Everyone Has Had Moments of Unexplained Happening

DAYTIME TV- May 1977

Earl Hindman (Bob Reid, Ryan's Hope)

"I have a number of prognostication dreams. About 3 years go, I dreamed there was a big plane crash in Washington D.C., out of the Mid West, that went into the side of a mountain. In my dream, I saw the bodies. I saw the wreck, I saw everything. What happened that night is that 2 planes went down, one into the side of a mountain, in a big storm in the Mid West, just like in my dream. It was a wooded area, and in my dream I had seen bodies in trees. I got the insomnia after the dream. Another plane, did go down that night, touched ground but didn't crash."

Love Louise's response.

Everyone Has Had Moments of Unexplained Happening

DAYTIME TV- May 1977

Louise Shaffer (ex-Serena Faraday, The Edge of Night)

Laughing. "I don't believe in it for a minute. The farthest out I'm willing to go is psychiatry. I'm one of those people who, if you ask them their astrological sign, will say, 'Spinach, what's yours?"

Edited January 11, 201114 yr by safe

Malcolm Groome (Pat #1): Y IS FOR YOGA (1977)

Y is for YOGA – How to do it

AFTERNOON TV SPECIAL '77

SOAP STARS TELL HOW TO DO EVERYTHING FROM A TO Z!

“Yoga,” explains MALCOLM GROOME (Pat Ryan on “Ryan's Hope”), “means union. There are many different kinds of yoga. I follow Hatha Yoga, which is the physical and most popularized form of yoga. But there's Karma Yoga, which has to do with working on good deeds are stressed. Then there's Jnana Yoga, that is the yoga of knowledge – to seek union with God through intellectual pursuits. There's Bhakti Yoga, that's the yoga of devotion. And then there's Raja, the king of yogas. That's the yoga of meditation.

“I've been doing all of these yogas,” Malcolm continues, “but I've gotten into a Western style philosophy. It's the same as an Eastern style philosophy, it's just their organization, their teaching are more Western oriented.”

Malcolm has been doing yoga for eight years and has even studied in India. He practices his yoga every other day and say that the Hatha Yoga led him to his present philosophy. Malcolm is currently interested in something called Actualism, a Western style philosophy.

“I started with Hatha Yoga and Hindu philosophy, but then I went through a lot of things. I'm still interested in the physical aspects of yoga. I think the physical aspect is really valuable, too. And the philosophies are very valuable ,too. The same truths that are in the Eastern things and in the yoga are also in what I'm doing now. It's just just that Western philosophy has more of a Western vocabulary, which is better for me to relate to.”

Although Malcolm has only been practicing yoga for eight years, he says, “ I've been sitting in the lotus position since I was kid.” Malcolm first read about yoga, and then took classrs, both in the U.S. And India.

There are several books on yoga, but the one that Malcolm recommends if titled, “The Illustrated Book of Yoga.” He added that he'd heard the Richard Hittelman series of books on yoga were very good, too,

Malcolm recommends classes for beginner, he says, “ You can be doing something wrong out of a book and not know it.” If you attend classes, you get experienced help that will help you correct your mistakes and tell you what you're doing wrong.

Although yoga is both physical and mental discipline, Malcolm thinks that you don't have to be interested in the philosophy of yoga to benefit from it. “Yoga slows down the body so that the mind can also be stilled,” he says. “ I thinks that you benefit anyway, you can't avoid it, “ he says positively.

Edited January 14, 201114 yr by safe

Thanks for continuing to share these with us. The 70s soap magazines provide so many unique types of discussions which would never be asked today - talking about therapy, EST, astrology, and so on. Malcolm seems like a fascinating person.

I loved Louise's response too. She seems like a hoot.

Helen Gallagher (Maeve)

Helen Gallagher - Hard Working Perfectionist

TV dawn to dusk – June 1978

Helen Gallagher, star of the Emmy-award winning Ryan's Hope, has always been a perfectionist. Helen has wanted to excel at acting throughout her life. As a little girl going to parochial school, she wanted to sing and dance so badly that she had a chronic case of asthma which didn't go away until she began working. After recently winning her first daytime, she claimed, “Something in an audience frees me unbelievably!”

In some ways, Helen fears serious dramatic acting, but her perfectionism always comes before fear. She says,” I find acting quite painful. I don’t really want to strip away my innermost feelings. I don't want to be pained on stage – I want to have a good time. But if I decide to do something I somehow always manage to get it down – whatever it is, to understand the inner workings of it. I don't mean to sound pompous, but I can't give myself permission to do things badly.”

