During the course of his reporting for this week's cover story on TV soap operas, TIME Correspondent Leo Janos joined two of the actors on NBC's Days of Our Lives, Susan Seaforth Hayes and her husband Bill, for lunch at a Hollywood restaurant. "A well-known movie star was seated across from us," Janos recalls. "Within 15 minutes of our arrival, the Hayes' were besieged by autograph seekers. I watched the movie actor's face. At first he was simply puzzled, then he was piqued. Finally he became incensed. No one had paid him any attention, and I could tell he had no idea who was signing all those autographs. Bill Hayes just smiled and said: 'Happens all the time.' " Other staffers who worked on the project were equally intrigued by the heroes of the soaps. Reporter-Researcher Jean Vallely spent a week following the performers in ABC's Ryan's Hope and NBC's Another World, a title that she found to be particularly appropriate. She had to get up at dawn in order to get to the sets in time to catch the beginning of the day's video taping at 6 a.m. Said Vallely: "I hadn't realized how hard soap-opera actors work." New York Correspondent Mary Cronin, a daytime drama addict from the radio days of Mary Noble and Helen Trent, reported on the battle of the soaps from the networks' point of view. Staff Writer Gina Mallet, who divided her time between the tube and the typewriter in her office, wrote the cover story.-

In any given week, TIME'S coverage reaches well beyond the major headline stories. Some of the issues, large and small, dealt with in this week's magazine:

>How should "full employment" be defined in a long period of high joblessness? (ECONOMY & BUSINESS).

> Could smokers be the next oppressed minority? (ESSAY).

>Will recent court decisions expanding athletes' rights destroy professional teams? (SPORT).

>Can a dish that once had to be served under such aliases as "steakfish" and "greyfish" find respectability? (MODERN LIVING).

> How can a band win fans in the rock era by playing old dance tunes on such instruments as harps and the uilleann pipes? (Music).

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.