RYAN'S
BAR ONLINE
THE UNOFFICIAL FAN
PAGE FOR RYAN'S HOPE
Ryan's Hope is the story of the Ryan family, the owners of Ryan's Bar, and their working-class but gentrifying "Riverside" neighborhood on New York's upper west side. The half-hour daytime drama series originally aired in the U.S. on ABC from 1975-89. Character-driven and realistic writing, acting, and directing set the show apart throughout (most of) its run.
Created by the late Claire Labine and Paul Avila Mayer, Ryan's Hope helped launch the careers of Kate Mulgrew, Marg Helgenberger, and other future stars of primetime and film. The serial also introduced many now beloved soap opera veterans like Roscoe Born, Ron Hale, and Ilene Kristen to daytime television audiences. And the series featured a number of legendary stage performers, including the multiple Tony award–winning Helen Gallagher, who headed the cast as matriarch Maeve Ryan from the first episode until the last. However, Ryan's Hope wasn't just a stopping point in otherwise storied acting careers; it was a worthy showcase in its own right. The late Nancy Addison Altman, Bernard Barrow, John Gabriel, and Michael Levin are just a few of the multi-talented performers whose losses are still felt but whose memories live on for generations of viewers thanks to their dynamic portrayals of complex, distinctive characters who sat and/or poured at Ryan's over the years.
Ryan's Hope won numerous Daytime Emmy and Writer's Guild of America awards, among other accolades. The show has been syndicated internationally, and in the early 2000s the American cable network SoapNet rebroadcast all but a few lost episodes of Ryan's Hope's early years. Critics hailed the serial as "a unique blend of the new and the traditional...that was damned near perfect," and which "rejuvenated decades-old family themes with fresh, strong writing and a contemporary attitude"; "soap opera verismo"; and—during the show's second act on SoapNet, at a time when storytelling across the present-day genre was really beginning to decline—"a soap-writing class being broadcast right now."
This website is a fan tribute and in no way affiliated with ABC, Disney, Labine-Mayer Productions, or any other business. Previously published materials are copyrighted by their original owners and are reproduced herein for informational and non-commercial purposes only.