extraordinare.
Try and add a bit of the real world to the soaps. I know that they are catering for a mainly white audience in the sticks, but they could at least add a few characters that reflect the mainly city environments that they are based in. Would it kill to have maybe an Eastern European character, or a black guy who doesn't talk like Ray Winstone?
Wait hire someone from within the team? Lorraine Newman?????? Ahhhhh
And don't fire anyone for 6 mths??? What?? EE just fired a whole loada people and is a whole lot better as a result.
And most hilarious of all - give new characters connections on the show. According to half the wannabe producers on DS they'd introduce whole new families who have NO connections to anyone and who never interact with any of them... Oops!
He's not saying ONLY hire someone from within, he's saying look from within the team before you go to outsiders, as they will know the show and how it operates.
The not firing anyone for six months makes perfect sense if you're a new producer on the show. As opposed to making your mark immediately, it's more important to play out the current stories to a natural end instead of abruptly and then if the characters who may not work haven't generated interest by that time, it's fine to let them go. It's called common sense.
I think EE especially stopped existing in reality by the turn of the millennium.
Great rules, man clearly knew what he was on about though, despite my objections to 2 of the rules.
So why do soaps get it wrong so often? What do they see differently that we do?
Ok, there will be unforseen circumstances, eg the Ferreiras could have been really good if the original story had played out, but the actor playing the Dad had visa problems.
But that doesn't explain all the other cock ups!
Shouldn't they just. Especially Stuart Blackburn and Oliver Kent who is royally f+++ing up Casualty and Holby City at the moment.