SoapOperaFan.com . . . Days Of Our Lives Announcements/Breaking News

New! Exec Producer Shake-up: Gary Tomlin in / Ed Scott out!
Daytime vet Gary Tomlin has signed on as Days new Co-Executive Producer, replacing Ed Scott! "I have decided that it's in the best interest of the show's future to make this change in order to improve ‘Days’ both visually and emotionally,” said Ken Corday, Executive Producer. “We at ‘Days’ are grateful to Ed Scott for all of his contributions and amazing energy over the past year. Gary Tomlin brings a long successful history of being an actor's producer and a writer's producer to our cast and crew and I know the viewers will see the immediate results of this change for the better."

For those not familiar with the name, Tomlin first hit daytime in 1973, when he was cast on NBC’s "Search for Tomorrow" as Bruce Carson. He went behind the scenes, landing on Days as Co-Head Writer from 1980-1981, followed by stints as head scribe at "Another World" and "One Life to Live." In 1997 Tomlin rose to Exec Producer of NBC's "Sunset Beach", then on to "One Life to Live" in 2001, where the series received its first ever Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Series for the 2002 season.

"I'm very happy to be back at 'Days' where I began behind the scenes in the early 80's," said Tomlin. "It's wonderful to be given the opportunity to work with Ken Corday."

Alison Sweeny and other celeb moms auction maternity clothes off their bellies!

Like this dress? It could be yours for the right price! Ali Sweeny has signed and donated the raspberry Isabella Oliver Ruffle Wrap to the Isabella Oliver Celebrity Maternity Fashion Auction on the Clothes Off Our Back website.

If pink isn't your color, other Isabella Oliver maternity items were donated and/or signed by actress Minnie Driver, singer Lisa Marie Presley, actress Teri Hatcher (from her character's "Desperate Housewives" wardrobe), boxer Laila Ali, singer Gwen Stefani and many others. Proceeds from the auction will benefit Clothes Off Our Back's children's charities, including America's Second Harvest, The Art of Elysium, Hope North and H.E.L.P. Malawi.

You have until August 27 to win one of the lovely Isabella Oliver designed maternity items signed by your favorite celebrity mom, so go to clothesoffourback.org and put your bid in now!

Marlena's twin sister, Samantha, is heading back to Salem and Deidre Hall has agreed to play the dual role for one day. During the '70s and 80s, the role was played by Deidra's real life twin, Andrea Hall, until the character fell victim to the Salem Strangler. (One can only imagine this is a dreamy of ghostly return!) Andrea was back in the fold again in 2001 to play Hattie, the familiar stranger who became one of Stefano's pawns and underwent surgery to look even more like Marlena, but apparently wasn't available or wasn't asked this time around.

No Olympic Interruption!
In the past, Olympic action has been bad news for NBC's Days, which was preempted during the competitions the last go round, but not this year! It's confirmed that the show will air "great story" through the Olympic season, but best to keep an eye on your DVR/VCR schedule for any changes as the show may occasional air at alternate times.

Alison Sweeny expecting - It's a girl!
SoapOperaFan.com and our readers want to send out a big congrats to Alison Sweeny (Sami) and her husband Dave who are expecting their second child! Word is Ben can expect to be a big brother to a baby sister around January 20, 2009. While word is the expectant mom has been having some rough morning sickness, she looked gorgeous when we spotted her at an NBC party in mid-July.

Hottest of the Hotties!

The ladies and gentlemen of daytime are all hot, but TV Guide channel recently gave a shout out to the sexiest of them all in "Soaps' Sexiest Women," hosted by Y&R hottie Kristoff St. John, and "Soaps' Sexiest Men," hosted by Kelly Monaco. We've listed the winners below, but you can catch portions of both TV Guide specials on YouTube. Just search for "Soaps' Sexiest Women" and "Soaps' Sexiest Men."

The Young and the Restless' Daniel Goddard (Cain) came in at number 1!

