NEWS: June Spencer, Jade Harlow, Twitter Trolls, Jimmy & Hazel, Cord Cutting

The Archers star June Spencer has been with the British radio soap opera
since its debut in 1950.

Actress June Spencer: "The creator of The Archers thought he was God"
As the Radio 4 soap opera celebrates its 65th anniversary, June Spencer, the actress who plays Peggy Woolley, spoke to Telegraph about the first ever episodes in 1950.

“We doubled like mad in those days,” recalls Spencer. “As well as Peggy, I played the Irish Rita Flynn, using an accent I borrowed from my landlady.”

Spencer, now 96, doesn’t hold back on The Archers' creator Godfrey Baseley. “I can’t say he was greatly loved. He was a very abrupt man and he could be very dictatorial. He thought he was God. He wasn’t very popular but he knew what he was doing when he invented The Archers.”

The show, originally billed as “an everyday story of country folk” but now described as “a contemporary drama in a rural setting”, has become a national institution and the world’s longest-running active soap opera (second only to Guiding Light for total longevity), with more than 17,800 episodes in the bank.

Downton Abbey series finale wins Christmas Day ratings battle in the UK
The final episode of Downton Abbey beat Strictly Come Dancing’s Christmas Special to win the battle of the Christmas Day ratings, as 6.6 million tuned in to wish a fond farewell to the Crawleys. Downton went head-to-head with an hour-long special of EastEnders in the 8:45 p.m. time slot, but even a shock car crash involving the Mitchell and Beale families only captured the attention of 5.7 million fans. It still triumphed in the war between the soaps, with Coronation Street pulling in an average of 5.6 million and Emmerdale 4.3 million.

Drake posted a photo on Instagram of his reunion with Degrassi
co-star Andrea Lewis with the caption, "Forever my ting..

Drake can’t stop smiling after reunited with his Degrassi girlfriend, Andrea Lewis
Jimmy and Hazel, together again. On Thursday, Drake reunited with his former Degrassi co-starm Andrea Lewis, who played Hazel Aden on the show. Jimmy and Hazel started dating in Season 3, and lasted until Season 5. They met in detention, and were dating when Jimmy was infamously shot, which ultimately caused tension in their relationship. Things ended because of Jimmy’s attraction to Ellie.

Cord cutting is gonna suck in 2016, but it’ll get better
If you’re willing to break the law, you could supplement a meager streaming video service by torrenting pirated copies of your favorite shows. But with the feds cracking down on torrent trackers, that might not be an option for long, even if you’re willing to risk it. Or you could try staggering your subscriptions. Subscribe to HBO Now for for the few months that Game of Thrones is on the air, and then cancel and switch to Hulu. Subscribe to Sling TV in the fall for Monday Night Football, then cancel when football season is over. But that sounds like a hassle.

Such is the plight of the cord cutting couch potato in 2016. It will probably get better. The Federal Communications Commission is looking into Comcast’s data rates. Eventually, the advantage of exclusive deals with specific streaming providers may not be worth it for studios. For example, instead of going exclusive with Netflix, Marvel might make its superhero shows available on Netflix, Hulu and YouTube simultaneously, so you won’t need so many subscriptions.

Twitter says new measures "have tackled trolls"
Twitter has clamped down on internet trolls by introducing a series of measures over the past year, its European head Bruce Daisley has said. Speaking to The Independent ahead of Twitter's 10th birthday, Daisley said more effort had been put into user safety than any other issue.

"The measures we've taken correlate directly with a reduction in the amount of bad behavior," he said.

A series of high-profile users have quit Twitter, citing online abuse.

The newspaper reports that the site has been targeting suspected so-called internet trolls - people who use social media accounts to abuse others - by asking more users that they identify themselves through phone verification.

Days of our Lives alum Jade Harlow stars in movie inspired by real tragedy filmed in Massachusetts town
A feature film inspired by details of the Christa Worthington murder is planned for release this summer following a month of filming this fall in Provincetown. Harlow (Sheryl on Days) will star in Denton Harbor as a character meant to resemble Worthington.

