News
Tyra Banks Quits Her Own Show FABLife! She Says It's To Work On Cosmetics Line, But Was It Dissension Among The Ranks?
Photo Credit: Disney/ABC
More problems for ABC’s daytime programming block, which never helps out legacy series General Hospital, the only soap opera left on the network! Today, Tyra Banks announced she quit her own talk show, FABLife! After less than three months as the main host and executive producer, she parted ways with the ailing series.
In a statement Banks related, “That this is a very difficult decision, but necessary.” She went on to say: “I will be devoting more time to my new, growing cosmetics company, TYRA Beauty, which is expanding faster than anticipated, as well as overseeing my company’s other entertainment ventures. I will, however, continue to support the growth and success of FABLife and greatly admire my fellow co-hosts and the talented production team behind the show.” Banks will stay on as executive producer through December, and will remain on-air only a few times a week through the end of the year, and only make after that occasional other appearances! FABLife’s other hosts remain for now with: Chrissy Teigen, Joe Zee, Leah Ashley and Lauren Makk.
However, other sources have reported that there is major dissention behind the scenes of this latest syndicated series from Disney/ABC. TMZ related: “We’re told Tyra and one of the executive producers did not get along. We’re told she was particularly upset because she felt she had been double-crossed … she claimed show honchos promised to push her cosmetics line much harder than they did. We’re told there was a staff meeting a week ago where execs said the show would be moving in a different direction. But Tyra had been missing days on the show, and the handwriting was on the wall.”
PEOPLE offered up: “The show wasn’t what Tyra wanted. She was disappointed with the direction that the producers were taking. It wasn’t right for her. She hopes it will be successful for the other cast members but she has to move on.”
So here we go again, while All My Children was replaced with The Chew and that seems to have found enough a consistent audience for some staying power, nothing that has replaced One Life to Live ever took hold: The Revolution, Katie, and now FABLife.
What do you think is the real reason Tyra wanted out of her own show? Is this show about to just tank for good? How can ABC ever find a solution to this programming issue, and what should they do? Resurrect One Life to Live, if they have retained the rights? Do something bold and launch a new half hour soap? Come up with some other form of entertaining series other than these lifestyle shows which seem to all fizzle? Share your thoughts in the comment section below!
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Great to see another One Life to Live replacement off the air! Tyra went from having two shows to none. I could only stand her on Top Model anyway.
Bring back One Life To Live, this talk show is a train wreck. Cancel Fablife, I watched this horrible talk show once and it put me too sleep. LOL. We need Viki Buchanan back and the whole gang. We need love in the afternoon back with One Life To Live.
One Life To Live will be stuck in that lawsuit with Prospect Park for years, and, sad to say, the longer it is off the air, the less likely they will ever reboot it because audiences have moved on. I do take delight, however, that everything they thought was going to be a sure fire replacement winner, has tanked. I wonder how much money they have spent chasing ratings over what they spent if they would have just kept OLTL on the air!?
What do you think the reason is? Boycott ABC across America works. Also stupid lifestyle show that no one cares about. They still don’t understand anything they put on except soaps will not make. How much more of this?
One thing’s for sure, OLTL is not coming back no matter how many failed shows succeeded in its stead, whether programmed by ABC itself or by its syndication subsidiary.
The Talk also had a sluggish start during its first year on air and it took some retooling, firings and a few new co-presenters to make itself viable for CBS (and still programmed by CBS Daytime).
But CBS didn’t sacrifice their soaps to make room for The Talk. Well, except for maybe As The World Turns, but The Talk’s ratings ARE higher.
That 80’s outfit she is wearing in the photo for this article does not do her any favors. Just sayin’.
ABC really screwed up when they cancelled two soaps at once. No one but ABC knows the economics, but if GH can be profitable, AMC or OLTL could be.
I don’t know what the status of the Prospect Park lawsuit is or when and if the rights would revert back to ABC, but if it were legally and economically feasible, ABC should just get OLTL back on the air.
