FROM THE VAULT: VARIETY ARTICLE ON DAYS, MARCH 6, 1967
AS LONG AS SERIALS IDENTIFY WITH PEOPLE AND THEIR problems they'll be as popular tomorrow as they were 26 years ago and the end is a long way off. Few have a better right to say it than Betty Corday. Her long involvement with the soaps (she detests the word) has, through a tragic circumstance, elevated her to executive producer of one of NBC's strongest daylighters, "Days Of Our Lives" (last rating 8.1).
When her husband, Ted, died last July, she took over the reins and has maintained the serial's strong pull with the hausfrau. With the temporary leave of Gail Patrick Jackson and sometime directorial activity of Ida Lupino, Mrs. Corday remains the lone femme in Hollywood television with the exalted title and working at it five days a week. What little is left of live television in Hollywood, she submits that it's the best training ground extant for all areas of showbusines.
The pay doesn't reach the grandiose figures of primetime, but it's steady for 52 weeks of the year. "Serials haven't changed much over the years," says Mrs. Corday, "because our province remains fixed, that of creating dramas of present-day life that evoke an empathy with the home viewer and mirror her own problems. We don't want to get embroiled in controversial matters so we avoid messages. We try to depict what happens in the typical home with at times certain literary license. NBC has been fair and rarely have our scripts been sent back for rewrite."
The working schedule would frighten off most actors. The morning call is for 6:30 and the day ends at 8:00. That's for five days a week to put away five half-hour shows. Not only have there been no complaints but some pretty fair actors in Hollywood have banged at her door. She uses nine regulars, among them Macdonald Carey (Tom Horton), Coleen Gray (Diane Hunter) and Terry O'Sullivan (Richard Hunter), with occasional parts for four or five others. Since Corday Productions was formed, the femme partner, who came out of Benton & Bowles where she was the agency producer on serials, has been associated with only long-runners.
Their "As The World Turns" has long been a rating leader but now is in the Procter & Gamble stable. Irna Phillips, who has been writing serials since they came into being, is story editor on "Days", and described by Mrs. Corday as having the mind of a novelist, who can dictate an entire episode without as much as a pause. The Corday operation is linked with both Screen Gems and NBC and now that she is a permanent resident, other serials will be coming along.
The talent pool in Hollywood makes casting a delight, what with the steady stream of actors from N.Y. and those "between" pictures and tv assignments eager to pick up experience and the remuneration that goes with it. Daytime serials have spawned many a star for feature pictures and television so they are no longer scorned as a "last resort."
AS LONG AS SERIALS IDENTIFY WITH PEOPLE AND THEIR problems they'll be as popular tomorrow as they were 26 years ago and the end is a long way off. Few have a better right to say it than Betty Corday. Her long involvement with the soaps (she detests the word) has, through a tragic circumstance, elevated her to executive producer of one of NBC's strongest daylighters, "Days Of Our Lives" (last rating 8.1).
When her husband, Ted, died last July, she took over the reins and has maintained the serial's strong pull with the hausfrau. With the temporary leave of Gail Patrick Jackson and sometime directorial activity of Ida Lupino, Mrs. Corday remains the lone femme in Hollywood television with the exalted title and working at it five days a week. What little is left of live television in Hollywood, she submits that it's the best training ground extant for all areas of showbusines.
The pay doesn't reach the grandiose figures of primetime, but it's steady for 52 weeks of the year. "Serials haven't changed much over the years," says Mrs. Corday, "because our province remains fixed, that of creating dramas of present-day life that evoke an empathy with the home viewer and mirror her own problems. We don't want to get embroiled in controversial matters so we avoid messages. We try to depict what happens in the typical home with at times certain literary license. NBC has been fair and rarely have our scripts been sent back for rewrite."
The working schedule would frighten off most actors. The morning call is for 6:30 and the day ends at 8:00. That's for five days a week to put away five half-hour shows. Not only have there been no complaints but some pretty fair actors in Hollywood have banged at her door. She uses nine regulars, among them Macdonald Carey (Tom Horton), Coleen Gray (Diane Hunter) and Terry O'Sullivan (Richard Hunter), with occasional parts for four or five others. Since Corday Productions was formed, the femme partner, who came out of Benton & Bowles where she was the agency producer on serials, has been associated with only long-runners.
Their "As The World Turns" has long been a rating leader but now is in the Procter & Gamble stable. Irna Phillips, who has been writing serials since they came into being, is story editor on "Days", and described by Mrs. Corday as having the mind of a novelist, who can dictate an entire episode without as much as a pause. The Corday operation is linked with both Screen Gems and NBC and now that she is a permanent resident, other serials will be coming along.
The talent pool in Hollywood makes casting a delight, what with the steady stream of actors from N.Y. and those "between" pictures and tv assignments eager to pick up experience and the remuneration that goes with it. Daytime serials have spawned many a star for feature pictures and television so they are no longer scorned as a "last resort."
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