2. Days of Our Lives James Scott (E.J.)
3. General Hospital's Greg Vaughan (Lucky)
4. All My Children's Cameron Mathison (Ryan)
5. Y&R's Joshua Morrow (Nick)
6. One Life to Live's David Fumero (Christian)
7. The Bold and The Beautiful's Jack Wagner (Nick)
8. Y&R's Kristoff St. John (Neil)
9. As the World Turns' Austin Peck (Brad, Days ex-Austin)
10. Days Jay Kenneth Johnson (Philip)
11. GH's Jason Thompson (Patrick)
12. Y&R's Thad Luckinbill (J.T.)
13. ATWT's Agim Kaba (Aaron)

14. AMC's Aiden Turner (Aidan)
15. GL's Daniel Cosgrove (Bill)
16. B&B's Kyle Lowder (Rick, Day's ex-Brady)
17. OLTL's John-Paul Lavoisier (Rex)
18. Days' Shawn Christian (Daniel)
19. B&B's Brandon Beemer (Owen, Days' ex-Shawn)
20. GL's John Driscoll (Coop)
21. AMC's Sterling Sulieman (Dre)
22. ATWT's Dylan Bruce (Chris)
23. B&B's Texas Battle (Marcus)
24. Day's Darin Brooks (Max)
25. GH's Brandon Barash (Johnny)

General Hospital's Kelly Monaco (Sam) came in at number 1!

2. Y&R' Michelle Stafford (Phyllis)
3. Days' Nadia Bjorlin (Chloe)
4. B&B's Katherine Kelly Lang (Brooke)
5. AMC's Rebecca Budig (Greenlee)
6. GL's Gina Tognoni (Dinah)
7. GH's Sarah Brown (Claudia)
8. Days' Arianne Zuker (Nicole)
9. Y&R's Sharon Case (Sharon)
10. ATWT's Terri Colombino (Katie)
11. Days' Kristian Alfonso (Hope)
12. ATWT's Julie Pinson (Janet)
13. One Life to Live's Bree Williamson (Jessica)

14. AMC's Alicia Minshew (Kendall)
15. Y&R's Christel Khalil (Lily, Y&R)
16. GH's Kirsten Storms (Maxie)
17. B&B's Lesli Kay (Felicia)
18. ATWT's Marie Wilson (Meg)
19. Y&R's Eva Marcille (Tyra)
20. ATWT's Marnie Schulenburg (Alison)
21. Days' Shelley Hennig (Stephanie)
22. GL's Michelle Ray Smith (Ava)
23. B&B's Ashley Jones (Bridget)
24. ATWT's Maura West (Carly)
25 GH's Rebecca Herbst (Liz)

FAN REPORT: Our family at the 2008 DOOL Basketball Game, by Shari Gamson
I have been watching DOOL since the day it started on television in 1965. My daughter, Teri, was three years old when she first started watching with me and she became a lifelong fan. Later, her son, Arik, now 26, also got hooked.

For the past several years, we have attended the annual DOL Celebrity Basketball Game in South Pasadena. This year, we again had the opportunity to join in the fun of watching the game, talking to the cast members and taking pictures with them. Teri asked several of them to autograph the DOOL tee-shirt she was wearing, and they did. During half time, she was asked by Jed Reynolds (James' son) to join in their practice and shoot a couple of baskets. She actually got one in! Last year, Arik convinced James Scott (E.J.) to come over and meet his Mom. This year, he wasn't there but, Arik brought a miniature surf board for Shawn Christian (Dr. Jonas) and he seemed really pleased to get it. When I met Bryan Datillo, (Lucas), I reminded him that I had asked to be his adopted grandmother. He said his real grandmother gives him a special birthday gift each year, but I didn't think I should copy her special gift. My husband, Sherman, isn't a big fan of the show, but he takes pictures for us and enjoys the game. He did miss seeing one cast member he really likes - Alison Sweeney (Sami), who was out of town.

I was fortunate to win one of the silent auction items, which included gift cards for three restaurants and a great autographed picture of James Reynolds (Abe)! All of the team players and other cast members were friendly and gracious to all the fans and, although still sweaty and tired from playing the game, most stayed as long as needed to satisfy their fans.

We thank Shari for sharing her experiences with meeting some of the DOOL cast! If you'd like to read another fan's BB game experience, check out the event blog from the Trivia Contest winner here!
If you have you have met a daytimer and would like to send us your story, along with photos, please contact us.
(Our contact info is on our main page Days Page.)

Renee Jones Talks!
To read what the woman behind Lexie has to say about coming, going and sticking around Salem, not to mention her current storylines, click here.

If you missed the Days of our Lives Celebrity Basketball Game, never fear. You can get the score from Lori here. Not only does she dish game highlights and rubbing shoulders with the stars, but she also caught some spoilers and scoop from Salem locals and expats like Jason Cook and Brandon Beemer, who relocated to General Hospital and Bold and the Beautiful, respectively.

Read Nadia Bjorlin's exclusive interview about Soap Cruise 2009 and being back in the Days fold here!

The Daytime Emmy Nominations are out! To find out which 6 nods Days received, click here.