If it was legally feasible, it ain’t economically feasible. Soaps in their current format cost to much to produce. If they get the rights back from prospect park, ABC can merge both shows and start a new story bible.
If they went back to the model they followed for years, i.e. soaps made all the money for the network, it could work. The problem was soaps became big business in the 80s so each show spent more and more money to outdo each other and salaries became astronomical! Wasn’t Susan Lucci making a million a year at one point? Most soap actors start out at $150,000 a year or so and if they could go back to that model, producing it low cost, it could make money again. One Life To Live was costing $50 million a year when… Read more »
Karma’s a “beotch”…..house of mickey!!!!
So true!!!!!!!!!!!!
Hmm didn’t even know she existed ..
I watch zero daytime tv, zero..
I watch my soaps at night via internet..
0hh oh! when home sick or whatever I watched Judge Judy, that’s it..
ABC deserves all the crap shows, the cancellations and most of all low ratings. They could have had great daytime had they not canceled AMC and OLTL.
Something bold as the article suggests: A completely new soap opera.
Can we get a new soap opera with a different production model in that time slot? Or do the affiliates still own that time slot?
I would like to see a talk show devoted to soaps past and present. Ideally it would regard the genre with respect and not focus on the often sensationalized aspects such as multiple marriages and back-from-the-dead stories. I would like to see the actors interviewed in an Actor’s Studio format, focusing on the craft of soap acting and the historical significance of the genre. Actors could discuss their soap characters, story lines, fellow actors and favorite memories. There would be room for lighthearted discourse as well of course, but daytime drama and its artists should be regarded with the dignity… Read more »
This is a great idea. I hope “someone” takes notice. 🙂
Ah, that was called the “Soap Opera Network” and sadly, it failed.
You’re right of course, but the difference is that this would be integrated into the daytime line-up where the soap watchers are a built in audience.
Nothing can replace One Life to Live!!!!!!!!!!! I think the only solution to the programming problem is to put One Life to Live back on the air and integrate some All My Children characters into the show. The shows share a common creator, Agnes Nixon, and take place in the same area of the country. There have been crossovers between them in the past. If there is a functioning brain cell anywhere among the alphabet network executives, that’s what they will do.
Agree. 100%. They could bring it back with much fanfare and do it right. Look at what Days of Our Lives is doing with it’s 50th anniversary–THAT is how they should bring back OLTL.
The problem is, launching a soap, in this day and age, would be astronomical in terms of costs. Even launching a reboot of AMC and OLTL is not worth it to the networks. They would have been smart to just leave them on the air but of course, they had to go mess with their formula, which worked beautifully for years. Remember the days when ABC was LOVE IN THE AFTERNOON and you could watch soaps straight through from 12:30-4:30?
Bringing back OLTL and AMC will solve ABC Daytime’s programming mess. After the lawsuit is settled, perhaps a “super-soap” blending Pine Valley and Llanview characters/story lines. Former loyal ABC daytime fans will not watch anything that replaces OLTL.
I’m sure Tyra saw the writing on the wall for this show, and it’s probably headed for cancellation. I can’t say I’m surprised. There are just way too many talk/lifestyle shows on daytime TV, and this one is a carbon copy of the failed Revolution, only with different hosts. If that show did not work, what made Disney/ABC executives think that this one would? I have no clue what they were thinking. I know they’re cheaper to produce, but you do have to think that all this $$$ being thrown out by the company producing and promoting one failed talk… Read more »
The fans of the canceled soap need to look in their own back yard.. Both soaps were abandoned by their fans, leaving them to die. The fans moved on, had little interest to hang on for dear life until the soaps could be turned to entice viewers. Not everybody will dedicate 30-40-50 years of their lives watching a soap 5 days a week, they do tire of it and life changes and moves on.. ABC canceled the soaps because of low numbers because millions of fans stopped watching. ABC is about money/profits not emotions. The soaps were not making profits… Read more »
Look, I’ve got to believe that even if soaps are now niche viewing, there is something valuable to advertisers and the network about having hundreds of thousands of viewers loyally watching a show every day, year after year. The real problem, as I see it, is that soaps are not adding younger generations of viewers and so it’s only a matter of time before there are no viewers at all. The soap style of story telling is profuse among prime time and online shows, so how do we get fans of these shows to tune into soaps?
