Coronavirus: American weekday soaps The Bold and the Beautiful and The Young and the Restless suspend production - report.

by Thinus Ferreira

The American weekday soaps The Bold and the Beautiful and The Young and the Restless have both suspended production according to reports, along with another soap, General Hospital which shut down last week already because of the rapid growth in cases of the Covid-19 novel coronavirus pandemic globally.

Episodes of The Bold and the Beautiful are carried on Vodacom's Video Play service and EVA (DStv 141).

Deadline reports that The Bold and the Beautiful, produced by Bell-Phillip Television Productions, as well as The Young and the Restless, produced by Bell Dramatic Serial Company and Sony Pictures Television, are shuttering from Tuesday 17 March 2020.

Days of Our Lives seen in South Africa on e.tv, produced by Corday Productions and Sony Pictures Television, already shut down for four months in November 2019 due to budget reasons.

Collectively South Africa's TV industry has multiple large ensemble cast and crew weekday soaps - each numbering far more than 100 people - that are produced for the SABC, e.tv, as well as M-Net's Mzansi Magic (DStv 161) and kykNET (DStv 144) channels carried on MultiChoice's DStv satellite pay-TV service, none of which have yet shut down production because of the coronavirus.

M-Net (DStv 101) will very likely have to postpone the filming and change the island location of its upcoming 8th Survivor SA: Immunity Island season, produced by Afrokaans, that was set to broadcast in September, while Rapid Blue will likely implement changes for the second season finale and "Women Tell All" episodes of The Bachelor SA.

Questions are also swirling around the latest 16th season of Idols, produced by [SIC] Entertainment, and how it will continue given that the show has a contestant and crew complement of over 100 people, as well as several local scripted drama series in production across various TV channels.

SABC and Danie Odendaal Productions will likely be forced to cancel the upcoming 20th anniversary celebrations and viewers' competition for its longrunning 7de Laan Afrikaans weekday soap.

Sony's hack attack in 2014 in America impacting e.tv in 2015 in South Africa - here's just one example.

You won't find episode synopses on the electronic programme guides (EPGs) of MultiChoice's DStv, On Digital Media's StarSat or Platco Digital's OpenView HD, printed in the TV tabloids or newspaper TV listings of February's upcoming episodes of The Young and the Restless - and it's not part of a fiendish plot by Victor Newman to get back at Nikki.

Episode synopses for weekdays soaps are usually issued a month to a month and a half in advance of the actual broadcast date to the press by broadcasters since the factory-run TV puppy mills churn out episodes with a 2-month buffer period - except in extreme circumstances where major production disruption occurs like for instance SABC1's Generations which completely shut down in November 2014.

Something else that shut down at the end of 2014 however was Sony Pictures in Los Angeles.

An intrusive and devastating cyber attack, exposing dirty studio insider secrets while internal correspondence, movie deals and payments, contact details, salacious studio executive emails ("Kevin Hart is a whore") and even unreleased Sony movies came flooding out.

Due to intense paranoia and security concerns, Sony Pictures clamped down and regressed to Hollywood's "dark ages" - basically doing everything since December on pen and paper, issuing paychecks manually on old machines, using BlackBerrys, fax machines and Gmail accounts and picking up the phone to actually call people and completely avoiding email.

In a globalised electronic entertainment world where Hollywood studios, distributors and broadcasters are inextricably linked, 2014's Sony hack attack is impacting distributors and broadcasters around the world in big and small ways - with a lot of it not readily visible or known to ordinary, outsider consumers and viewers.

One small absence like e.tv's The Young and the Restless episode synopses is however part of the little canaries in the coal mine signaling how truly devastating Sony's hack attack really was and its ongoing global impact on the entertainment biz.

e.tv in South Africa usually receives its monthly The Young and the Restless episode synopsis directly from Sony Pictures in Los Angeles. But Sony Pictures is now scared of email and has reverted to doing as much as possible on actual physical reams and reams of paper.

With the system being hacked and Sony Pictures slowly coming to grips with the hack impact and restarting, renewing and restoring the hacked system, Sony Pictures has not been able to, or refrained from sending February episode synopses of The Young and the Restless.

e.tv literally doesn't have it yet - unless, or until the disused fax machine in Marcel Golding's gilded but now empty corner office perhaps sputters to life.

So here's a little clue as to Sony's health report in 2015 as the globo company slowly nurses itself back to health after the hack:

When you are able to read again about Victor and Nikki and the rest of the people of Genoa City, realise that it signals that blood is once again starting to circulate through the veins of Sony's damaged worldwide content distribution system.

BREAKING. The Talk, The Young and the Restless, The Bold and the Beautiful, all renewed for another year.

The Talk (M-Net), The Young and the Restless (e.tv) and The Bold and the Beautiful (SABC3) all seen in South Africa, have all been renewed in America by the CBS network.

It means that the two daytime soaps and the American talk show all seen on weekdays in South Africa, will all endure with yet another year of available episodes.

BREAKING. The Young and the Restless' iconic soap star Jeanne Cooper dead at age 84, 'her light finally gave into the wind'.

Jeanne Cooper, from the American daytime soap The Young and the Restless, known to millions of fans around the world as Katherine Chancellor, has died. She was 94.

The Young and the Restless is shown in South Africa on e.tv.

Jeanne Cooper was hospitalised in April for unknown reasons after an undisclosed illness. Jeanne Cooper's oldest son, the actor Corbin Bernsen, announced the death of his mother in Los Angeles on Twitter today:

"Mom passed this morning. She was in peace and without fear. You all have been incredible in your love. In her name, share it today with others."

On Facebook Corbin Bernsen said that the last time he saw his mom - who've portrayed the iconic role for almost 40 years since 1973 - was on Friday.