As previously reported, Joseph Mascolo (Stefano) was proud to be on hand as his parents celebrated 80 years of marriage on April 23. We've learned that just nine days later, on May 2, Mascolo's father Peter passed away at 106 years of age, in Newington, Connecticut. Soap Opera Fan extends heartfelt condolences to Joseph and his family.

Nadia Bjorlin and her brothers release a Four Song EP! She is beautiful, she can act, and she can sing! On her website, she explains the type of music she sings... "The music is best described as classical crossover, in the likes of Josh Groban and Andrea Bocelli. We recorded these four songs because of the beautiful three part harmonies and of course it is accompanied by my brother Jean Paul on piano." Congrats to her! Find her music on Amazon or iTunes!

Christine Fix writes her newest wardrobe Q&A for DAYS fans! Congrats. It's her 1 year anniversary, writing these pieces. Fans, if you love the DAYS fashions, feel free to write to Christine here to ask if she can find out where a specific piece comes from and who it's created by! Read the newest article right here

Matt Cedeno Interview! Read it here! Find out what "Brandon Walker" has been up to recently and what he had to say to Soaps.com/Soap Opera Fan's Lori Wilson, about a return to DAYS!

Samantha's Friends
Bradenton, Florida: Once a year, several top soap actors gather for Samantha's Friends charity Fundraiser gala brunch and show and this year the event raised $20K to help young people challenged by a catastrophic illness gain their independence with the assistance of a service canine. To read more about the event and see photos, follow this link to soaps.com.

Hello! Some of you are noticing that we're currently under a little construction and I wanted to give all of you a heads up as to what's happening with Soap Opera Fan these days! Dustin has sold Soap Opera Fan, in order for him to concentrate on his studies! In a statement on the message board, Dustin says he has been maintaining this site for almost 14 years and decided to sell the site for various factors, one of which is to focus on graduate school! To quote Dustin: "So all these factors contributed in my decisions to give up the page, and I truly hope you can understand. Again this wasn't an easy choice for me, but essentially for so long I feel I have put the page first and now it was time to put me first." Dustin has stayed with us through the transition for a few months but at this point, he's no longer maintaining the site in any capacity. We've agreed that we both would like to see him posting from time to time as a "guest writer", depending on how much time he has available! We wish him all the best in his future endeavours, knowing that it is never easy to leave a huge part of your life that you've put all your love and hard work into.

A little about us! The company who purchased the site is called She Knows LLC. They own and operate various sites on the web including She Knows.com. My name is Christine Fix, I'm Canadian, reside in Toronto Ontario and work as a writer, reporter, senior producer and editor-in-chief of Soaps.com, Reality TV Magazine.com and now, Soap Opera Fan. My writers reside both in Canada and the US and are a wonderful and very talented team. If you've any questions or feedback about the site, myself or my staff, we've got an open door policy. Feel free to contact us at . Our staff will try to get back to everyone but we do ask that you allow our staff time to answer! Thank- you for your patience regarding the delay in our updates. Friday March 28th, we've started posting the spoilers and comings and goings and you can find our updates posted Monday March 31, 2008, for Passions and Days Of Our Lives!

Please feel free to read the updates, spoilers and comings and goings on Soaps.com and we'll be linking to our sister site with any interviews or major news that we feel you want and need to know about! Cheers and thank- you!

Sincerely,
Christine Fix
Senior Producer / Editor-in-Chief
Soap Opera Fan Soaps.com Reality TV Magazine.com

Daytime Emmy Pre-Nominations Released
The 2007 Daytime Emmy Pre-Nominations list has been released. These are the actors that the show puts in for consideration for the final nominations. The final list of who will be up for the award is selected at a later date. For now, here are the actors "Days" put in to be considered. For the list of all soap nominations, head over to Soaps.com.

Lead Actor -
Stephen Nichols (Steve)
James Scott (EJ)
Thaao Penghlis (Tony)
Peter Reckell (Bo)

Supporting Actor -
Bryan Datillo (Lucas)
Jay Kenneth Johnson (Phillip)
Joseph Mascolo (Stefano)

Supporting Actress -
Judi Evans (Bonnie/Adrienne)
Martha Madison (Belle)
Mary Beth Evans (Kayla)

Leading Younger Actor -
Blake Berris (Nick)
Darin Brooks (Max)
Matthew Florida (Ford)

Leading Younger Actress -
Kristen Renton (Morgan)
Shelley Hennig (Stephanie)
Rachel Melvin (Chelsea)

Update! Days Writers Re-Hired?
Deadline Hollywood Daily is reporting that at the WGA East's meeting this weekend on the resolution to the writers strike, that it was announced that the fired "Days" writers would all be getting their jobs back, because of technicalities that a fired striking writer must be replaced by another striking writer, not scab writers.

