'All My Children' bites the dust

What will Venus Marshall do without Zach? Or Erica Kane? Or without knowing if Angie and Jesse will ever find peace, especially since he came back from the dead after being gone for 20 years, and Angie got her sight back, and they finally got back the baby they lost that wasn't really theirs because Jesse had switched it for the one that was left in a police car?

What will millions of fans do after soap opera "All My Children" airs its last episode today after 41 years?

"I really am sad," said Marshall, who lives in Virginia Beach and has watched the show since its debut.

"I didn't realize how much it was a part of my day."

AMC isn't dying due to some weird woods-related disease or a summer avalanche that claimed the lives of so many soap opera stars. The show is fading to make room for a new generation.

The longest-running of the genre, "Guiding Light," clicked off two years ago after 72 years, and "One Life to Live" will end its 43-year run in January.

Soap operas, named such for the cleaning-product companies that sponsored them, were once the staple of daytime programming. The narratives began as radio shows, then jumped to 15-minute segments on television, and eventually expanded to full hours of tears and triumphs. By 1940, soap operas represented some 90 percent of all commercially sponsored daytime broadcast hours.

But the shows began to lose their target audience as more women entered the workforce and cable TV expanded its offerings.

A live talk show called "The Chew," which will center on food, will replace "All My Children" at 1 p.m. on ABC. A health and lifestyle show called "The Revolution," made by the producers behind "The Biggest Loser," will take over for "One Life to Live" in January.

"General Hospital" will remain ABC's sole soap opera, one of only four among ABC, CBS and NBC's daytime schedules.

"All My Children" premiered Jan. 5, 1970, set in a fictional Philadelphia suburb. Marshall was 9 then, and she started watching with her mother.

When she went to college, she scheduled her classes around the Pine Valley saga. She said it was a joke at the registrar's office that no one signed up for 1 p.m. classes.

"The student union center was packed at 1 o'clock," Marshall said. "And then at 2, everybody would run to the closest exit to get to their 2:05 classes."

Now, the married mom records the show and watches it in the evenings.

Despite the often ridiculous story lines, Marshall said she picked up some real-world knowledge. She learned from Erica Kane how to buy a dress, keep the tag on, wear it - don't sweat in it, though - and return it.

"I can't believe I admitted to that," Marshall said, "but it's true."

She'll miss that constant in her life and the tidbits she could share with family when they called to catch up.

Nancy Defnet of Virginia Beach picked up the habit in junior high when she started watching with her mom. Defnet, 38, liked the thrill of the cliffhangers.

"If you watch the Friday show, you know something is going to happen that will keep you coming back on Monday," Defnet said. "That's the best part, figuring out what's next."

The past two weeks of the show have been particularly good, she said, as the writers tie up long-dangl-ing story lines. But rumors on the Internet imply that today's show will end with a mystery, the idea of which excites and bothers Defnet.

"I've seen JR twice put a gun to his head," Defnet said this week, wondering about a possible plot twist. "Will he or will he not kill himself?"

Another fan, Leslie Draper, said he feels like he grew up with the folks in Pine Valley, because his grandmother and great aunts would watch and discuss.

"They would sit on the porch and talk about the characters like they were talking about people they knew," he said.

He, too, planned his college classes around watching the show and his all-time favorite, "Guiding Light," but abandoned the routine when he graduated from Ferrum College in the early 1980s and started working.

He kept up with the characters by reading weekly newspaper digests, and he threw a party, complete with a black wreath, two years ago when "Guiding Light" ended. Draper isn't planning a going-away shindig today, but he will tune in.

"I want to see how it ends."

Will Zach and Kendall live happily ever after? Will Tad and Dixie? Finally? Will Erica's memoirs destroy them all? And how will fans live without knowing?

Denise Watson Batts, (757) 446-2504, denise.batts@pilotonline.com