NEWS: Lisa LoCicero, Drake, Jeff Kwatinetz, Terrence Evans, Rick Springfield, Kathy Brier

Lisa LoCicero back on-screen at General Hospital next week
LoCicero will be back on-screen as GH's Olivia next week, after a maternity leave that the actress, who gave birth to daughter Verity on May 30, says "flew by." LoCicero tells Soap Opera Digest she doesn't know much about the show's storyline intentions for Liv, but acknowledges, "The writers really got hit with a double whammy in terms of this storyline. You’ve got a burgeoning romance, one of them gets knocked up and the other one [Wally Kurth, ex-Ned; Justin, DAYS] leaves unexpectedly [laughs]! It’s kind of like, ‘Uh, good luck coming up with something smooth for this!’ "

Drake reunites with his former Degrassi co-stars
Before being known as Drake, Aubrey Graham made a name for himself as a Canadian actor starring on Degrassi: The Next Generation. The rapper played Jimmy Brooks on the series, a basketball player who ended up in a wheelchair after a school shooting left him paralyzed.

Drake met up with a trio of his former costars on Wednesday night at the Toronto screening of the new series "We Are Disorderly." At the event, he was seen taking photos with Daniel Clark (Sean Cameron), Adam Ruggiero (Maro Del Rossi) and Lauren Collins (Paige Michalchuk).

Stage and Screen Actor Terrence Evans Has Died at 81
Evans appeared as Irwin Stubbs on Days of our Lives for 14 episodes in 1989. His other credits included Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Voyager and Terminator 2.

Rick Springfield on What It’s Like to Jam with Meryl Streep
The General Hospital alum has a co-starring role opposite Meryl Streep in the new Jonathan Demme film, Ricki and the Flash, in which Streep plays the lead singer of a Southern California bar band who returns to Indiana to make peace with the ex-husband and three children she left to pursue—not very successfully—her muse.

"She brought that character to life" Springfield says of Streep. "It had nothing to do with [musical technique]—I mean it mattered that it looked like she could really play the guitar. But what really sells it to me is that she was incredibly brave and that she was that character. She’s not Meryl Streep when she sings."

Empire Creator Confirms Young Cookie Spinoff Plans: 'There's Ripe Story'
“There is going to be a spinoff from Empire, without question,” he said. “There’s so much ripe story that we’ve talked about already— about Cookie’s family, what makes her her. That in itself is fascinating to me.”

Patrick Duffy and Anne Archer have joined the cast of Will Wallace’s directorial debut Trafficked
The stars join previously announced cast members Kelly Washington, Ashley Judd, Jessica Obilom and Efren Ramirez.

One Life to Live alum Kathy Brier starring in "Gypsy" on Staten Island
The show opened last night at the Harbor Lights Theater Company, and runs two weekends through August 16th in an exciting new partnership with the historic St. George Theater in Staten Island.

Brier, who played Marcie on OLTL, stars as Electra.

Jeff Kwatinetz to telaunch The Firm management and production company
Kwatinetz is bringing back The Firm, almost seven years after the management and production company folded following his exit as CEO. Kwatinetz, who went on to launch Prospect Park with ex-Walt Disney Studios president Richard Frank, will be relaunching The Firm, which he originally established nearly two decades ago.

Netflix renews Sense8
August 8 is the birthday of all eight lead characters, so Netflix picked today to announce that Sense8 will be “reborn" for a second season.

STARTED ON DEGRASSI: TeenNick Airing Three Classic 'Jimmy Brooks' Episodes on October 11

TeenNick will air three classic episodes of DEGRESSI plus some bonus archived footage featuring Jimmy Brooks on Friday, October 11 at 10 p.m. ET.

Jimmy was played by actor Aubrey Graham during the first eight seasons of DEGRASSI: THE NEXT GENERATION. Graham is now best known as a rapper using his middle name, Drake.

Check out a preview from TeenNick below: