EMMYS GALORE FOR “AS THE WORLD TURNS [OFF]”

Sunday’s 37th Annual Daytime Emmy Awards ceremonies turned out to be a bittersweet affair for the cast of the CBS soap opera As the World Turns, which ends its 54-year run on TV on September 17. Michael Park won the best actor award; Mara West, the best actress award; and Julie Pinson, the best supporting actress at the event, which was held in Las Vegas this year and televised by CBS. Accepting his award, Park referred to the fact that just last Wednesday the cast had taped the final episode of the series, which debuted in April 1956. “I pray that you never have to endure what we endured on Wednesday,” he said. (From 1959 to 1972 As the World Turns was the top-rated program on daytime television, and from 1958 to 1978, it was the top-rated soap opera.) Other awards at Sunday’s ceremonies went to The Bold and the Beautiful for outstanding dramatic series; Billy Miller of The Young and the Restless for best supporting actor; Discovery Channel’s Cash Cab for outstanding game/audience participation show and host (Ben Baily); Warner Bros. TV’s The Ellen DeGeneres Show for outstanding talk show, entertainment; CBS-TV Distribution’s The Doctors, for outstanding talk show, informative; and Dr. Mehmet Oz for outstanding talk-show host for Sony Pictures Television’s Dr. Oz. The awards show, which averaged just 2.72 million viewers — its smallest audience in history — last year when it aired on the CW, more than doubled its audience to 5.60 million viewers in its return to CBS, placing first in every half hour between 9:00 p.m. and 11:00 p.m.