The Stage

Studied control - Soaps and Hollywood

Published Friday 27 May 2005 at 11:20 by Roz Britton

Does the modern British soap opera borrow its management style from the Hollywood studio system? Roz Britton investigates.

The days when Jane Russell, Clark Gable and friends plied their trade under the ever-watchful gaze of Hollywood’s studio bosses seem a far cry from the gritty realism of the 21st-century British soap but could the ghost of the old star system lie at the heart of EastEnders or Coronation Street?

The Hollywood star system enjoyed its heyday in the thirties. It was a set-up under which actors would be signed to and controlled by one of five major studies - Fox, MGM, Paramount, RKO and Warner Brothers.

British soap’s latter day Jack Warner and Louis B Mayer, Phil Redmond and Mal Young - who between them have stamped their mark on every continuing drama from Hollyoaks to Holby City - would be the first to admit that they have paid more than a little lip-service to the Hollywood management style.

“I don’t think anyone who runs a soap consciously sits and thinks ‘oh, I’ll do it like the studio system’ but it becomes that way because these shows have been around for such a long time and the tricks you need to use to hold on to and nurture the core characters are so similar,” explains Young, former BBC head of continuous drama.

So what are these tricks or techniques that soap producers and studio bosses share?

When troubled star Judy Garland attempted suicide in 1950, her studio MGM felt that she had brought them into disrepute and terminated her contract.

Times have changed and it is unlikely that any modern day star would be fired for trying to take their own life. However, in British soaps the worst offence that a star can commit is to bring their show into disrepute. EastEnders star Jessie Wallace was suspended following a drink-driving conviction in 2003 and just last Christmas her co-star Leslie Grantham received a suspension when he was caught up in an internet sex scandal.

No star is, was, nor ever will be, bigger than the soap or the studio.

“When actors misbehave to such a degree that you can’t work with them anymore and their offscreen lives are becoming bigger than their onscreen, then they are breaking their contract. They are bringing the show into disrepute. They are ruining the show,” reveals Young.

“They are meant to be role models. A lot of young people watch the soaps and look up to the characters. If we’ve got people saying, ‘it’s okay for me to take drugs or to drink and drive’, well, as a broadcaster we can’t be seen to condone that.”

Strong comparisons also exist between the contracts used on soaps and those introduced under the star system.

The powerful Hollywood studio MGM was said to have “more stars than there are in heaven”. These stars were frequently bound under restricting seven-year contracts, where the studio dictated the projects on which they would work.

Likewise, the soap star - although usually bound to a one-year contract - will not be allowed to appear in other dramas, commercials or undertake other professional jobs while under the terms of that contract.

Young explains: “When Phil Redmond and I did that consultancy on Emmerdale and we dropped a plane on the village. They asked us to take over the Christmas storylines. But there were no actors available because they were all being allowed to do pantos. So every year you were left with a sheep and one of the lesser characters, that was it.

“So you have to say ‘you work here or you don’t’. The minute you work around people’s wants and desires, everyone else says ‘what about me?’.”

Brookside and Hollyoaks creator Phil Redmond sites one key difference between the contracts - the ‘get-out’ clause: “One of the things that I often talk about to the critics is that when actors want to leave, that’s it. Slavery was abolished years and years ago.”

Under the star system, performers could be sued for breach of contract if they tried to leave or refused work.

The Hollywood seven-year contract was deemed to serve the interests of the studio, rather than the star. It was viewed as a way to keep the actors’ wages as low as possible by locking them into a strict long-term financial agreement.

For a soap actor, the contracts offer a rare piece of security in an increasingly insecure industry. “A soap actor is the only acting job in the world where they will get holiday pay and guaranteed money,” said Young.

“Even if they get pulled and their storyline doesn’t work, you sign them for a year, so they know they can pay their mortgage.”

To all intents and purposes, star system actors became products for the studio to package and sell. Actors had virtually no control over their public image. Studios dictated the star’s name, hair colour, biographical details and would even send performers to the plastic surgeon.

They were encouraged to live up to their on screen persona and stories re-enforcing this brand would be planted in the papers. Mae West was the sex bomb, Clark Gable the playboy and, despite her heavy drinking, Sandra Dee was forever the clean-living, virginal blonde.

Redmond admits that actors behaving outside character are a concern for soap producers. “If you’ve got a character who is playing a reformed alcoholic, what you don’t want is that actor going out all the time on drunken binges,” he said.

“But I think that the old Hollywood system had actors’ private lives tied up completely. We don’t go near that kind of thing.”

Perhaps the key difference between the soaps and the studio is the level of social support offered to troubled stars. When Judy Garland’s drug addiction had left her unable to film Royal Wedding in 1950, MGM suspended her, despite the fact that they had originally prescribed the addictive pills to help her put in a longer working day.

Half a century on, when Coronation Street actor Jimmi Harkishin was pictured taking drugs last year, the soap reportedly encouraged the star into rehab and held his role open for him.

But perhaps this is simply a sign of the times, an indication of a more open-minded society. Perhaps had Mayer looked at Garland through today’s eyes he might have taken a different stance.

The days when the studios ruled the world may be long since past but the studio system is alive and kicking. It has simply changed address.