Passions Will Live On!!!!!!

[jimnysf]

Posted: 4/25/07 at 11:03pm

http://www.soaps.com/passions/news/727/Passions_Will_Live_On




Passions fans can rejoice! The powers that be have heard your voices and our favorite show has just been saved. The show will live on for at least another year on DIRECTV. Eric Shanks, the executive vice president of Entertainment for DIRECTV, has stated that, 'Passions fans no longer need to mourn the demise of their beloved program as it has found new life on DIRECTV.' Citing the passionate support of more than 2 million fans, and daytime's largest and most consistently growing audience of 12-24 year olds, Shanks went on to assure them that: 'We care about this show and are extremely proud to give it an exclusive home here at DIRECTV.

The show has just been added to DIRECTV's The 101 Lineup. It is the first scripted show that they have added to their innovative and exciting new media format. The new episodes will continue to be produced by NBC Universal Television Studio and Outpost and will air in the same 2:00 pm time slot that the show now occupies. In addition, the episodes will be re-aired in a special marathon session every weekend. The only major change announced so far is that the show will now air new episodes from Monday to Thursday only rather than through the entire work week.

For those who are wondering, this means that the September7th end run of Passions on NBC will be a cliffhanger. The producers of the show are already promising to keep many strands of the show wide open so that they can be instantly rejoined when the show makes its move to DIRECTV on September 17th. New episodes shall go into production in August with the majority of the cast and crew expected to continue with the show. (We will post more details on who will be returning as the information becomes available).

Worried that you won't be able to watch because you don't have DIRECTV? Well, it may not be as difficult as you imagine. Knowing that the majority of their prospective audience does not have DIRECTV, the company has begun offering free installation, a DVR or HD receiver upgrade and a portable DVD player for new subscribers.
Passions not cancelled!

[jimnysf]

Posted: 4/26/07 at 10:55am

Press Release

NBC'S PASSIONS TO WORK ITS MAGIC ON DIRECTV VIEWERS WITH ALL-NEW EPISODES BEGINNING SEPTEMBER 17
Fan Favorite Daytime Drama Joins DIRECTV's The 101 Lineup; New Episodes Produced by NBC Universal Television Studio Will Air on DIRECTV

El Segundo, Calif., April 25, 2007—NBC Universal Television Studio and DIRECTV, the nation's leading satellite television provider, today announced that the NBC Universal-produced daytime drama Passions has found a new home on DIRECTV where the popular program will continue for a 9th season. Under the new agreement, NBC Universal Television Studio will produce brand-new episodes to air Monday-Thursday on DIRECTV's original programming channel, The 101.

The celebrated daytime drama, which currently averages 2 million viewers and enjoys an intensely dedicated fan base, will end its network run on NBC September 7 with a series of cliffhangers and will resurface on DIRECTV September 17, picking up where the series left off. The show will remain in its current time slot of 2 PM ET and DIRECTV will air encore marathons of the show each weekend. The majority of the cast and crew are expected to return when the one-hour series begins shooting the new DIRECTV episodes in August.

"Passions fans no longer need to mourn the demise of their beloved program as it has found new life on DIRECTV," said Eric Shanks, executive vice president of Entertainment for DIRECTV. "We care about this show and are extremely proud to give it an exclusive home here at DIRECTV."

"This new arrangement with DIRECTV is truly a landmark development that allows NBC Universal to extend the Passions brand in a fresh and entirely new way, to DIRECTV's 16 million homes," said Marc Graboff, president, NBC Universal Television, West Coast. "It will reward the dedicated fans of the daytime drama who can continue to enjoy it on DIRECTV and also opens up a great new model for other television programs to find new life on other non-traditional platforms."

Those fans without DIRECTV will have plenty of time to switch before the new season begins. DIRECTV will make it easy for Passions viewers to keep track of the happenings in "Harmony" by providing fans free installation, a DVR or HD receiver upgrade, and a portable DVD player by calling a special phone number (866-788-0003) or visiting the Web (www.directv.com/passions). Passions fans can also visit www.nbc.com for more information about the show.

Passions will be the first scripted drama series to join The 101 original program lineup which includes viewer favorites like Project MyWorld, The Fizz, havoc on The 101, and Championship Gaming Series. The series will broadcast four one-hour episodes per week, as well as a weekend marathon of that week's shows so fans can catch up on the action each week.

Passions explores the lives, loves and losses of four core families in the small New England town of Harmony: the Cranes, the Lopez-Fitzgeralds, the Bennetts and the Russells, each of whom have their own distinct and diverse personalities. The series debuted on NBC in 1999 and has routinely been amongst the top daytime programs for women ages 18-34, and currently is tied for #1 among all daytime dramas in both women ages 18-24 and females 12-24.

New episodes of Passions will begin shooting in August and will continue to be taped at the CBS Studio Center in Studio City, Calif. The show is produced by NBC Universal Television Studio in association with Outpost Farms Productions, Inc.






Direct TV

[RobbO]

Posted: 4/26/07 at 1:05pm

what's passions?