Hal Munson (ATWT) started out as a dayplayer cop, then ended up having a brief affair with Margo and fathering half of Oakdale.

Gwen Norbeck (ATWT) hired to play an old friend of Ali's and have a bad date with Will, and TIIC liked JL so much, they immediately put her on contract and made her Carly's half-sister.

Erica Kane was only supposed to be on All My Children every other Tuesday and now 40 years later...

Spinelli!

Nick Davis (AMC). He was supposed to be killed off after 6 months but became popular with the audience.

Actually, just a note. Paul did NOT give Nikki VD. It was the other way around. She infected him. he gave her hell for it, too. I was watching the show at the time. Anyway, the specifics of this were misreported in a soap publication years ago, and the myth...took off, LOL!

The actor who plays Paul has given interviews lamenting the loss of his character's good name, LOL, and correcting the mistake, but the myth persists to this day, 30 years later.

Haha, good to know. We should've known it'd be Nikki. God only knows what else she contracted while rubbing up on that stripper pole

Erica Kane was only supposed to be on All My Children every other Tuesday and now 40 years later...

Susan Lucci signed a three year contract when she signed on as Erica. Hardly short term.

Initially Y&R's Nina was just a short-term summer story character, one of two pregnant teens. Bill Bell was however so impressed by Tricia Cast that he brought her back a few weeks after her original stint ended.

Robert Scorpio was only supposed to appear in a handful of episodes but they kept him on a little longer

Eric Braeden has commented that Victor Newman (AKA Christian Miller) was supposed to be a short term role, too! He was only supposed to be on for a few months.

Edited October 26, 200916 yr by NorrthCafe

D'oh...I don't know how I missed the earlier statement about Braeden. Sorry.

Susan Lucci signed a three year contract when she signed on as Erica. Hardly short term.

hmm... Interesting, I didn't know that. I remember back in 1999 when she said she was supposed to be on every other Tuesday. I was just assuming it was supposed to be short term but since fans loved her, it developed into longer.

How have we gone this long without mentioning Roger Howarth as Todd?

I'm fairly positive both Olivia and Edmund were short-term San Cristobel players on GL at first, as well. And Ashlee and Doris Wolfe.

Mark Lawson as Brody on OLTL - romantic spoiler for Rex and Gigi becomes leading talent based solely on his talent. Oh, and Tonja Walker as Alex Olanov - her run was supposed to end with her attempting to drown Cassie at Loon Lake, I believe, but Linda Gottlieb loved her and the role took off. Timothy Stickney debuted as a recurring player, "Jimmy Glover," a loan shark Max got in deep with due to his gambling. OLTL loved him and decided to make "Jimmy" turn out to be R.J. Gannon. Dunno if THIS qualifies as "taking off," but Jill Farren Phelps turned evil, short-term corrupt cop John Sykes (John Bolger) into a leading man during her tenure at the show, based on her adoration for Bolger as one of her Another World "Friends Of Jill."

Michael B. Jordan as Reggie on AMC. Oh, well.

Was Vienna short term on ATWT at one point?

Edited October 27, 200916 yr by Vee

I think they did have some plans for Edmund but I can't remember. That whole story was hard to tell because they cast name soap actors as Olivia and Dax, so I thought they'd stick around. I still wish they'd done more with Thom Christopher.

I think Vienna was short term initially.

I forgot about Todd, I guess because he took off so fast.

There's also Danny on GL, and I think Drew. Mustn't forget Danny.

GL did that a lot. Another was Doris Wolfe, who spent years loitering as the town DA until she began to get bigger stories when many characters began leaving.