hi Melissa,, there never will be new and younger.. The soaps are still in the 20th century.. Look at ”now” TV, cable, movies etc.. they are not couples based, no long drawn out couples and their problems to break-ups. younger people do not get into that.. All, the Netflix series have very little to none love couples. The movies have no involved love couples to even care about, it is not popular TV shows Empire has no couples as in soap couples, Cookie and Lucious are not romantic but a couple millions love. even how to get away with murder,… Read more »
Your exactly right Melissa. Kids dont even watch TV anymore! Everything is on their phone or pad. Imagine if Taylor Swift released her music only on a album? She wouldnt reach a tenth of her fans. Her fans would latch on to something else. Soaps have to adjust to technology. The soap stories have to move quicker. There is too much stimulation out there to sit and drag a story out over a year! Kids live in a world where everything to them is a appetizer, no more entrees!
Timmm.. the now gen do not have or take the time to sit and watch a show, they binge watch when they get bored with whatever, binge watching is in and nobody even tunes in once a week, any longer to watch their favorite show.. they binge it.. Also, they live fast.. everything has to move on fast.. they would never take the time to invest in a soap.. it takes a long time to get to know the characters, not to mention backstories, and 3 months to even know what is going on, and it’s PG rated.. None from… Read more »
Great post, fans by the millions quit watching and the audience left was unattractive to advertisers. Times changed, so do audiences. I don’t see the connection to the OLTL cancelation and the Tyra show. In my city Tyra airs on a Fox station at ten am. It has nothing to do with soaps. It is a syndicated talk show. GH has a decent lead in, the Chew gets better ratings than the sorry soap it replaced with better demographics. I watched a couple soaps back in the day but really the shows were pretty bad the last ten or fifteen… Read more »
ABC is basically screwed, and they did it to themselves. When they gave the 2:00PM (CST) hour back to their affiliates to accommodate the pricey ‘Katie’, which promptly flopped, there was no way in hell the affiliates were going to give that hour back. History could have told them that. Without a full network of stations, there is no real possibility of a new soap being launched. ABC News has been itching to expand GMA, and the only way for that to happen is for either GH or The View to go.
Oprah was the last of her kind on daytime. Talk shows like hers will NEVER excel again!
Love to see the karma continue of ‘programs’ the network thought would be so great when they cancelled the ABC soaps, especially OLTL!!
We had to endure the pain of the Daytime Emmys this year which turned out to be one long commercial for things Tyra including this not-a-surprise-trainwreck!! And not to mention her dreadful fashions she subjected to us!
I always feel bad for the behind the scenes professionals on these shows when they are out of a job because of cancellations, but they are far more talented than Tyra and will be picked up elsewhere.
FABlife is dreadful. Derivative and empty of meaningful content. And the hosts just do nto engage. It all seems forced. Am not sure why the webs think this is what we want. I prefer daytime dramas and am sad that a few decided they were out of fashion. Y&R scores 5M viewers, more than eye some primetime network fare!
PLEASE bring back One Life to Live!!! I want to see Viki Buchanan & the rest of the gang on my tv!
What a dreadful show. I hope i tgets cancelled. The Chew should be the lead in to GH since that’s been the only successful talk/lifestyle show ABC has been able to muster.
The network has two black eyes already. They don’t learn. They won’t put another soap back on the air and their attempts to create ratings keep hitting them in the face.
I say just leave the time OFF AIR. I would rather watch an OFF AIR station then any of the crap they have had on for the last few years.
Just put on “Bewitched” and “I Dream of Genie!”