"I said goodbye to her Friday, and even then not fully meaning it or expecting that would be the last time I saw her."

" And while her light finally gave into the wind that gives flight to all our journeys, there will always be a glimmer left behind by what she stood for."

The Young and the Restless turns 40 years old today; marks 40th anniversary with cake-cutting ceremony.

You know that sweeping piano and violin theme and today The Young and the Restless, the American soap seen in South Africa on weekdays on e.tv at 16:40, turns 40 years old.

You would have seen The Young and the Restless on the cover of the soap and television magazines in South Africa this week and stories inside to mark the 40th anniversary of The Young and the Restless which was first introduced to South African viewers on TV1 with a dubbed in Afrikaans sound track.

The Afrikaans sound track of Rustelose Jare was eventually ditched in December 1994 when regime change took hold of the SABC, not long afterwards the soap was also gone.

e.tv resurrected The Young and the Restless but the viewership in South Africa has simply never recovered to what it was in its heydey on TV1 with the evil meddling Sheila, Victor and Nikki, Mrs Chandler on the bottle, and the evil fat Rose who kidnapped the poor pregnant Nina and held her at the clinic against her will, waiting for her to give birth and wanting to steal her baby ... (I've watched lots of television, don't judge.)

Of course in America, The Young and the Restless is the number one most watched soap, produced by Bell Dramatic Serial Company and Sony Pictures Television.

The Young and the Restless commemorated today's 40th anniversary - it started on 26 March 1973 - and more than 10 000 episodes filled with backstabbing, marriages, divorces, betrayals and softly-lit scantily-clad romance scenes with a private cake-cutting ceremony on the show's CBS Television City sound stage which was attended by cast, crew and the producers.

"The Young and the Restless has such a legacy," says Jill Ferren Phelps, executive producer. "My charge is to bring it into the next decade and do so without disrupting anything, particularly the viewers who are so important to us. Our goal is to keep it fresh, keep it going for another 40 years."

The Bold and the Beautiful and The Talk renewed for further seasons; joining the already renewed The Young and the Restless.

The Bold and the Beautiful (SABC1) and The Talk (M-Net) have both been renewed for further seasons joining The Young and the Restless (e.tv) which had already been renewed as part of a multi-year deal in America by the CBS network.

The Bold and the Beautiful turns 26 this year and The Young and the Restless turns 40.

The Talk has been renewed for a 4th season and The Bold and the Beautiful for another year joining The Young and the Restless for another TV season.

The Young and the Restless fires its head writer Maria Erena Bell after 5 years, husband has to tell her.

The Young and the Restless (weekdays, e.tv, 16:40) fired its head writer Maria Erena Bell whose father-in-law created the America soap.

Daytime Confidential first reported that Maria Erena Bell is suddenly out after she joined as head writer in 2007.

The shocked Maria Erena Bell says she has no idea why Sony Pictures Television which produces the soap fired her.

She immediately vented on her Facebook page, saying "I was not given a reason and in fact I have heard nothing from Sony or CBS. They sent me a message through my husband Bill who had the terrible job of conveying that they'd gone around him and were letting me go".

Maria Erena Bell said "I fought hard for my vision and to keep the show on track with the characters that matter to the audience". She said "there have been a lot of tears shed in the last few days."

BREAKING. Melody Scott Thomas back at The Young & the Restless after sudden disappearance 5 months ago. (No amnesia to blame.)

Soap actress Melody Scott Thomas is back at The Young & the Restless (weekdays, e.tv, 16:40) after a major 5 month absence because the soap produced by Sony didn't want to pay her. What followed was plummeting ratings for the most popular soap in America on the CBS network.

The news that the very popular Melody Scott Thomas was gone from The Young & the Restless broke in June after she was already gone for the month of May. Now she's back in Genoa City as Nikki newman after 5 months after Sony asked her to return and she signed a new contract.

''They have come around and suddenly appreciate me again in the way that [Y&R creator] Bill Bell did back in the old days,'' Melody Scott Thomas told TV Guide. She said she doesn't know what happened regarding Sony who stopped using her since the end of April, saying ''Sony would have to tell you, but they won't.''

''I don't want to be the one speculating why they did what they did and why they finally came to me when they did, other than to say I'm very happy to have this whole ugly five months done and over. Strange things happen in this business. I don't know that we ever really know exactly why things go down the way they do. I just know it was never my decision to be gone,'' Melody Scott Thomas told TV Guide.

BREAKING. The Young & the Restless on e.tv renewed for another three years in America.

On the heels of the soap opera Days of Our Lives on SABC3 that was renewed for another two years in America earlier this month, comes the news that The Young & the Restless weekdays on e.tv has also been renewed for another three years in America where it's broadcast on the CBS network.

Just like Days of Our Lives, The Young & the Restless is also produced by Sony Pictures Television and it's America's number one soap in terms of viewership for the 22nd year in a row.

BREAKING. Soapie duel looming! e.tv moves The Young & the Restless earlier opposite Days of Our Lives!

You're reading it here first.

I can exclusively first reveal to you what Genoa City will be buzzing about tomorrow: that e.tv is moving the later afternoon soapie The Young & the Restless to a new timeslot of 16:40 on weekdays from March.

WHAT THIS MEANS: With Y&R moving out of the way on e.tv, Oprah's ratings on SABC3 should rise even further from March since e.tv will lose viewers in the 17:30 timeslot who now will get Medical Detectives on e.tv.

With Y&R now moving up against Days of Our Lives on SABC3 at 16:40 an interesting battle is now going to take place. Days is a very strong strong show on SABC3, delivering even higher ratings during the afternoon for SABC3 than even most evening or late night shows. E.tv however has a bigger footprint as a TV channel, so it will be interesting to watch this Young vs Days soap opera duel play out in the coming months.