For the first time in 25 years, a new daytime drama has gone into production: The gates — follows the lives of a wealthy black family in their gated community – coming to CBS in January 2025.
The showrunner and head writer for the show is veteran soap writer Michele Val Jean, known for her Emmy Award-winning work on The bald and the handsome (B&B) And General Hospital (GH). Val Jean’s new job makes her the first Black person and first Black woman to oversee a daytime soap opera as showrunner/EP. She was also the first black female head writer of a daytime drama. The gates is a CBS Studios/NAACP production company in association with P&G Studios (which long since left). As the world turns, guiding light And An other world).
The time slot, the premiere date and the cast The gates have yet to be determined, but it is expected to take the vacated spot The conversation.
The last time a broadcast network premiered a soap opera about a black family was in 1989 with NBC’s Generations, which Val Jean wrote for and which lasted only a year. An industry expert tells Yahoo Entertainment what she expects The gates to do it right and strengthen the genre.
What does a new soap opera means mean?
“A rising tide lifts all boats, so a new soap can only be good for daytime,” TV expert and columnist of Soap Opera Digest Carolyn Hinsey tells Yahoo Entertainment.
It’s been a challenging decade for soaps. In the 1950s they became a fixture on TV; Twenty years later, there were 19 on the air – with 50 million people, many of them men, watching in any given week. Like other genres, soap operas experienced reduced viewership with the rise of cable. The shows – known for their intensely loyal fan bases – were also deemed redundant. Precautions that go beyond breaking news — such as airing the 1995 OJ Simpson trial (and the 1994 pretrial) — have deeply dented ratings. In the 2000s, as reality TV boomed and streaming came about, soap operas were used by panicked TV executives for cheaper-to-produce talk shows.
Today there are only four soaps left: B&B, GH, Days of our lives And The young and the restless. (To dawn moved to streamer Peacock in 2022, ending its 57-year run on NBC.)
It hasn’t been lost on soap viewers – who are still clamoring for the return of All my children, one life to live And ATWTall taken off air in the 2010s, despite fervent “save our soap” campaigns – that, with the cancellation of The conversationthe replacements for soap operas have now themselves been abolished. While ratings for soap operas have definitely fallen over the years, talk shows, even those with stars like Kelly Clarkson and Drew Barrymore, have lagged behind soap operas in terms of ratings. With a new soap launch, probably in the time slot of a replacement now 15 years later, the circle is complete.
Hinsey says she “absolutely” sees it The gates as a vote of confidence for the genre. “None of the talk shows that replaced the soaps have demonstrated the longevity of the shows they replaced – or earned the same loyalty from daytime viewers,” who have seen the shows trending daily on X.
As for the addition of a new show, “I’m surprised it took this long,” she says. “I was honestly thinking a combination of All my children And A life to live could have been rebooted by now for the ABC lineup or maybe even Hulu,” as has long been rumored. “A lot of those ABC actors cycled through it General Hospitalso we know they still look great and are available for use.”
Viewer demand for well-executed drama series remains high.
“I think the success of ongoing dramas like Grey’s anatomy, To takeThis is us, the Crown, etc., on streaming services bodes well for a new daytime soap,” says Hinsey. “There are so many ways to keep up with our shows these days. I have a 78 year old neighbor who is watching Days of our lives on Peacock. Where there is a will there is a way!”
Can The gates what to achieve Generations not?
Expectations for The gates is high. Executive producer Sheila Ducksworth, chair of the CBS/NAACP production partnership, said in March that it will be “everything we love about daytime drama from a new and fresh perspective.” The show “will greet an audience that has traditionally been underserved.” It will feature “multi-dimensional characters, juicy storylines and black culture.”
“I have known Michele Val Jean since the 1990s, when she worked on GH, and I have great respect for her work,” says Hinsey. “Michele understands the genre and is an excellent dialogue writer.” (Val Jean and Ducksworth were not available for interviews for this story.)
As for the casting: “Debbi Morgan and Darnell Williams were extremely popular as Angie and Jesse AMC, so they would be a good start,” Hinsey suggests.
Many of today’s most successful black actors got their start on soap operas, including Laurence Fishburne, Angela Bassett and Michael B. Jordan. The late Ellen Holly had the honor of being the first black soap star in 1968. J&R has been perhaps the most successful and robust family, striking gold with the Winters family: Shemar Moore, Victoria Rowell, Kristoff St. John and Tonya Williams. However, black characters are seen as an unsung part of the genre.
Generations broke through in 1989 as the first soap to debut with a core black family. NBC pulled the plug after just thirteen months, saying it was not performing. However, the odds seemed opposite; for starters it was against the number 1 show, J&R; in other markets, and it aired at 2:30 a.m. in the pre-DVR era. It has also been reported that Nielsen, which measures media audiences, did not track as many black households. A 2024 Nielsen study found that Black audiences consume more media than the rest of the population and feel underrepresented in media.
The gates promises to deliver on representation. The foundation for success is diversity behind the scenes and in the writers’ room, led by a woman who has written more than 2,000 episodes of daytime TV. It also has NAACP support, with the goal of increasing the visibility of Black artists on broadcast and streaming platforms. Technology has also improved greatly from the VHS era of the ’80s. Instead of pitting the show against the best soap opera, J&R will be one of the lead-ins.
“Soap fans have lost so many shows since then [Generations],” says Hinsey. “I think they will make a point to find The gates and give it a try. It helps that it will be broadcast in the following timeslot Brave and handsome on CBS. When people set their DVRs for J&R And B&Bthey can just add an hour.”
If the show is a success, it could be a much-needed boost to a popular genre that has been underappreciated in the modern era.
“Like The gates is doing well, which I think it will. I wouldn’t be surprised if ABC reboots AMC and/or OLTLThen Hinsey says.