Her perfectionism has led to the Tony Award for best supporting actress in a musical – Pal Joey in 1952 and again in 1971 for best actress in a revival of No No Nanette. She has also earned many regional and summerstock awards, and most recently the Emmy for the part of Maeve on Ryan's Hope.

Helen is only a perfectionist as far as her work goes. She is willing to let it be submerged in her social life. Separated from her husband Frank Wise for 20 years, she has no desire for a divorce. “What for? she asks. “I don't expect to marry again. My life is not built around a social stricture. It's built around my work. Work is the most important thing for me.”

If she has to be perfect at one thing, and means to direct all her energies towards it, we all thank our lucky stars that she has chosen to be as perfect as possible at a craft we can all enjoy.

Thanks for continuing to share these with us. The 70s soap magazines provide so many unique types of discussions which would never be asked today.

I enjoy reading them, too.

Some things about the actors' lives are repeated in these interviews, from various magazines, but I always learn a new tidbit or two.

Magazine were very different back then.

Edited January 14, 201114 yr by safe

Catherine Hicks (Faith #3): I FEEL SORRY FOR A LOT OF MEN TODAY

Catherine Hicks : I FEEL SORRY FOR A LOT OF MEN TODAY

DAYTIME TV - October 1977

When Catherine Hicks says she doesn't like to waste time, she means it.

Two weeks after she arrived in New York, she landed the role of Faith on Ryan's Hope.

"It's amazing how it all happened," Cathy says, curled up in an arm chair in her beautifully decorated West Side Manhattan apartment.

"When I came to New York, I was sure I didn't want to do a soap opera. But before I was even unpacked, my agent sent me down to try out for the part of Holly Bauer on Guiding Light and that same week I tested for Faith on Ryan's Hope."

"When I went down to Ryan's Hope, I was completely in the dark. I'd never even heard of the show. But when I walked in the studio, all my pre-conceived notions about what a soap opera was went right out the window. Here were all these terrific young theater actors - people like Malcolm Groome, Kate Mulgrew and Ilene Kristen -- and I thought to myself, 'Hey, wait a minute, this is exciting!' It felt more like working in a young repertory company than on a soap opera."

Catherine was born in the Greenwich Village section of New York, but when she was still an infant her parents moved to Arizona for health reasons. An only child, she grew up in Phoenix and Scottsdale, where her dad was an electronic salesman, and her mother, a homemaker, followed the CBS serials – As The World Turns and Guiding Light – faithfully.

Cathy first thought about becoming a actress when she was eight. Later, as a teenager she changed career plans several time. “First, I wanted to be a professional cheerleader,” she laughs, “then I decided to become an English teacher. For a while, I got really interested in theology and even wanted to be a nun.”

That happened when she was a senior at St. Mary's college, the women’s undergraduate division of Notre Dame. As a co-ed, she also got involved in dramatics, but she didn't have enough confidence yet to take herself seriously as an actress. Then a few days before graduation, her drama teacher approached her and said, “You're going to graduate school, aren't you, Cathy?”

“For what?” she asked him.

“Why for acting, of course. You know you've got the talent.”

That was all the encouragement she needed. She applied to Cornell University, which has a topnotch earn-while-you-learn drama program. Cathy studied there for two years, playing the leads in campus productions like Bus Stop and After the Fall. At Cornell, she also met director Peter Stelzer, who has since become a “very special guy” in her life.

With Peter on staff at Cornell, and Cathy in New York, they only get to see each other occasionally on weekends now, but Cathy doesn't mind.

“I think a good relationship can thrive on separation,” she says. “A lot of people would disagree, I know, but I think you get a sense of your identity from being alone. If you have to be apart from someone you care about for a couple of months at a time, because of work, it can give you a chance to breathe. You're not so attached. It gives you a chance to enjoy the adventure of begin alone -- I'm not talking about being promiscuous or unfaithful – but about really learning to survive on your own.”

Cathy admits meeting “an awful lot of lonely people in New York,” but doesn't count herself among them. For relaxation, she reads, listens to records, soaks in a hot tub, practices yoga, haunts thrift shops and antique stores for bargain buys for her new apartment, and socializes.

“I have a whole groups of girls that I became friendly with at Cornell and we still keep in touch regularly. Some are in the theater, some are in the production end of show business, and one girl is a nurse.”

