ABC Cancels All My Children, One Life To Live

ABC announced Thursday its cancelation of two venerated soaps operas: All My Children will finish its 41-year run in September while One Life to Live will end its 43-year run next January. That means Children's battle ax Erica Kane (played by Susan Lucci, pictured) will finally end her vampy run.

Canceling soap operas seems to be a new trend as Guiding Light, which was the longest-running soap of all time, was canceled in 2009 and As the World Turns finished its 54-year run in 2010.

The decision was made in order to add more variety to ABC’s daytime programming. The two soaps will be replaced by The Chew, a show all about food and related topics, and The Revolution, a program about health and other such subjects. “We are taking this bold step to expand our business because viewers are looking for different types of programming these days," ABC Daytime President Brian Frons said in a statement. "They are telling us there is room for informative, authentic and fun shows that are relatable, offer a wide variety of opinions and focus on ‘real life’ takeaways. A perfect example of this is The View, and that factored into our decision. “