In 1980, All My Children’s Mona Kane (Frances Heflin) and Charles Tyler (Hugh Franklin) wed. It was a long road to the altar for the sweet duo. Mona had been Charles’s secretary during his unhappy marriage to Phoebe Tyler, who had refused to give him a divorce. Finally, though, she consented, allowing Charles and Mona to move forward with their wedding plans.
In 2007, Nick Newman (Joshua Morrow) and Phyllis Summers (Michelle Stafford) wed on Young and Restless. During the ceremony, an emotional Phyllis addressed the guests. “Just wanna quickly say thank you everybody for joining in this celebration. It means so much to me. My family — Daniel, Lily, Noah and Summer. I honestly didn’t think that I would ever find what I was looking for. But then I realized what I’m looking for is family. That’s what I’m looking for. And you’re my family,” she said. After the vows were exchanged, though, the happy mood deflated rather quickly, as the bride was placed under arrest for extortion!
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In 2008, Maxie Jones (Kirsten Storms) and Damian Spinelli (Bradford Anderson) shared their first kiss on General Hosptial. In a 2023 interview with Soap Opera Digest, Storms spoke glowingly of the “Spixie” pairing, saying, “My all-time favorite storyline is the ‘Spixie’ storyline and working with Bradford [Anderson]. He’s such a fantastic actor and incredibly intelligent. I also think he has one of the hardest parts to play on GH, because his dialogue is so difficult and there’s always a lot of it, but he makes it sound like he knows what he’s talking about when he delivers it. I just admire him and enjoy working with him a lot, and we had great chemistry.”
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In 2010, original As The World Turns cast member Helen Wagner (Nancy) passed away at the age of 91, just a few months shy of the series’ final episode, which aired in September. Co-star Colleen Zenk (ex-Barbara) told Soaps In Depth, “Helen was the one who read every script from beginning to end.” She added, “Even the shows she wasn’t in. All the scripts had to be sent to Helen. And she would know more about your storyline and your character than you did. Always. She was amazing.” Marie Masters (ex-Susan) shared that she was there on Wagner’s final day of work at the ATWT studio. “I watched her leaving that day, how frail she was,” she said. “She had a little stairway to go down, but my God, she went down those stairs with such determination with nobody helping her, and she was still in those high heels. One step… two steps… three steps… I had an impulse to reach out and I said, ‘Don’t you dare!’ And then she left. And I never saw her again.”
In 2014, Michelle Stafford made her General Hospital debut as Nina Reeves after exiting the role of Phyllis Summers on Young and Restless the previous year. In 2023, she recalled to Soap Opera Digest, “Finola [Hughes, Anna] is such a close friend and Ian [Buchanan, ex-Duke] was on the show at the time and a good friend. I watched General Hospital when I was a youngster, and that was very exciting to me, to be on the show that is a huge part of the reason why I’m an actress. I never said it to Tony [Geary, ex-Luke] because I was too embarrassed to say it, but he is a big reason why I’m an actor today. I would watch him and he was having so much fun and I just thought, ‘I want to do that. I want to do what that guy is doing.’ ”
