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I think the 1980s were the best years of Days, I really miss the characters and storylines: Bo, Hope, Eugene, Calliope, Patch, Kayla, Justin and Adrienne, Marlena and Roman, John, etc. The show may be renewed but really sad hearing this as we head into the holidays, Christmases at the Horton house was magical, good memories.
If they released the actors form their contracts and in a worst case scenario the show does not get picked up, then there will be no shows tying up storylines or even having a chance to say goodbye to their fans.
I can't help but think the show will never be the same, regardless of whether it gets renewed or not. Obviously if there's no renewal, it will be one of the few (if only?) modern daytime soaps that leaves the air without a purposeful (planned) ending. Certain soaps have ended on cliffhangers, but the majority try to tie up loose ends. Days will not have the opportunity to do either. BUT....if the show is renewed, Corday will only get back the actors he asks to return, who also agree to what will certainly be lower salaries. So he may end up with 50% of the old cast if he's lucky. The show will be tasked with answering why the cast of 30+ characters is suddenly down to 15-16 random characters that may or may not have their main scene partners any more. I guess the question is: would the renewed, scaled-down (stripped-down) version be worth watching?
For those of you who watched the sad final years of Guiding Light, you probably know what I'm talking about. To keep that show on the air, they abandoned the traditional filming model and relocated to a small NJ town, where they filmed with hand-held cameras in actual businesses and homes and (most often) out in fields and in woods. The lighting and sound were terrible, and the discomfort of the actors was obvious. They wanted to keep the show on the air so badly that they cut too deeply and produced a show that was unrecognizable. I know others will not agree, but I felt the show would have been better off ending on a high note, rather than being remembered for the years in Peapack, NJ when the show resembled a high-school film project. Days already has cut the staging and sets down to bare bones, and after cutting the labor dollars similarly, what would be left? Hand puppets?
I have one good memory (1) from watching this or some other soap. It was around Christmas and the men of a certain family were going out to the woods to get a Christmas tree. It was kind of funny.
I think nowadays maybe people prefer more wholesome stories. Hence the popularity of Christmas movies on Lifetime and Hallmark.
I can't help but think the show will never be the same, regardless of whether it gets renewed or not. Obviously if there's no renewal, it will be one of the few (if only?) modern daytime soaps that leaves the air without a purposeful (planned) ending. Certain soaps have ended on cliffhangers, but the majority try to tie up loose ends. Days will not have the opportunity to do either. BUT....if the show is renewed, Corday will only get back the actors he asks to return, who also agree to what will certainly be lower salaries. So he may end up with 50% of the old cast if he's lucky. The show will be tasked with answering why the cast of 30+ characters is suddenly down to 15-16 random characters that may or may not have their main scene partners any more. I guess the question is: would the renewed, scaled-down (stripped-down) version be worth watching?
For those of you who watched the sad final years of Guiding Light, you probably know what I'm talking about. To keep that show on the air, they abandoned the traditional filming model and relocated to a small NJ town, where they filmed with hand-held cameras in actual businesses and homes and (most often) out in fields and in woods. The lighting and sound were terrible, and the discomfort of the actors was obvious. They wanted to keep the show on the air so badly that they cut too deeply and produced a show that was unrecognizable. I know others will not agree, but I felt the show would have been better off ending on a high note, rather than being remembered for the years in Peapack, NJ when the show resembled a high-school film project. Days already has cut the staging and sets down to bare bones, and after cutting the labor dollars similarly, what would be left? Hand puppets?
You are right DanielAvery! I don't think Days will be the same - production values will go way down and I think that is even a slower sadder death for the show because we all remember how it great it was, well for me the 1980s was MUST SEE DAYS, it was fantastic with the super couples but also villains like Stefano and Tony DiMera, I even remember Renee, and Gloria Loring played Liz, those were really the good years.
When you mentioned Guiding Light, I went on youtube and it really was awful those last few years - it was like someone holding the camera and it was shaky at times, a lot of outdoor scenes and the indoor ones were so spare, one scene just had two men sitting around what looked like a empty cabin with a table and two stools. I personally wasn't a regular viewer of Guiding Light, but I remember the show being on CBS? There were so many back in the day and now there is only GH, Y&R, B&B, and for a while more Days.
On another site, it was reported they are ahead 8 months in taping and released the actors from their contracts so they could work on other projects if they chose to. I'm sure it was a cost cutting move for NBC.
Freddie Smith (Sonny) explained on his radio program that yes, everyone was technically fired but the show is coming back. Shortening the time from when the show is filmed to when it airs and not paying salaries will net the show 2 million dollars to be used later. They are still building sets but admits their budget has been limited. He expects the show to begin filming again in January 2020 or as late as April.
It's one of the oddities of soaps that although the actors are the most visible parts of the production, they know the least about what is going on in the business side of things. They are almost always the last to know anything in situations like this. And yet the show has to send the actors out to do whatever press/informational releases they can. It puts the actors in an awful spot, on top of the very public "firing" they've all suffered. "Hey, Actor X! We're keeping you in the dark about your employment status, but here--go give an interview to this magazine and pretend everything is hunky-dory."
It was stated that since the hiatus will last longer than 13 weeks, the 'firing' was more of a technicality than anything else. The contracts have always had 13-week cycles where, if an actor doesn't work for that period (or the show no longer wants to write for them), they've technically been let go (what is usually referred to as "their option wasn't picked up"). Though the actor might have a one-year contract and they will be expected to be available for that year, the show can decide to exercise their option to fire the actor if it's not working out. They can only let them go at four points in the year, though (once every 13 weeks). And since the show was being renewed from year to year, I don't think anyone had multi-year contracts, even the biggest names.
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