But while enjoying her freedom, Cathy doesn't intend to remain single forever. “I did a diaper commercial the other day and held a baby for five hours – and, frankly, it made me feel very maternal. I think I'm just starting, in a vague way, to whiff the sensation of wanting a child, not right now, but maybe in five or ten years. Yes, I definitely look forward to getting married and raising a family one day.”

As for women's lib, Cathy has mixed feelings on the subject. “ I think it's marvelous, I think there have been some mistakes on how it's been publicized, and interpreted along the way.”

“I'm a little worried about what's happening. I wonder how men and women are going to get together for the next couple of decades while all these changes are taking place. Women are working on improving themselves in a very wonderful way and really helping each other -- but where does that leave the men? I feel sorry for a lot of men today, I see men who are obviously really marvelous individuals, talented, nice guys, but they're very lonely. Maybe the women they want are doing their own thing or else the women they want just aren't interested in the. It's a shame. Something's amuck, but I don't know what the answer is."

A charming girl, with a deep and discerning intelligence, Cathy obviously knows what she wants in life. And what she wants isn't superficial, in any way, shape, or form.

That's why she went to New York to pursue stardom, rather than heading out to sunny, seductive California. “I grew up out West,” she says with sudden fire in her soft-spoken voice, “ and it's not what it's cracked up to be. The southwest is beautiful to pass through, but it was kind of a wasteland to grow up in. There's a whole psychology as to why people go out there.”

To Cathy, the California golden life represents a kind of false hope. “It's bright and sunny and the mood out there is, 'We're gonna get our bodies in shape, we're gonna get in the car and drive all over, go to the beach and play volleyball -- and that will solve everything!' It's very physical and recreational because there is so much space. But you never brush elbows with anyone. You go from your air-conditioned house to your air-conditioned car to an air-conditioned movie.”

In New York, there's so much to do, so much energy. There’s human contact. You sneeze and a block away somebody leans out the window and yells, 'God bless you.'”

by Jason Bonderoff

Edited January 15, 201114 yr by safe

Catherine said , "I have a whole groups of girl's that I became friendly with at Cornell and we still keep in touch regularly. Some are in the theater, some are in the production end of show business, and one girl is a nurse.”

One of Catherine's friends from Cornell, who was the actress who worked as a nurse, was Sharon Gabet. Sharon played Raven #2 on The Edge of Night. She also had roles on Another World as Britttany and One Life to Live as Melinda #3 .

(Excerpt)

Sharon Gabet (Why SHARON GABET Doesn't Hide Her Handsome Roomate) interview

DAYTIME TV – September 1978

"I didn't get an acting job in New York for a year,” Sharon recalls. “My girl friend, Catherine Hicks, had gone to New York ahead of me and landed on Ryan's Hope within a month. But I didn't have her luck. So, I while I waited for my New York nursing license to come through, I worked as a waitress.” Nursing jobs came later.

CAST TWISTS

Who's Arriving & Who's Leaving on the Soaps

DAYLIGHT TV – July 1978

SHARON GABET who took over the role of Raven Jamison on The Edge of Night, comes from quite a large family -- she's one of nine children! Raised in Fort Wayne, Indiana, she got a nursing degree at Purdue and later joined the theatrical apprentice program at Cornell University. Guess who one of her best girl friends at Cornell was? CATHERINE HICKS, now better known as Dr. Faith Coleridge on Ryan's Hope.

Of course, Cathy won't be on Ryan's Hope for long. She's leaving soapdom, we hear, to co-star in a new Broadway play, Tribute, with Jack Lemmon. That's quite a tribute to her talent!

Edited January 15, 201114 yr by safe

This is fascinating stuff. I'd love to have seen Sharon, Catherine, and Jordan Clarke all acting together. I never knew that Catherine was in the running to play Holly on GL. I can't see that.

Ana Alicia (Alicia): HELLO, IS THIS LINDA?...I MEAN ANA ALICIA?

Ana Alicia: HELLO, IS THIS LINDA?...I MEAN ANA ALICIA? (1977)

DAYTIME TV – December 1977

Leave a message for Ana Alicia Ortiz with her phone-answering service, and you never know who will call you back. Due to a mix up in communications, I almost would up interviewing the wrong Ortiz.

It all started when I left a message asking Ana Alicia to call me at our Daytime TV offices. The next day Ms. Ortiz called, and editor Jason Bonderoff made the appointment with her for an interview.

