PREVIEW: ABC Family Tuesday Night Soaps SWITCHED AT BIRTH & JANE BY DESIGN

The Year of the Soap continues on ABC Family with the Winter Premiere of SWITCHED AT BIRTH and the series launch of JANE BY DESIGN.

ABC Family’s big summer hit, SWITCHED AT BIRTH, returns at 8 p.m. ET/PT. This season, the families must deal with the arrival of Bay’s biological father Angelo (Gilles Marini), inflaming old passions and creating new rivalries. All in all, everyone struggles to navigate family dynamics that seem to be getting more, not less, complicated.

The series uses American Sign Language and explores deaf culture with an array of deaf and hard of hearing actors. The series was named the recipient of AFTRA’s (American Federation of Television and Radio Artists) 2011 American Scene “Crystal” Award®” -- the top individual television program honoree in this year’s competition -- “for its groundbreaking and seamless inclusion of performers with disabilities, storylines that showcase new assistive technologies, and ethnic diversity.” Most recently, Executive Producer Paul Stupin was awarded the 2011 Producers Guild of America George Sunga Award by the Media Access Awards.

SWITCHED AT BIRTH star Katie Leclerc, Vanessa Marano, Constance Marie, D.W. Moffett, Lea Thompson, Lucas Grabeel and Sean Berdy.

Academy Award winner Marlee Matlin, Gilles Marini and Austin Butler are recurring guest stars.

The world premiere of JANE BY DESIGN follows at 9 p.m. ET/PT. JANE BY DESIGN follows Jane Quimby (Erica Dasher), a quirky teen with an eclectic chic fashion sense, who lands a job at a hip fashion house when they mistake her for an adult. Torn between her love of fashion and the need to finish high school, Jane conceals her true age to assist the demanding, but talented Gray Chandler Murray (Andie MacDowell), who travels the world in search of the next big style trend. Jane quickly learns that working for a successful executive in the cutthroat world of fashion is not as glamorous as she once thought. But with help from her best friend Billy Nutter (Nicholas Roux), Jane tries to keep up appearances as she toggles between two lives and guard her secret. Even with Billy’s support, will Jane’s ruse be a passing fad, or will she be able to fashion a career in the design business?

JANE BY DESIGN is executive produced by Gavin Polone, April Blair and John Ziffren. The series stars Erica Dasher, David Rogers, Nicholas Roux, Rowly Dennis, India De Beaufort, Meagan Tandy, Matthew Atkinson, and featuring Andie MacDowell.

RELATED:
- INTERVIEW: Katie Leclerc (Daphne) & Vanessa Marano (Bay) Share Lots of Dish and Giggles from the Return of ABC Family's New Hit, SWITCHED AT BIRTH
- INTERVIEW: JANE BY DESIGN's Andie MacDowell