The City (TV series)

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The ABC soap opera The City aired from November 13, 1995 to March 28, 1997. It was a loose spin-off of Loving.

In the story, the (mostly young) survivors of the Corinth Serial Killer (the final story on Loving) all moved from the Pennsylvania town of Corinth to a spacious loft in New York's SoHo district. Several months later, Lorraine (Maggie Rush), who had dazzled critics and fans in the final months of Loving, joined the show. She had left her long-lost love Charles (Angie's ex-husband) and took up with fellow middle-aged alcoholic Nick Rivers (Roscoe Born). Rivers shared a past with Sydney Chase (Morgan Fairchild) and there were plans to team the two up (they had palpable chemistry a decade earlier in ABC's short-lived primetime soap Paper Dolls) but the plans never materalized.

While it was started by Loving creator Agnes Nixon, The City was different from other soaps of its day, as the city wasn't the main setting on this show: the loft and its surroundings took precedence, and the city was secondary. Also, the show was shot on videotape using the Film-Look process for its entire run.

One of the most daring storylines on this show was one involving a transsexual. Photographer Bernardo had a one night stand with model Azure C (Carlotta Chang). He went to the corner to get some orange juice when he saw a picture of Azure C. before the sex change operation. The modeling agency which they both worked had to do a lot of damage control. The storyline began to take off but was soon dropped, in part due to the subject matter and in part due to lackluster reaction to Chang's performance. Azure and Bernando reconciled and left town.

Like its predecessor, the show did not catch on (even though the cast had many famous faces, such as Morgan Fairchild and Debbi Morgan). In an attempt to remind viewers of the well-received "Corinth Killer" plot, in mid-1996 the show had most of the characters stalked (and some murdered by) a killer who left notes saying "Happy Now". The killer was revealed to be Danny (Ted King)'s girlfriend Molly Malone (Melissa Dye), whose sweet, perky behavior belied her true nature.

Fairchild had only signed a one-year contract and left when that contract expired in late 1996. ABC replaced her with Jane Elliot, who was very popular as the witchy Tracy Quartermaine on General Hospital (Elliot had previously helped produce Loving from 1994-1995). But when the ratings continued to be the lowest of any daytime soap opera, ABC pulled the plug.

Five months after cancellation, after airing classic episodes of ABC's other soaps (All My Children, One Life to Live and General Hospital) in The City's timeslot, ABC would replace the show with Port Charles, a soap that would last until October 2003.

The show did provide happy endings for most of its characters but when they failed to get Morgan Fairchild to appear again as Sydney Chase, the show killed her off by the "Happy Now" killer.

Talkshow The View has used Sydney Chase's loft set from The City until its fifth season.

[edit] Award Nominations

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