It’s so sad that the daytime dramas many of us watched as teenagers and young adults are dying.
The cancellation of ABC’s “All My Children” and “One Life to Live” means we’re close to the end of the serial TV format that brought us such loved and hated characters as Erica Kane, Tad Martin and the Buchanan family – and so many hours of conversation about them.
Yes, “General Hospital,” “Days of Our Lives” and “Young and the Restless” remain, but probably not for long.
It’s been mentioned in news articles that more people now get their drama from reality TV and it's true that more water cooler talk now revolves around “American Idol,” “Survivor,” the “Real Housewives” and, sadly “Jersey Shore.”
The good news is that this transition demonstrates evolution. We’ve grown up.
You have to admit that following the lives of made-up people on a day-to-day basis and talking about them as if they were real is a little weird. Here in the 21st century when most of us can make movies on our cell phones and produce video in an instant, we’re a little too sophisticated and cynical to be concerned that Sonny’s going to get shot for the hundredth time or that Luke and Laura will never get back together.
Now we worry about actual living beings, even though we don’t know them from Adam Chandler. Who’ll get voted off the island? Will “The Situation” keep his washboard abs? Which celebrity loser will Donald Trump fire? How will the housewives keep buying Berkin handbags if they get divorced?
We even follow second and third tier TV. I’ve been on the streets of Manhattan with friends who point out: “There’s so-and-so from the third season of “Project Runway!”
But at least they’re real people. We’ve evolved all right. I wonder what’s next? Following the people on “You Tube” who make their kids do crazy things for their Flip video cams. Oh, right, Flip is dead now too.
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