BREAKING NEWS: Distribution Company Behind MTV's The Hills Moves Into Scripted DAYTIME Soaps!

Oh happy day. Take heart soap lovers, one of Hollyweird's biggest players, Trifecta Entertaiment is jumping into the daily soap game! According to Broadcasting & Cable, Trifecta, distributors of such monster hits as MTV's Laguna Beach, The Hills and Punk'd, has purchased the distribution rights for Hacienda Heights, an English-language, open-ended sudser aimed at Hispanic audiences, from San Francisco-based Chan Add Films. (See trailer here).

According to the article, Hacienda Heights executive producer Desmond Gumbs financed and shot the first 11 episodes, which were then tested in such large Hispanic markets as:  San Francisco, Los Angeles, Yuma, Ariz,; and Santa Rosa, Calif. 

New York-based entertainment company Sahara Media has signed on to finance 89 more episodes for a total of 100 half hour episodes. At that point Trifecta plans to offer Hacienda Heights as a syndicated daytime strip. WOOO HOOO! Okay, back to being professional.

Hacienda Heights, which has an all-Hispanic cast, already has quite the soapy connection. One of my fav-or-ite leading men ever, Tom Eplin (ex-Jake McKinnon, Another World/As The World Turns) directed several episodes of the series early on. 

"This is great news for the soap world. The fact that Trifecta Entertainment, a company that is currently distributing shows like Punk'd and American Idol Rewind, would value the genre enough to make this type of investment could be the sign of life we've been looking for," says We Love Soaps editor Roger Newcomb, who initally broke the news of Hacienda Heights going into production almost two years ago.  "If Hacienda Heights does well, you can bet we'll see more soaps in syndication, perhaps even some of the indie web soaps airing today."

This isn't the first time a daily soap have been attempted in syndication. Rituals, based on the novel by Charlene Keel, and co-created by Keel, Days of Our Lives' Ken Corday and Gene Palumbo, premiered on Sept. 10, 1984 and ended its run on Sept. 6, 1985.
 
In 2006, upstart netlet My Network TV made its debut with several telenovela-style, five-night-a-week soaps which failed, however Trifecta head Hank Cohen and Gumbs don't seem too worried about the past, according to the B&C article.

Cohen believes My Network TV's soaps failed because they were aimed at the wrong audience, and contend Gumbs ability to economically mass produce episodes of Hacienda Heights at his own Frisco-based soundstage and studio will make it easier to turn a profit. The business model sounds akin to Tyler Perry's for his TBS sitcoms House of Payne and Meet The Browns. Looks like we just might continue to be tuning in tomorrow after al!