Then, a day later, I got word that a Linda Ortiz had called, returning the message I'd left with her answering service. Baffled, I wandered into Jason's office and said, ”Are you sure you gave me the correct name of the actress who plays Alicia Nieves on Ryan's Hope?”

“Of course, I'm sure.”

“Well, somebody named Linda, not Ana Alicia, just returned my call. Do you suppose she uses a nickname?”

To clear up they mystery, I called Linda Ortiz at the number she'd left with our receptionist. When she answered the phone she told me in a Spanish accent that she had a temporary job at an accounting firm! Suspicion mounted within me. Finally I asked, “Is your name Linda or Ana Alicia?”

“Linda.”

I began to suspect something fishy. Defying my fears that I'd make a fool of myself, I finally asked, ”Linda, are you an actress?”

“No.”

I sighed, “Well, there's been a slight misunderstanding. I'm trying to contact Ana Alicia Ortiz, the actress.”

“Oh, darn, and I was getting so excited about the interview.”

“I'm very sorry, Ms. Ortiz.”

“So this means the interview is off, right?”

I hung up and ran to tell Jason,” I just canceled that interview you made with Ana Alicia. It turned out that you made it with the wrong person. By the way, did your Ms. Ortiz have a Spanish accent on the phone?”

Jason began to laugh hysterically, “ Now that you mention it, her voice changed every time I spoke to her. First she had an accent, then she didn't.”

I gasped. “Do you realize that we've been talking to two different people? We've each been taking calls from each of them on different days. We laughed. Jason couldn't remember which Ms. Ortiz, he'd made the appointment with. “Let me see...did she have an accent the day we made the appointment, or didn’t she?”

Back I went to the phone and left another message with the service, this time, emphasizing the name ANA ALICIA. The next day the real Ana Alicia called from the studio. I told her the story and heard unending laughter. She cried, “Please stop. I have to do a weeping scene in five minutes and I'll never be able to stop laughing.”

I asked if we could set up an interview so we could finally meet. “But we’ve already got an appointment,” she said, “ for tomorrow at two o'clock.”

“Who set it up?”

“Somebody from your office named Jason.” I realized that Jason had, after all, arranged the interview with the right Ortiz.

After I gave Ana our address, I teased, “How will I know if you're the real Ana Alicia?”

“I'll be carrying a puppy Peke-a-poo named Chiquita.”

And the next day she did indeed come to our offices with her puppy. (We haven't heard again from Linda Ortiz, but we do wish her the best of luck wherever she is – and whatever she may be doing.)

Articulate, intelligent, and sincere. Ana laughs freely and has the ability to put people at ease.

The ability came I handy a few months ago when she moved to New York City. She recalls, “ I'm from a small town and it really was a big adjustment... I didn't know anyone when I came here... I was in a new city and I was told so much about it – don't walk in the streets, don't go out at night – I was scared. A couple of weeks later I said, 'Forget it, that's life. You have to be careful in every city. But you have to live. You can't continuously hid and worry.'”'

Quoting fellow actress Bette Davis, Ana says.” Be careful what you wish, because it comes true..” Why does she believe it? “Two years ago I was watching Ryan's Hope and I told my mom, 'I'd like to be on that show one day... I don't know if I'll ever do it, because I'm not one of the beautiful people. And my mom said, 'You'll see, you'll do it!'”

Working in a Los Angeles repertory company two years later, Ana went to an audition for a television role. She recalls, “ It was the first interview I'd gone to in six months. I walked in and read the script, noticed it was for Ryan's Hope, and said, 'Something's strange.' Then I noticed that the character's name was Alicia – my name and she was supposed to be my real age.”

Born in Mexico on a December 10, Ana Alicia move to El Paso, Texas, with her mother and two brothers and sister when her father died. After high school, she attended Wellesley College for one year on a scholarship, and then transferred to the University of Texas so that she could perform dinner theater nearby.

What does she dream for the future? Besides doing film and Broadway plays, producing and writing her own shows, Ana says, “One of the thing I want to do in my life is to marry and have a couple of kids. I feel that I could give a lot to children – if I was ready financially and if I found the right man. Yes, it's funny – one thing that I've never found so far is a man of whom I could say, 'I want him to be the father of my children.'”

What does she look for in a man? “ A loving and a sensitive individual because I'm a very sensitive person. I give an awful lot, but if I find someone who doesn't then I just end up giving and nothing comes back. You have to share.”