Days Writers Fired
Hogan Scheffer, who was brought in last year to take over as head writer, has been fired along with many to most of the writers under him, who have been on strike since November. Currently the show is being written by "scab" writers, writers which will cross the picket lines. Recently Hogan Scheffer's name along with the other writer's names fell off the credits for the show.

Tom Cassiello, one of the writers who was fired, has been posting about the drama on his myspace page. You can read his official "Goodbye Letter" on his Myspace page.

There has been no official announcement from Days about the following news yet. The writers strike is possibly ending this week, as contracts have been drawn up and are expected to be approved.

Writers Strike Could Hurt Soaps!
Writers Now Set To Strike!
Writers Strike Begins!
New Negotiations Scheduled!
Negations Stalled!

Last week the Writers Guild of America voted to strike come midnight, October 31st if new contracts are not agreed upon. Their current contracts expire at midnight on Halloween. At the heart of the strike is the fact that networks are now making more money from the shows through DVD sales, online plays and download sales through iTunes, cellphones, etc . . . In 2001 a strike was averted at the final hours of the night, which could happen again tonight. The last time the writers went on strike was in 1988, and it lasted for 5 months.

Should writers strike again, a lengthy strike could be disastrous for the soaps. Soaps usually only tape 3 weeks in advance, with the final scripts of the show not being delivered too much ahead of the taping of the shows. Should the strike happen and not be resolved quickly, we could see the soaps running out of new episodes by the end of November or early December. The spots would most likely be filled with old reruns of other syndicated shows, news programs or infomercials. Current primetime TV shows would run out of new episodes in early 08. Movies too would be affected as the studios would not meet projected dates for some of their upcoming blockbusters.

Even though several deals were offered, and a professional mediator was brought in, contract talks with the Writers Guild of America broke off last night. Today. November 1st, the guild is set to vote again on whether to strike or continue working without contracts in hopes of negotiating a deal. If they vote to strike, the strike could begin as early as tomorrow, November 2nd.

On Thursday the Writers Guild of America voted to strike, but as of yet no announcement has been made to when the strike will begin. Some news reports indicate it could happen at any moment, others say it will most likely be delayed until Sunday or Monday to allow last minute attempts to resolve the contracts before striking.

Last minute negotiations fell through, and the writers strike began at 12:01am this morning, Monday November 5th.

The soaps are currently without their writers, but have enough scripts and episodes to get through January, maybe into February. However there may be no interruption as negations to end the strike are set to begin again on November 26th.

In early December, a week after starting talks again, the WGA ceased talks and rejected deals presented to them. There have been no new talks since and the strike has gone on.

NBC Universal is acquiring Oxygen Media, one of the nation's leading female-focused cable television networks, thus expanding its highly successful cable portfolio. The announcement was made on October 9th by Jeff Zucker, President and CEO, NBC Universal.

Zucker said: "In just seven short years, Oxygen has become the crown jewel of independent networks. It's a terrific property with a clear mission, strong brand, and desirable audience. This acquisition increases our foothold in the advertiser-coveted young, upscale, female demographic, and perfectly complements our current roster of cable channels and plays to our strength of running and operating cable networks."

Oxygen was founded by current Chairman and CEO Geraldine Laybourne along with talk show host Oprah Winfrey and television producers Marcy Carsey, Tom Werner and Caryn Mandabach.

With all the rumors swirling about for almost a year now that "Days of Our Lives" could be canceled by NBC come 2009, and with "Passions" already having been dropped and picked up by DirecTV and NBC.com for online play, the acquisition of the Oxygen Channel is good news for soap fans as it very well could become the home of NBC soaps in the near future as more and more network soaps will probably find themselves on cable channels down the road.

Hey Tivo users, you can now get a special program all about "Days" on your Tivos! Curious what goes on backstage in Salem? Catch exclusive behind-the-scenes looks from your favorite soap opera, Days of our Lives, delivered right to your TiVo box every week via TiVoCast. To download this program, simply open up your Tivo menu. Select "Find Pograms" from the main menu, followed by "Download TV and Movies." "Days of Our Lives" should be an option on the list that appears. You can select to download the most current episode or have a season pass which automatically sends a new show to your Tivo every Wednesday. Please note that in order to download the program you will need to have a broadband connection and have your Tivo hooked up to the connection.

The End Of Days on iTunes? NBC Goes to Amazon's Unbox
The New York Times and other sources are reporting that a fallout between NBC and Apple over the pricing of NBC shows for sale on iTunes has lead to the announcement by Apple that no new NBC shows will be added to iTunes for sale! None of the new shows debuting this fall will be added, but whether new episodes of current shows will be added is unknown. NBC says Apple must sell them, Apple says they will not. There is no information yet on whether this will affect Days of Our Lives.

NBC announced that they have stuck a deal with Amazon to distribute their shows online through Amazon's Unbox service, which allows users to watch shows online, download them to their computer or mobile devices or to have programs sent to user's Tivos. New shows for the fall 07 season will actually premier on Unbox before their television debut, and users can currently get episodes of older shows such as "Heroes" and "The Office." Head over to http://unbox.amazon.com to learn more.

How the drama between NBC and iTunes will affect "Days" status on iTunes has yet to be mentioned in any of these articles. Given the original deal was actually announced by Sony and Columbia Tri-star Television, which own "Days," it may not be affected at all. Currently though "Days" is categorized by iTunes as an NBC show.

Days Moving Time In Many Markets!
Many have been emailing me about commercials indicating Martha Stewart's show is taking "Days'" time slot at 1pm. Beginning in September, Days is moving in many markets to either noon or 2pm! Please check your local listings to find the new time slot for "Days!"

Staff Changes At Days!
Days has named a new co-executive producer and casting director. Ed Scott, formerly from "The Young and the Restless" replaces Steve Wyman as co-executive producer at the show. Additionally Roy Steinberg, supervising producer, is leaving. Marnie Saitta, who also worked on "Y&R" replaces Fran Bascom as casting director.

Days To Be Sold Through iTunes!
Variety.com is reporting that beginning tomorrow, Tuesday June 12th, "Days of Our Lives" will be available for download through the iTunes store. Episodes will cost $1.99 a piece, though 20 episode passes can be ordered for $9.99.

Not Seeing Page Updates?
I often get emails that the page doesn't appear to have been updated in days, or when trying to get the latest summary one gets the summary from last week. The problem is that your web browser is pulling a cached update off your hard drive rather than the latest update from my server. There are several ways to fix this issue.

The easiest way to fix the problem is to make sure whatever browser you are using (IE, Netscape, Firefox, Opera) is the most current and up to date version. The newer browsers are much better at correcting this issue than older browsers are.

Other ways to correct the issue are to change the settings/options of your browser. How to do this will vary depending on the browser. One option to look for is how the browser checks for new versions of the pages you visit. Options usually include: once per session, once per day, every time I connect to a website. This option is usually found somewhere near the cache/temporary files settings (Firefox seems to not have this option).

If all else fails and the page isn't updating, go into your options and choose to clear/empty your temporary internet files/browser cache. Another option is to simply hold down CTRL on your keyboard and hit your browsers refresh/reload button, which forces an update.

Get Rid of Spyware, Protect from Viruses, Protect from Hackers!
If you are getting excessive pop-ups from this site (more than 2 a day) or any other site, especially pop-ups that make it past your pop-up blockers then you most likely have spyware on your PC! Please take the time to read through the following, I have links to completely free spyware and virus software that you can install on your PC in minutes!

Two great spyware removal tools are Ad-Aware and Spybot. Spybot actually includes a download blocker in it that stops a lot of stuff from being downloaded automatically in Internet Explorer. Spyware Blaster is another program that blocks spyware from downloading onto your PC. Unlike Spybot, it supports all types of browsers. I recommend using ALL THREE programs! If you are running Internet Explorer as your browser than you are more vulnerable to spyware than say users of FireFox, Netscape or Opera.

If you have no ant-virus program on your PC, a good free one to use is AVG Anti-Virus

If your online a lot, or have a cable modem and do NOT have any type of firewall installed, your vulnerable to hackers. I recommend using ZoneAlarm. If you have an up-to-date Windows XP system running Windows Service Pack 2 then you should have Windows Firewall running. Still, Zone Alarm is a good alternative and FREE!

Finally, if you haven't already, give Firefox a try. Most spyware makes its way onto your computer through loopholes in Internet Explorer. Firefox stops a lot of spyware from getting through. Additionally it is a heck of a lot faster than Internet Explorer! There is a third browser I highly recommend, and that is Opera. The best thing about Opera is that it is fast, really fast. It's also now FREE. Netscape is another browser you can try.