About: One
Day at a Time is a text based webserial that is much like a soap opera.
It takes place in the fictional town of Twin Peaks, which is located in
a mountain region of the USA. Below are a few regular questions that I
get asked. If you have any others, feel free to drop me a line!
Q: How did ODAAT begin?
One Day At A Time began in 1995. My brother Patrick
and I always grew up watching daytime drama's. I have been watching The
Young and the Restless for as long as I can remember. Growing up, we also
watched Days of Our Lives regularly. From time to time, we viewed Another
World, Bold and the Beautiful, General Hospital, One Life to Live, Passions
and Sunset Beach. We were heavily influenced by this community. Patrick
had his own series called Green Meadows. I wanted in on the action. We
sort of acted it out ourselves. I soon found it was hard to remember everything
I had done, so I started writing storylines. I wrote in the Soap Opera
Digest synopsis format. I started writing ODAAT in 1995. The storylines
that you are reading now, is what I wrote ... just tweaked a little bit.
Q: You started
publishing ODAAT in 2002 online. Why are there so few episodes after
15 years?
I took a 5 year break. I never stopped caring
or wanting to do ODAAT. A comeback was planned numerous times. Life
gets in the way sometimes. You know? I was young, I just came out of
the closet. I was in school, I was working full time. I just didn't
have the time to really put into producing a quality serial. I am glad
that I did take the time off. I think my series is better than ever
before.
Q: Why do you
have famous people as your 'cast'?
For image purposes only. Many people are visual
people, I am very visual myself. The images that I use are the best
way for me to tell you what my characters should look like. It is important
to remember a couple of things: the people in the photo are no way attached
to my serial, and they are really only for visual purposes! Just because
I have 'Natasha' being represented by Jessica Simpson does not mean
that Natasha acts or thinks like Jessica Simpson. It is who I think
Natasha looks like, that is all. This is a major reason I go outside
of the daytime community for my images. Many series stick strictly to
daytime actors. I will not confine myself or my series to that small,
short set of people. My series is beyond that; I like to break down
barriers.
Q: What is your
inspiration?
I get inspiration from many things. Mostly, I
think I just have a calling for drama. Growing up watching daytime,
it is very easy to get many ideas in your head for a number of different
dramatic storylines. You watch and you see where a show goes with their
storylines ... but all the while you think of something that they could
have done to make the storyline better. I incorporate that into my storylines.
I must say, initially Days was a big influence for me. I think you can
see it in my early episodes with some crazier plotlines (Vinny and Natasha
dying, but coming back to life; Victoria's personalities; Robin have
two half sisters ... to name a few). Now, I really want ODAAT to be
more classic soap opera, more relationship based. I guess that steams
from Y&R. I would rather tell stories that are slowly crafted tales.
Q: How long will
ODAAT go on for?
There is no end date. In my writings that began
in 1995, I wrote for 7 years. So I have 7 years worth of writing (keep
in mind ... when I was writing in the SOD format each piece of paper
was a week's worth of soap opera ... currently one piece of paper is
one episode for me. So I guess 7 and 52 weeks is how many episodes I
have.) But when I stopped writing, it could have continued. It will
end when I am ready for it to end.