The History Of Former NBC Soap Passions Once Seen On e.tv

Passions debuted in 1999 with major fanfare. Creator Reilly had been credited for a large surge in the ratings for Days of our Lives years before, thanks to innovative storylines like that of heroine Dr. Marlena Evans being possessed by Satan that drew new viewers, but also tended to alienate stalwart fans. With Passions, Reilly was able to start with a blank slate and no pre-existing fan base to please.

In the early days of the show, Passions heroine Sheridan Crane is identified as a close friend of Diana, Princess of Wales; soon Sheridan recalls speaking to Diana on the phone immediately prior to the 1997 car accident which took the Princess' life. Sheridan also has a similar accident in the same Paris tunnel, and speaks to a "guardian Angel Diana" who urges her to fight to survive, which drew considerable controversy. Sheridan later adopts the name Diana after a boating accident that results in amnesia.

The opening days of the show also introduced the Theresa/Ethan/Gwen love triangle that persisted as an ongoing main storyline to the very last episode of the series.

For much of the first three to four years of the series, supernatural elements such as witches, warlocks, and closet doors leading to Hell were major plot points, many surrounding the machinations of the centuries-old witch Tabitha Lenox and her doll-brought-to-life sidekick, Timmy — named by Entertainment Weekly as one of their "17 Great Soap Supercouples" in 2008. In 2001, HarperEntertainment released Hidden Passions , a tie-in novelization presented as Tabitha's diary, exposing the secrets and pasts of the town's residents. Passions featured a storyline involving Tabitha and Timmy promoting the book, which reached #4 on the real-life New York Times Best Seller list and garnered the series two alternative covers of TV Guide in July 2001.

In 2003, Passions submitted a trained orangutan named BamBam, who had been portraying the recurring role of Precious, for a Daytime Emmy Award. Precious was the non-speaking live-in nurse and caregiver for elderly Edna Wallace, and held an unrequited love for Luis Lopez-Fitzgerald, which was depicted in elaborate fantasy sequences. In early 2004, the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, which administers the awards, disallowed the entry with the following statement:

Our ruling is based on the belief that the Academy must draw a line of distinction between animal characters that aren't capable of speaking parts and human actors whose personal interpretation in character portrayal creates nuance and audience engagement that uniquely qualifies those performers for consideration of television's highest honor.

In summer 2005, the prominent character Simone Russell came out as homosexual; Passions made daytime history by being the first serial to show two women — Simone and love interest Rae Thomas — in bed making love. In 2007, it was revealed that longtime hero Chad Harris-Crane was cheating on his wife with another man. This was also a daytime first, with the men portrayed in bed together. Passions also broke new ground in 2007 with its portrayal of Vincent as an intersexual who becomes pregnant with his own father's son.

Nearly seven years after the debut of Passions on July 5, 1999, the NBC-owned Sci Fi Channel began airing the series from its first episode starting February 13, 2006; the reruns had originally been announced to begin on February 6. Due to low ratings, the reruns were taken off the air as of May 25, 2006. On August 15, 2006, Passions became the first daytime drama to make full episodes available for download and purchase from the online music store iTunes. On November 6, 2006, the show also became the first daytime drama to make full episodes available for free viewing via streaming on NBC.com.

Though plagued since its inception by low overall Nielsen ratings, Passions was historically top-rated in key demographics. The series was not renewed by NBC for a full ninth season in 2007 because of its low ratings coupled with the network's decision to extend its morning news and talk show Today to a fourth hour. Since NBC owned the series entirely, NBC began shopping for other networks, especially cable networks to pick up the series for a ninth season, however there was no luck in other networks willing to pick up the series because of devastating low ratings and extreme expensive production costs. In April 2007, Satellite provider DirecTV bought exclusive rights from NBC to continue airing Passions, with most principal cast members staying on. As the series was coming to an end on NBC, Passions Live talk show hosted by Eric Martsolf premiered in August 2007 every Thursday night on DirecTV's The 101 giving fans the chance to call the show and interact live with Passions cast members, making Passions the first and only soap opera to ever have live talk show in U.S. history. The Passions Live talk show continued to air every Thursday night after moving to DirecTV until October 2007. The live show was also streaming live on the Official Passions Site at NBC.com. The series ended its NBC run on September 7, 2007, and new episodes began airing on DirecTV's original-programming channel The 101 on September 17, 2007, making Passions both the first soap opera broadcast on a direct broadcast satellite service and the first series to make such a transition from broadcast television. The series ran Monday to Thursday at 2 pm ET/11 am PT, with repeats airing later in the day and on weekends. Although NBC.com continued to cover the series' official website with updating features, video clips of each episode aired, updating news, and products relating to Passions, including all of the full videos of Passions Live show once the series left NBC and had moved to DirecTV, initially new episodes were no longer available for free viewing on the Passions official website at NBC.com or for purchase at iTunes.com since NBC's broadcasting decisions were entirely sold to DirecTV and the NBC.com Passions site promoted a DirecTV link letting fans know that Passions was no longer airing on NBC and was only available on DirecTV. On September 27, 2007, DirecTV announced they would provide an All Access Pass to Passions to view all new episodes on the Official Passions Site at NBC.com for a monthly fee. This service began on October 1, 2007 for $19.99 a month then reduced to $14.99 a month when Passions' schedule was cut from four episodes a week to three episodes a week. After the series moved to DirecTV, the subscription service added a special feature where a trivia question relating to Passions would pop up on each episode airing on The 101 for viewers to use their remote control to answer. Passions is first and only soap opera to ever have this type of feature.

