ABC Takes a Slightly Telenovela Approach to ‘Port Charles’

It’s sort of a cross between Short Attention-Span Theater and a Latin American telenovela.

Starting Dec. 4, the half-hour ABC soap “Port Charles” will break itself up into miniseries-like 13-week story arcs, loosely based on the telenovela format that has been a mainstay on Spanish-language television for decades. The stories will focus on one core group of characters at a time, with secondary plots woven through.

Written in three chapters, stories will clip along faster than a traditional soap, which can take years to complete a key plot line. Every day, there will be a payoff, and a strong lead-in to the following day. Bigger payoffs will come at the end of the week, month and story conclusion, said Angela Shapiro, ABC’s president of daytime.

“This is designed for mini-closure each day,” Shapiro said. “The daytime drama genre came [into being] long ago when audiences’ lifestyles and experiences were a lot different. We’re trying to address a contemporary audience.”

The network had been looking for a way to revamp the spinoff soap--it was derived from ABC’s flagship “General Hospital”--for a few years, hoping to boost its average audience of about 2.4 million viewers last season. The traditional telenovela approach, in which the slate is wiped clean and new characters and stories are introduced every few months, was considered but rejected.

“Audiences have a close connection with the characters, and it wouldn’t make sense to toss them out,” Shapiro said. “That’s our unique hook.”

The format is ideal for sampling, and network executives think it will appeal to younger viewers, former soap watchers and even those who don’t normally watch the genre because it requires less of a time commitment and packs in action. If it works, it might be applied to the network’s hourlong soaps, Shapiro said.

ABC’s competitors say they will watch what happens with “Port Charles” closely, noting that the new approach probably will be easier and more effective with a relatively young soap rather than one with a 40-year history. (“Port Charles” was launched in 1997.)

“I think it’s a great experiment,” said Lucy Johnson, CBS’ senior vice president of daytime. “From the creative perspective, it might be a more effective way to write. You don’t have to worry about where a story will go in a year. I don’t know what the shortcomings of that format might be, but I certainly understand the appeal.”