By now, it is no surprise that soap fans are on fire over the double whammy of cancellations announced by ABC/Disney in April of this year. Protests have been held in New York, and across the nation, dating all the way back to April 26th, when the first wave of viewer dissatisfaction began to hit ABC/Disney. Twice, the Facebook Group Fans United Against ABC (FU-ABC, for short) has called on their 4,000-plus members to take to the streets. Both times, the movement has garnered media coverage from such notable sources as the Wall Street Journal. Another group, calling themselves Soap Fans United, staged the rally outside the ABC/Disney up-front presentations in New York City in May, creating what blogger Perez Hilton called a “riot.” Still stinging with the absence of All My Children from their daytime screens, the team at FU-ABC is taking a page out of another group of disgruntled Americans’ proverbial book, and plan on launching “Occupy Llanview” outside the Upper West Side studio where One Life to Live films from Nov. 14th through the 18th, as the show tapes its final ABC scenes.
“Occupy Llanview” is not, however being presented in the way that other “occupy” movement is, however. In an interview with FU-ABC spokesperson Kimberly Blackburn, I was informed that this event is slated to “…only last five days. We are going to be celebrating and commemorating the contributions of (OLTL and AMC creator) Agnes Nixon and One Life to Live, all at the same time.” That would presumably be a welcome change from the scathing comments which have been directed at ABC, and in more recent weeks, the network’s parent company, Disney, particularly with regards to the abysmal ratings of The Chew, which replaced All My Children. Also in contrast to their brethren a few miles to the south, soap fans do not plan on sleeping outside the studios (though I am sure the audience for The View, which often waits overnight outside before taping in the same building, wouldn’t mind the company) during their week-long vigil to maintain awareness about the changes in store for OLTL.
Even with OLTL joining AMC on their new home, The Online Network, in January, Blackburn says that there is a need to “…pay homage to the show as they say goodbye to the home they have known (ABC) since 1968. We will be there watching when this amazing cast and crew walk into the future next January…now, we just want them (the cast and crew) to know we are still here, still supporting our shows 100 percent.”
With fans who can recite from memory 40-plus years of storylines, that much was never in question.