On December 10, 2007, Variety magazine and various cast members confirmed that DirecTV had decided not to renew Passions for another year, but ordered 52 additional episodes to be taped through March 2008. New episodes of the series were broadcast until August 7, 2008, with DirecTV airing three new episodes per week starting January 2008. Universal Media Studios wrapped up production of Passions on March 28, 2008. The cast and crew were told at the wrap party that efforts to find a new outlet had failed and that the cancellation was final. Cast member McKenzie Westmore confirmed the news. Though Passions had been the highest-rated original program on DirecTV's The 101, it was reported that the network had failed to meet the projected number of new subscribers they had hoped to attract with the series.

Roundups #104: Insidus Games Presents Panic Restaurant, Adom TV To Air The Silent Thief And A Look At November's Lineup For WildEarth

Panic Restaurant is now available to download on Insidus Games

Panic Restaurant is a platform game that stars a chef named Cookie who must navigate through his own restaurant, which has been cursed by a rival chef named Ohdove. Cookie has to battle evil food monsters with kitchen utensil weapons in six levels before taking on Ohdove in a final battle.

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The Silent Thief coming soon to Adom TV

Jessie’s perfect life becomes a nightmare when her only son, Ethan is kidnapped by unknown persons. No contact is made by the kidnappers, making the police conclude that the kidnapping was an act of revenge. Jessie has no clue as to who holds a grudge against her or her husband, Brylle, since they live a relatively quiet life. Brylle is a hard working doctor while Jessie is a devoted housewife. However, Brylle suspects Amado, the father of a patient he failed to save, and Reign, a lover he is keeping from Jessie.

Jessie spends her time searching for Ethan. She gains an ally in Larry, the lead investigator of the case who has hidden feelings for her. She meets Marie, who is actually Reign pretending to be a friend and who is plotting to ruin her marriage and steal Brylle.

In Jessie’s quest to find her son, she uncovers secrets that will point to unlikely suspects and will push her to the limit. Will she get back everything that was taken from her?

The series airs from 31 October on Adom TV.

What to expect on WildEarth in November 2022?

WILD Babies
10-13th November

WildEarth CAT GMT CET ET Wild Babies 3.30pm - 7.30pm 1.30pm - 5.30pm 2.30pm -6.30pm 8.30am - 12.30pm
Like humans, baby animals must all learn to thrive on this planet. Watching them develop their own characters as they face their first days, weeks and months in the wild is fascinating.
For four days WildEarth will be celebrating wild babies and finding as many as we can on SafariLIVE. November is the time when many of the herbivore babies are born at the same time so as to have safety in numbers form the predators. Also a plethora of baby chicks will hatch in our birds' nests. Prepare for many hours of cuteness overload.

On The Hunt
26-27th October 2022
WildEarth CAT GMT CET ET On the Hunt 5.30am - 7.30pm 3.30am - 5.30pm 4.30am -6.30pm 10.30am - 12.30pm

On the Hunt is a detailed look at the remarkable strategies employed by hunters to catch their prey and the hunted to escape. Rather than simply concentrating on 'the blood and guts' of predatory behaviours we will focus more upon the diverse strategies predators use to catch their food, and also the various evasive techniques prospective prey use to escape death by predator.

Paramount Africa's Future Is Up In The Air As Several Of Their Websites Have Shut Down

For several months, Nicktoons has become a waste featuring mostly SpongeBob SquarePants and The Casagrandes with the Nick Jr. block adopting to a similar format with Peppa Pig and Paw Patrol. Basically, it appears as if Paramount is ready to call it quits.

