One Life to Live

One life to Live was created by Agnes Nixon, and debuted on the ABC network on July 15th, 1968. ABC took note of the other soap operas that had been created by Nixon, such as Another World, and asked her to write another series for their network. Since Nixon had been experienced in writing the type of soap opera style that had recently been introduced to the daytime format, ABC thought she could create a hit for their network as well. Nixon wanted to create another soap that broke the traditional lines and restraints of soaps that had been seen to date. So she created One Life to Live that focused on more controversial plot lines, characters that had underlying values, as well as socio economic and societal issues that were prevalent in the viewer’s everyday life. One Life to Live is set in the fictional town of Llanview, Pennsylvania. Llanview is modeled after Chestnut Hill, and actual suburb of Philadelphia. One Life to Live revolves around the wealthy Lord and Siegels families, middle class Rileys and Woleks, and the Grays, which are an African American family. One Life to Live presents topics and issues that are as varied as the families showcased on the program. One Life to Live prides itself as having a varied ethnic cast, humor, substantial issues, as well as strong actors. Victoria Lord, played by Erika Slezak, has always held a significant role on the program as she has suffered by love and loss, disease, rape, divorce, as well as a dissociative identity disorder. One Life to Live has also been known to revisit important and popular plotlines throughout its history often finding characters that were thought to be dead are found to be alive. One Life to Live has also enjoyed being able to integrate crossovers with other soap operas such as All My Children and General Hospital. This keeps viewers guessing and on their toes for they never know who could show up where. One Life to Live has achieved many awards including dozens upon dozens of daytime Emmy’s for their show as a whole and for individual actors. Erika Slezak has received the most notoriety as she has achieved half a dozen daytime Emmy’s during her stint on One Life to Live. The show celebrated its 40th anniversary in July of 2008 and also celebrated the return of some popular characters in hope of increasing viewership for the show. Other popular plotlines have also returned to the show to attain retention of viewers that have previously watched the show. All in all, One Life to Live has been going strong since its debut in 1968 and continues to enjoy tremendous success from its loyal fan base. One Life to Live is also viewed very highly from critics and was called, “the year’s most compelling series” by Soap Opera Digest in 2008. There is no telling how far One Life to Live will go as it has created a formula that is unstoppable.

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