I’d that that!
I think everyone needs to give up this pipe dream of OLTL and AMC coming back, as much as we all would like that. The legal wranglings between ABC and Prospect Park have killed that chance. Regarding these cheesy lifestyle/talk shows…the majority of viewers are middle class working people. Even the name FABLife, just has connotations of wealth, and grandeur, and arrogance. Middle America cannot relate to haughty notions like that, and have no desire to. People are busy working, raising families, putting food on the table, and haven’t the time or the inclination to watch celebrity vanity and excess… Read more »
Your right, AMC and OLTL at this point is a pipe dream! I would put a new soap on ABC, 5 days a week, a half hour show. I would hire former cast member’s from the above mentioned soaps. I also dont mind all the typical soap scenarios you listed. Its what makes a soap a soap! However, the problem seems to be the name “Soap.” It seems to turn people off, these days. When Don Johnson was out promoting “Blood and Oil” he cringed when they called his new show a soap and or compared it to Dallas.
There is a parallel between soaps and comic books. Each have been around forever, take suspension of belief to enjoy, and deal with recycled plots. But comics have experience a resurgence with online accessibility, and superheros online, in film, and all over tv. I am hoping for the same with soaps (well maybe not the film part). I agree that many of these plots have been recycled to death. When you can guess what’s coming weeks or months away that means the writing has has gotten really tired. (I know this has become the case for GH, even under the… Read more »
The only thing that would get me to watch ABC is to bring back All My Children. A new soap which had actors from AMC might also work for me. I love to see ABC struggling with these stupid talk shows!
Now will TPTB at ABC/D finally admit that idiot Brian Frons was wrong. The soap fans “can’t be trained like dogs to watch his vision of daytime”. Every OLTL replacement show has failed and I don’t know anyone who watches the Spew. I’ll bet if ABC ran repeats of OLTL from the very beginning ratings would soar! Bring back Love In The Afternoon!!
ABC screwed themselves when they cancelled those two soaps. I wonder what they think of Brian Frons (sp) now! I would want OLTL back on the air but I don’t see it happening. When ABC realized the uproar with the news of cancellation, it should have reversed the decision immediately. Every show in OLTL timeslot has failed and I, for one, will not watch any show they broadcast at that time along with The Chew in AMC’s timeslot.
Brian Frons did what his bosses wanted, he got rid of two soaps that got mediocre ratings and were expensive to produce. The Chew does well and makes more money than any soap. Advertisers do not want to invest in soaps, the audience is too old.
There is NO loyalty in show business. After all, its called show BUSINESS! None of the networks care about the fans. If it isnt making money, its off the air! Okay, BUT, how is that working where all these shows have failed after you screwed AMC and OLTL: fans? And GH, they continue to stay profitable. Why cant you see that if GH is still chugging, at least ONE other soap could do that again? As for Tyra, if EP’s lied to her and she is fed up okay, BUT I think she knows the show sucks and she is… Read more »
OH, Lord! Good riddance! We have abc on at work and it was nice to not hear her yapping barking the last few shows. I understand the show is being cancelled anyways, so who cares? Nothing will ever replace OLTL. (Maybe Helena put a curse on any show that takes over OLTL’s time slot. Hmmm.)
As a fan of AMC and OLTL, the “easy” answer from fans is to resurrect both soaps, as a half hour each, and fill the 2pm hour that way. But we don’t have to justify the expenses of that undertaking, we just want the dream to come true, going on four years later after losing these soaps. The risky answer is to create a new half hour soap featuring actors that are familiar to daytime audiences, with some type of altered, modernized, more relevant subject matter making it the soap of today’s viewer. Is it likely? No, but would it… Read more »
AMC and OLTL would never be near the same..
Many of their actors have moved on others have aged and some simply might be not interested..
Both soaps would mainly be new actors or characters.
And the millions to produce not 1 but 3 soaps, well ABC would never do that, never, and I do not blame them .. Never going to happen.