But that's not the only thing that seems bizarre about Paramount as several brands ranging from Comedy Central, MTV, BET and Nickelodeon all once operated a regional site which gives you details about some of the content seen on the channel and was usually a place fans would engage.

Now just like Nicktoons, Paramount Africa's websites appears to have been discontinued as several consumers are redirected to a European based website.

Sure Paramount in Africa is managed by the folks in those regions but there is so much of a variation on which the company seems to have cut down with MTV and Nick Jr. But the brands in question had a lot of variation during their run.

Comedy Central, MTV Base and Nickelodeon have all been redirected to the Netherlands. Take into account, there's a slight variation aside from content there's the matter of language of which not a lot of viewers are very much familiar with.

Even the media sales website had been listed as spam or a rejected website which could be another indicator that Paramount is distancing their focus away from their linear channels and more to Paramount+.

Interesting to note, My5 a UK based streaming service is managing the once available BET Africa website. This is the brand that took away the linear feed to the channel within that region which kind of raises questions over Paramount's linear offering.

Although there's no definite release date, several Nickelodeon feeds (including Nicktoons and Nick Jr.) had been renewed through at least 2027 which is likely where Paramount MIGHT start pulling the cord on some if not all their linear channels.

I mean Asia did lose a Nickelodeon while as Latin America lost a Nicktoons perhaps a couple of feeds could join before that time but with the recent developments I wouldn't be all that shocked if Paramount followed their competitors in moving their content to streaming.

Links

Comedy Central: click here

Nickelodeon: click here
MTV and MTV Base: click here

BET: click here

Nickelodeon To Likely Remain On Air Until At Least 2027

For several months, Paramount has begun reducing the amount of focus invested onto their linear offering. Nicktoons is a prime example as the channel has been overflowing their lineup with SpongeBob SquarePants and a spinoff to The Loud House, The Casagrandes.

The Loud House was getting the same amount of attention as abovementioned shows but no one knows at this point why it fell off the schedule more turn to its censorship at Nickelodeon while others turn to the current offering on Nicktoons mostly scrapped content.

NickMusic which has been more of a hit miss or hit run is the only thing giving Nicktoons life at this point. But with the amount of local music flooding the airwaves I'm sure MTV Base will do a better job pampering the existing lineup in the show.

As mentioned, Paramount seems to be cutting back on their linear channels. It's not only Nicktoons that has been affected but MTV, Comedy Central, BET and Nickelodeon appear to be tagging along as their websites had been wiped off the face of the earth.

Paramount had been gaining more exclusivity to Nickelodeon as the brand shuttered in Asia and watered down in Canada with Nicktoons suffering a similar fate in Latin America. As for Africa, Nicktoons is being treated like MTV Hits - non existent.

As much as the evidence of a potential closure keeps piling up. The sad part to all of that is the channel's licence in some parts of Europe primarily Scandinavia, Poland and Netherlands had been extended for another 5 long and boring years.

As seen on Paramount Africa's websites, most of their feeds had been redirected to these regions primarily Netherlands hinting at the possibility that Nicktoons even sister channels Nickelodeon and Nick Jr could remain on air for another 5 years although their duration is yet to be confirmed.

MultiChoice has halted a lot of channels during the year and this is me hoping that Nicktoons doesn't make it through 2027 unscathed as Da Vinci a channel which is more productive was almost crucified for the JimJam and Baby TV inspired Moonbug Kids.

Could BET Africa Be Taking The Digital Plunge As My5 Is All That Is Left Of Former Website?

Last year, it was reported Paramount will be closing the black skewed entertainment channel BET in the UK as part of a digital approach set by the company in question and at the time questions amounted to the digital endeavours for audiences in Africa.

BET has been active in the African market through DStv since 2014 serving up shows like My Wife And Kids, Real Husbands Of Hollywood, Love And Hip-Hop, Black Ink Crew, All Of Us and Mary Mary.

Over the years, the channel had become a victim of a dry spell often struggling to source out fresher entertainment and relied solely on content already viewed on Paramount's other brands Comedy Central and MTV.

As seen in the UK, My5 (aka Channel 5) a black based streaming service happens to be the distributor of BET and appears to have taken possession of the African feed although the brand shows no signs of rolling out in the region.

Although the linear version of the brand is defunct in the UK the one in Africa seems unlikely to be shuttered for the foreseeable future or for as long as the upcoming streamer Paramount+ has yet to rollout in the region.

Paramount+ is set to leverage a lot of existing content from their linear counterparts and as seen with Nickelodeon it has practically become a graveyard to their programming which is where the current local offering on BET might as well sit.