OK, it’s getting weird between ABC and Prospect Park, the company they licensed “One Life to Live” to for airing on the internet in 2011. When Prospect Park, which is owned by Jeff Kwatinetz, didn’t pull their plans together by early 2012, ABC took three actors and their characters from the cancelled “One Life” and migrated them to “General Hospital.” They were a hit, and “GH” has become a revived smash.
Now PP, which says it’s finally going to produce “One Life” and “All My Children,” wants the actors and characters back. They are willing to share, however. But they’ve issued a mysterious statement that only mentions Michael Easton, who plays John, and Kristen Alderson, who is Starr. Pointedly missing in the new announcement is Roger Howarth, popular from “One Life” as rapist-turned-anti-hero (only on a soap) Todd Manning.
Kwatinetz is well known to us in mainstream entertainment, but I doubt soap people have any idea of what they’re dealing with. The one time owner of The Firm has had a Renaissance with “Royal Pains” on USA Network. But he has a long and contentious past as a manager that includes nearly tanking Kelly Clarkson‘s career. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,287075,00.html
Kwatinetz still hasn’t made a deal with super soap star Susan Lucci, of “All My Children.” And there are doubts that Prospect Park can pull off the internet launches at all.
What will happen next is a soap cliffhanger.
Here’s what Prospect Park sent out tonight:
Prospect Park released the following statement regarding its licensing agreement with “All My Children” and “One Life to Live.” In 2011, when Prospect Park decided to put everything on the line to reboot these shows, they lent characters to “General Hospital” until shooting began for the new programs so that the characters could stay alive with the fans and also so that the actors could remain working. Everyone at ABC and on the production staff of “General Hospital” understood that this was a temporary arrangement until production started once again on “One Life to Live.” Now the time has come to start production and Prospect Park needs to, once again, cast these characters including Llanview transplants Michael Easton (John) and Kristen Alderson (Starr). See statement below:
“Prospect Park understands that ‘General Hospital’ has featured Llanview transplants Michael Easton (John) and Kristen Alderson (Starr) among others while we arranged production of the new version of ‘One Life to Live.’ These characters, who we own under our agreement, are obviously essential to our production efforts, and a large reason we licensed the program. We also understand that legions of ‘General Hospital’ fans have grown to love these actors and characters in a short time. So even though we are paying ABC millions of dollars to license the shows, we have been, and continue to be willing to equally share the characters with ‘General Hospital’ and ABC. It’s a win-win for the actors, the shows and fans, who love all of the shows and storylines. We hope to work out these agreements with ABC and the actors.”