Ana believes the two people in a relationship must be able to communicate with each other, “You need someone you can come home and open up to. Mom and dad aren't always going to be there, yet they're the ones who have unselfish love for you. That's the kind of love I would like to find in a marriage – unselfish on both sides.”

By Susan Evans

Thanks. That interview was a lot of fun. Poor Linda Ortiz.

From the July 1979 TV Dawn to Dusk & Daytime Stars (Ideal Publishing), an interview with John Blazo.

my own needs but I decided I could do more good in another field.

"After I got my B.A. degree at Brown, I tried law school at Temple. It was very sedentary and I hated it. Very few people like law school. It's nothing like practicing law. It's very dry and doesn't have much variation.

"I quit and after a year's hiatus entered a Quaker seminary (Earlham in Richmond, Indiana) to study for the ministry.

"That's not as out of the blue as it sounds. The ministry always interested me. In theology I hoped to find answers to some of those questions that plague us all: "Why is there anything at all? Why is there so much human suffering? What is life all about?

"I discovered there are no simple answers. Although I continued my studies at the Harvard Divinity School for a year and a half and I thoroughly enjoyed being a student of Church history, I decided it was not for me to lead a church. I didn't feel I'd been called. I felt inadequate.

"While at Harvard, I auditioned for shows at the Loeb Theater and was cast. Eventually, I began to realize that here was a profession in which I could find fulfillment - and to which, through sheer will and imagination I could bring something I hadn't been able to bring ot the others.

"I decided to go to New York and take a chance."

That was in September 1977, almost a year after he'd taken a bride.

John met Christie (his wife of two and a half years) his last three weeks at Brown University. She was due to graduate too. Then she was scheduled to head for Vienna to become an English teacher in the Austrian school system and he was going off to law school.

At the end of his term at Temple, he flew to Vienna to see Christie and they spent five weeks together hitchhiking through Europe (Hungary, Bavaria, France, Italy, etc.)

"It was the end of Christie's term too and she decided against continuing as a teacher. We came back to the States and she went to the University of Utah to study computer science. After a while I decided against becoming a lawyer and I joined her out in Utah, where, for a year I did odd jobs and read a lot. Then I entered the seminary on a scholarship.

"We were married while I was at Harvard, at the end of '76. In June of the next year, I looked up a New york theatrical connection of one of my school chums, the very well-known agent, Stark Hesseltine. He heard me read and told me to come back in September. During the interval I did a production of Love's Labours Lost in summer stock.

"In the fall, everything fell into line. Christie and I came to New York for a couple of weekends and found a great one-bedroom apartment; we still live there. She got a job as a systems analyst with Chemical Bank and Stark started sending me out on auditions.

"He got positive reactions and signed me to a contract.

"One of the auditions was for Ryan's Hope. I auditioned for them a couple of times but although they seemed to like me, I didn't get any of the roles I was up for. When Malcolm Groome left the show, they felt I wasn't right for the role of Pat Ryan but they saw me anyway.

"I don't know why they later changed their minds but I'm glad they did."

There was a year of off-Broadway and off-off-Broadway productions (A Christmas Carol, The Taming of the Shrew, Othello), before John joined the cast of the serial in June 1978.

Though he's quite content with his current lot and hopes to expand his career ("What I'd really like to be is a well-respected stage actor"), John doesn't rule out returning to a seminary in the future.

"I don't look back on the things I've done with a sense of incompletion," he says. "Everything has been completed. I worked toward being a doctor, a lawyer, a minister and nothing has been wasted. I've learned a lot and I can use everything I've learned.

"Finding a religious element in my life was a surprise. It was not really fostered in my upbringing.

"I was confirmed Episcopalian and Presbyterian but my family moved a lot when I was a kid (my father's business career took us to different cities) and we attended many different churches. The church was chosen for the minister and the people who attended rather than for its denomination.

"I'm not evangelical and I've been a skeptic from the word go, a real doubting Thomas. I don't talk about my faith a lot and I know I haven't acted on it enough.

"I attend church only sporadically now. I fell away from it but I'm trying to find my way back.

"Yet when I was going to church regularly, I never got the impression that many people I knew loved God. And I do feel that people who have real faith (much more than I), people who experience God, have much richer lives.

"I'm just starting to find that love of God myself. It happens to you in different ways. You have to reach for it and then you're embraced.

