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Article: Why soaps won' t wash in America They've summoned Satan, encountered aliens but US soaps still can't compete with OJ Simpson or Jerry Springer. BARBARA McMAHON reports from New York
- Article from:
- The Evening Standard (London, England)
- Article date:
- July 8, 1999
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 1999 Evening Standard - London. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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HE'D deny it, of course - he always does - but OJ Simpson is
guilty.
He's responsible, at least in part, for the death of a grand old
lady.
His victim is a soap opera, one of America's longest running -
NBC's Another World, which broadcast its final episode, its 8,891st,
last month, after a run of 35 years.
With a mere three million viewers (compared to 14 million in the
UK for EastEnders, a country with a population a fifth of America's),
death was not unexpected. And this was not the first sign that
American soaps are in crisis. If one were to lapse into the
melodramatic cliche that is the shows' staple diet, one might say
that the daytime serials are struggling for breath on a ...