One Life to Live (often abbreviated as OLTL) is an American soap opera broadcast on the ABC television network for more than 43 years, from July 15, 1968, to January 13, 2012, and then on the internet as a web series on Hulu and iTunes via Prospect Park from April 29 to August 19, 2013. Created by Agnes Nixon, the series was the first daytime drama to primarily feature ethnically and socioeconomically diverse characters and consistently emphasize social issues. One Life to Live was expanded from 30 minutes to 45 minutes on July 26, 1976, and then to an hour on January 16, 1978.
One Life to Live heavily focuses on the members and relationships of the Lord family. Actress Erika Slezak began portraying the series' protagonist Victoria Lord in March 1971 and played the character continuously for the rest of the show's run on ABC Daytime, winning a record six Daytime Emmy Awards for the role. In 2002, the series won an Emmy for Outstanding Drama Series.
On September 17, 2010, One Life to Live became the last American daytime soap opera taped in New York City; it earned this distinction after As the World Turns, which had been taped in New York since its 1956 premiere, aired its final episode. No daytime serial has emanated from New York since; ABC's lone soap, General Hospital, CBS's The Young and the Restless and The Bold and the Beautiful, and Peacock's Days of Our Lives are all recorded in California and CBS's other serial, Beyond the Gates, is produced outside of Atlanta.
On April 14, 2011, ABC announced that it was canceling One Life to Live after nearly 43 years on the air due to low ratings. On July 7, 2011, production company Prospect Park announced that it would continue the show as a web series after its run on ABC, but later suspended the project. The show taped its final scenes for ABC on November 18, 2011, and its final episode on the network aired on January 13, 2012, with a cliffhanger. On January 16, 2012, the following Monday, ABC replaced One Life to Live with a new and short-lived talk show called The Revolution that aired until July 6 of the same year.
On January 7, 2013, Prospect Park resumed its plan to continue One Life to Live as a daily 30-minute web series on Hulu and iTunes via The Online Network. The relaunched series premiered on April 29, 2013. The new series was plagued with several behind-the-scenes problems, most notably a litigation between Prospect Park and ABC regarding the misuse of One Life to Live characters on General Hospital. On September 3, 2013, Prospect Park suspended production of the series until the lawsuit with ABC was resolved.
Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
No comments yet — be the first.
Sign in — Sign in to leave a comment or review.