Zone brings US soaps to UK screens

Zonemedia are to launch a UK version of their female-skewed entertainment channel Zone Romantica on September 3.

Programming will feature several series from 20th Century Fox, Television Distribution, including the highly melodramatic legal dramedy Ally McBeal; also from the same creator, David E. Kelley, popular medical series, Chicago Hope; and the first showing in the UK of Snoops. Starring Gina Gershon of Pretty in Pink and Showgirls fame, Snoops is a drama series that centres around an unconventional detective agency in LA.

Viewers can follow the dramatic happenings in Salem when long running American soap Days of Our Lives is brought to UK television screens. Soap fans will also be pleased to learn that salacious soap, The Young and the Restless will be keeping Days company when the channel launches. It follows the daily lives and loves in fictional Genoa City and the history long infamous rivalry between Jill Foster Abbot and Katherine Chancellor.

Heart-warming, inspirational films will round-out programming.

Zone Romantica will be available on Sky's digital satellite platform at channel number 146 following the acquisition of BEN TV's EPG slot. The purchase allows the channel to sit alongside Zonemedia's Zone Reality branded offerings.

An additional version of ethnic station BEN TV launched on channel number 194 last month in preparation for when the current content on 146 is replaced.