At their peak in the 80's and 90's a few afternoon soaps had ratings of up to 16 million viewers on American TV.  Since they were so popular, evening hour long soap operas were developed.  Shows like Dynasty, Falcon Crest, Dallas, Knots Landing and others were over the top, campy, trashy, celebrated wealth and success, and audiences couldn't get enough.

Dallas really got the evening soap opera era started when it had it's debut in 1978 on CBS. 

When I was a child my mother and grandmother used to watch back-to-back soaps.
They are now long gone, but they were, "The Edge of Night," and "The Secret Storm," 
Later on when I was in university quite a few students at UBC were really into "The Young and the Restless," not because they really liked the soap, but because they found it funny and campy.
 

newsguy1 wrote:

When I was a child my mother and grandmother used to watch back-to-back soaps.
They are now long gone, but they were, "The Edge of Night," and "The Secret Storm," 
Later on when I was in university quite a few students at UBC were really into "The Young and the Restless," not because they really liked the soap, but because they found it funny and campy.
 

When the Edge of Night premiered in 1956, it aired at 4:30pm which really was, in the winter, the edge of night. In 1963 it moved to 3:30pm which I remember because that is what my mom was watching when I got home from school. The only thing I remember about Secret Storm was the intro had waves crashing on to a rocky shoreline.

newsguy1 wrote:

.. Later on when I was in university quite a few students at UBC were really into "The Young and the Restless," not because they really liked the soap, but because they found it funny and campy. 

University students are prone to embracing things that allow procrastination from doing their studies.

The number of crappy/cheesy Sunday afternoon movies I watched is a testament to this : )) 
 

DX wrote:

mace wrote:

While there are only three daytime dramas remaining on broadcast television [Young&The Restless, Bold&Beautiful and General Hospital] one of them will be in production for at least four more years. CBS has renewed it through 2027-28. It has been the top rated soap since 1988. With only two competitors now, that doesn't seem like much of a victory. However, 36 years ago when it became the most watched daytime drama, there were twelve others competing for viewers. In 1969-70, there were nineteen of them in production, predominantly airing between noon and 4pm.

Which one of them then, and was it named after a Prism song?

The 1980 tune "Another World"?

Traditionally soaps are cheap to make, though not as cheap as in the days of live to air and shaky sets. Modern audiences tend to demand higher production values. I thought Train 48 was a good model - a single set (the train), shows airing the same day they're shot with little if any post and scripts with only a basic outline meaning the dialogue is largely improv. Shame Global didn't stick with it but it would be a great model for a US network to try.