Soap Opera, Shakespeare and Synthetic World Drama

I've caught several American soap operas in the past few weeks. I can't tell you which ones, or even what was going on, but I was struck by some fascination with the mechanisms of the Soap Opera. First of all, I'm something of a Spanish (Univision) Soap Opera guy: I generally don't watch them for the plots, merely for the pretty women on them. (Completely off topic: Spanish Soap Operas have the cliche that all of the women are rather well endowed in the chest department, with often the sole exception being the often "villain", due to what I assume is the simple matter of fact that the lesser endowed women need to make up for it with acting talent which then stereotypes them into the one actual role that requires some acting talent, albeit the ability to act mad, angry, vicious, and ultimately someone with an inferiority complex due to a smaller breast size...) There are a couple of not-quite-but-almost Soap Operas I do pay attention to the plot, however. (Smallville and Veronica Mars, should I catch it randomly.)

So I was trying to unwind bits and pieces of the plot. As a casual observer, this is a tough thing, particularly as I came in the middle of both episodes and realize that the shows I was watching could have nearly a half-century of back-story. It is much easier to watch shot composition, which is interesting in that all soap operas seem to have a long list of shot rules, including a too heavy use of the close-up. (This transcends the genre, apparently, as the Spanish Soap Operas look almost the same shot for shot.)

The idea I struck on was that if Shakespeare was writing for the audiences of the Television era (which, to ...