There will be no soaps created and canceled soaps are not coming back. Scripted drama is very expensive to produce and the daytime audience is unattractive to advertisers.
Ah, Rapids, what goes around comes around and what is old is new again. SOME day they will be back. SOME day they will seem like a great idea and seem new again. Hollywood is out of ideas so it is only a matter of time.
There is some bittersweet justice that ABC cannot get a successful replacer for our beloved OLTL! In 6 weeks it will be 4 years!
Shame on ABC
Bring back a 30 minute version of OLTL. The head writer is available as will be many of the actors. Evening soaps are burning it up!
I saw George Lucas on CBS Morning News on Friday. Charlie Rose did an interview about the upcoming Star Wars blockbuster and the fact that since Disney took over Lucas didn’t want to be involved. This brilliant creator of Star Wars said that it was a SOAP OPERA and that all Disney was really interested in was a laser show. He said it was the multi-generational storytelling of this SOAP OPERA that made it the great success it is today and that without that he wanted no part of it. The genre isn’t dead. You just need those with the… Read more »
General Hospital
GH’s Gavin Houston Teases How Zeke’s Love Life Is About to Take an Unexpected Turn
Next week on General Hospital, Gavin Houston returns as Portia’s (Brooke Kerr) brother, Zeke. When viewers last saw Zeke, he was in Port Charles for Portia’a wedding to Curtis (Donnell Turner) back in February.
Photo: ABC
Fast-forward to June and Zeke is back. However, from the looks of it, Zeke might find love this time around, or is it something more casual?
According to preview in the latest issue of Soap Opera Digest, when Zeke settles in at the Metro Court he grabs a drink at the pool, and while there sees a very attractive woman.
Photo: ABC
Houston shared on the encounter, “He sees this attractive woman and tries to pick her up by being his fun-loving, charming self. He buys her a drink and there is definitely some chemistry there.”
However, apparently this woman is someone who his sister, Portia, knows well. The smart money is that he is hitting on Jordan, who has just walked out on a conversation with her ex-husband, Curtis. This, following the two kissing and Curtis going back to his marriage with Zeke’s sister. But could the woman Zeke is impressed by be someone else?
Share your thoughts on Zeke’s return, and who you think will be the woman he is interested in via the comment section below.
News
Eva Longoria on Reprising Her Role of ‘Desperate Housewives’ Gabby : “I Would Be The First to Sign Up for a Reboot”
Just where would Gabrielle Solis be today? That was the question posed to Eva Longoria, who is on a publicity campaign for her directorial film debut with Flamin’ Hot.
The former Desperate Housewives star spoke with Access Hollywood’s Mario Lopez, where she revealed where she thinks Wisteria Lane’s Gabby would be today. Longoria chimed in, “She’d be an influencer for sure … she’d be a social media mogul.”
When asked if she would be down for a revival of Desperate Housewives, Longoria enthusiastically said, “I would be the first to sign up for a reboot. I miss Gabby so much. I miss being Gabby Ruiz.”
Photo: ABC
Even though, Desperate Housewives ran from 2004-2013, since its premiere 20 years ago times have changed. The series creator, Marc Cherry, doesn’t seem so ready to bring back Wisteria Lane.
Longoria shared, “He feels like there’s no Why now?” She added that Cherry also expressed, “What do I have to say with these characters that we haven’t already fully mined?”
Photo: Hulu
Soap fans also recall Eva played Isabella on The Young and the Restless from 2001-2003, before joining Desperate Housewives a year later. Flamin Hot, which tells the biographical story of the invention of the Flamin’ Hot Cheetos” is set for release on Hulu and Disney+ on June 9th.
Would you want to see a reboot of Desperate Housewives? Share your thoughts in the comment section below.
All My Children
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B&B Alum Pierson Fodé in Consideration to be the Next ‘Superman’
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Sherri Shepherd Loses Her Wig During Talk Show and Says, ‘The Show Must Go On’
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