"I don't express my faith enough, I don't let it direct me. I feel I should be more helpful to my community, that I should use my faith for other people's benefit. I try but at this point in my life, I'm too preoccupied with my own desires.

"As an actor, I'm filled with too much self-concern: what I look like, how I sound, how I'm presenting myself at auditions. It's good to have faith in yourself but it's more important to help other people find faith in themselves.

"Life has a purpose. In my contemplative moments I ponder what it is. Surely each one of us helping the other must be a part of it.

John continues to ask questions. But he's finding more answers these days. And he's beginning to realize that his true ambition, his ultimate goal, is to grow - not merely as an actor, but as a human being.

Marilyn T. Ross

Thanks.

A few years ago, I had found this, online, about John Blazo. It's from 2001.

The Morning Call/John Blazo

The Morning Call

May 3, 2001

Born again thespian -- John Blazo can't wait to get back to Broadway. More than 20 years ago, Blazo gave up a promising career in the theater to become a medical missionary.

"I had an agent, a role on the television soap "Ryan's Hope' and a lot of stage offers," said the New Jersey native. "But in 1981, I was in a show called "Semmelweiss.' Ed Sherin was the director and Kathy Bates and Jeff DeMunn were in the cast. I just quit. I had had enough of show business."

Looking back, Blazo says he had always had a conflict between performing and social service. After trying summer stock while a student at Brown University, he enrolled first in law school and then at Harvard's Divinity School. He didn't find what he wanted, so he headed to New York and worked in the theater for several years.

But he was idealistic, quitting the theater to join the Dorothy Day Catholic Workers movement. He went to Mexico and Guatemala, and married a doctor. In 1991 they moved to Allentown. When the marriage ended, Blazo tried theater and worked at Theatre Outlet. He starred as Einstein in "Picasso at the Lapine Agile," and then acted in "The Crucible" at Civic Theatre of Allentown.

Blazo credits his second wife with giving him the encouragement to try again. Now he has a new cabaret act which he hopes will take him back to New York and a try at the club circuit.

Last week, Blazo tried out his act at the King George Inn. May 10 he will sing at the Starfish Brasserie in Bethlehem. On May 25 he will sing at the Weekday Cafe in Quakertown and on July 29 he'll be at The Shanty in Allentown. Blazo sings songs from his CD "Miles Beyond the Moon," which includes old favorites such as "Time After Time," "Night and Day," "They Can't Take That Away From Me" and "I've Got You Under My Skin."

"I have a wonderful new accompanist, jazz pianist Eric Doney. He is a former musical director for Englebert Humperdinck," says Blazo. "When I first started out more than 20 years ago, my love was musical theater. I got waylaid. Now I am trying again. My goal is to break into the New York clubs. It's hard work, but this area is a good place to start."

Thanks for sharing that. I have always felt that Blazo didn't get a chance as Pat. He played Pat as thoughtful, scared - which Pat should have been at that time - but still had Pat's humor and charm. They gave him underwhelming stories, first the reunion with the VERY frosty Karen Gowdy version of Faith, and then the story with Nancy, where, as they even pointed out in a scene, the two actors looked like siblings. I wish they'd kept him around instead of having that shockingly bad recast, followed by banishing Pat for two years.

Ana Alicia Ortiz (Alicia)

Ana Alicia Ortiz : Ryan's Newest Angel Baby

DAILY TV SERIALS – September 1977

When the producers of Ryan's Hope cast the role of Puerto Rican character, Alicia Nieves, they found their ideal, not in New York where the show is taped, but in California. Dark-haired beauty, ANA ALICIA ORTIZ made the grade as the para- medic who comes to Delia's aid during her miscarriage – and who proves to be a romantic interest for at least one male character on the show, Bucky Carter, who thinks she's an angel.

When informed that she had the role. Ana Alicia had only two days to quickly pack up her belongings in order to arrive in New york for the taping of her first Ryan's Hope episode.

Raised in Texas, this twenty-three year old brunette attended the University of Texas and Wellesley College in Boston, before moving to California less than a year ago. A former member of a Los Angeles - based theater company, Ana Alicia's talents include singing, dancing, and writing – she's also an accomplished pianist

Although born in Mexico, she doesn't speak with an accent off screen – only in the role. A fan of Ryan's Hope before she was cast, Ana Alicia is ecstatic to be part of this Emmy Award winning show.

Meanwhile, the role of Alicia's brother is being portrayed by JOSE ALEMAN. But the character may not turn out to be as heavenly as his name suggests!