Fifteen minutes into the soap opera Betsy Hamel let out a groan."If I hear her say one more time 'I can't tell about the baby, I can't tell about the baby,'" said Hamel, letting her sentence trail off without an answer as to what she was threatening for the character on "Days of Our Lives."
Hamel is a semi-regular viewer of the soap opera, as are several others who gather in front of the television outside the Campus Market in Faunce House weekdays at 1 p.m. An informal ritual has developed over the years, with members of the Brown community assembling to follow the daily twists and turns of the show's melodramatic plot.
"It's a mindless distraction from work," said Hamel, munching on a salad. "Some people go out for lunch with people in the office and 'talk office.' [The show] just makes you not talk about yourselves - it takes you away."
The number of viewers varies on any given day. There are a handful of regulars who schedule their lunch to watch the hour-long soap opera and another several who drop in periodically depending on the academic calendar and their workload. During the school year there are also regular student viewers and those whose attention is unmistakably caught while attempting to study at the tables.
Hamel, who works in the College Admission Office, times her "addiction" to "Days of Our Lives" to three years ago when she began having lunch in Faunce House. She actually prefers another soap in the same time slot, but resigns herself to watching "Days" most workdays because "it just happens to be the most watched one in this place at this time."
The television cuts to a conversation between Billie (the object of Hamel's earlier angst) and her mother, Kate:
Kate: The baby was a girl?
Billie: Yeah, a beautiful baby girl. I named her Georgia.
Not following? Billie told her husband, Bo Brady, that she had a miscarriage after she and his former wife, Hope, had a fight. The real explanation is that she lost the baby, Georgia, a week before that fight when she was driving to New Orleans from the show's fictitious Midwest town of Salem. Billie is now telling everyone the false story about the miscarriage.
But Bo does not believe that Hope caused his wife's miscarriage and he does not hate Hope, explains Sandra Lacey, who works in Financial Aid. In fact, Bo and Hope are a couple that everyone wants to get back together, she added.
The television screen flashes to a scene with Bo and his brother Roman:
Bo: I don't know what to do, I have no idea what to do.
The screen cuts to an ad for Era liquid laundry detergent. (Soap operas are so named because soap manufacturers were among the original sponsors of such programs.) Hamel and Lacey slip into a conversation about the plot of another soap opera they both watch.
"I come here and laugh," said Lacey, when prodded to explain her interest in the show. She is often recognized for the viewing habit when she is back in her office. "Students come in and say to me 'did you go and watch the story today?'"
It is the students who Michael Anthony Cardillo claims got him hooked on "Days of Our Lives." Cardillo has a television in the hair salon that bears his name in Faunce House and it is frequently tuned in to the soap opera. At least three-quarters of his customers watch the show, he said.
Its appeal is simple, according to Cardillo: The actors and actresses are continuously facing problems with their relationships that viewers can relate to but the television characters are more glamorous. Every man is handsome, every woman is beautiful and everyone is rich.
"It kind of makes you forget about the everyday hassles of life," said Cardillo, of Cranston. "It is a little fantasy getaway in the middle of your day."
Now and again Cardillo drops in on the group sitting outside the Campus Market if he is caught up on his appointments; his television is smaller and lacks the quality reception of the more communal set.
Although there are new shows to watch year-round, the best months for viewing coincide with the television ratings sweeps: February, May and November, said Elaine Joy Wilson of the News Bureau. Those are the months when the story lines "heat up," said Wilson, a faithful follower of "Days" since 1967, two years after the show began.
The story is heating up toward the end of today's show. The television flashes back to the conversation between Billie and Kate:
Kate: My instinct says that you're just not telling me something about the loss of your baby ... oh, please, please tell me about your baby. Honey I am here for you.
Billie: Mom, I have done something horrible but I had no choice.
Bo was only staying with Billie because of the baby, Lacey explains. If Bo knew Billie lost the baby he would not stay with her unless she blames Hope.
It was the last scene of the afternoon involving Billie and Kate, leaving viewers to wonder what would Billie say next? Would she confess the real story of her miscarriage to her mother and open herself up to the risk of losing Bo?
"You'd get addicted," said Hamel, spearing a piece of lettuce with her fork. "If you came back at the end of the summer you'd ask, 'Hey, did Billie tell anybody about the baby?'" - Kristen Lans
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