Question about Agnes Nixon?

Question

We all know that "One Life to Live" and "All My Children" are two of Nixon's most beloved and most successful creations on daytime TV.

So how did she really come up with these titles?

Answer 1

The original One Life to Live title opening used from its July 15, 1968 premiere to April 1975. Featuring a roaring fireplace with the words One Life To Live faintly appearing and growing larger as the sequence concluded. The flames were supposed to be symbolic of a hellfire, as the show's title was supposed to be Between Heaven and h**l, but was changed at the last minute as sponsors felt the title was too strong and could engender controversy.[2]

So, yeah, the title for this week's column is "Between Heaven & h**l." For those of you who don't know, this is not merely the name of a particularly rancorous OLTL discussion board, but also one of the original proposed titles for One Life to Live. At the time, OLTL creator Agnes Nixon reportedly felt this title would properly convey the class and societal struggles she intended to portray on the show when it began in July of 1968, forty long years ago. ABC found this title to be too dark, however, so here we are. I don't regret the name change, but I do find it terribly appropriate for a column covering OLTL's 40th Anniversary episodes, when Viki Davidson, our 40-years-strong "icy, 'daddy's girl" heroine journeyed into that purgatory between life and death herself, met some old friends, and came out on the other side stronger. Doesn't she always?

This opening was again seen on July 21, 2008 as an homage to the show's 40th Anniversary special.

Originally, One Life to Live's closing credits were done over a videotaped shot of an empty set or a mimed sequence between two or more characters. For the first ten years on the air, credits scrolled in the center of the screen in the same white Craw Clarendon Bold type as the title logo.

The title of the show refers to the brotherhood of man. Nixon believed that it doesn't matter who one was, what one looked like, or where one was from — for every human being was a child of God. The poem at the start of the All My Children photo album reads:

“ The Great and the Least,

The Rich and the Poor,

The Weak and the Strong,

In Sickness and in Health,

In Joy and Sorrow,

In Tragedy and Triumph,

You are ALL MY CHILDREN

”

The poem, which epitomizes the goal of All My Children's storytelling, was penned by Nixon herself.

The show was originally owned by Creative Horizons, Inc., the company created by Agnes Nixon and her husband Bob. The show was sold to ABC in January 1975.[4]