have an extraordinary, well-educated Chinese woman who took charge of the house and gave the children good care on all levels. Of course, I felt sorry if I was away when one of them was sick, but I knew they were getting good care at home.

"I've since asked them if they minded not having a proper 'mum' at home all the time, and they said they didn't. That's not to say they didn't miss me. I'd be heartbroken if they didn't, but I don't think it's traumatized them in any way. I hope not." Then, her Irish sense of humor pops out and she says, "Maybe it has and they haven't admitted it and they'll turn out to be dreadful people! Wouldn't that be horrible?"

And what about her marriage? Did it suffer in any way because of her absences?

Her answer is candid and thoughtful. "If you're asking me generally, I think, of course absences put a strain on marriage. On the other hand, I think it's better we sometimes go our separate ways. We adore each other and Edgar is my best friend as well as my husband and we have a great deal of respect for each other. But we're both very volatile people and I drive him crazy sometimes and he drives me crazy - the way people do when they're married. But it's a very solid relationship. I miss him dreadfully when I'm on the road and I hope he misses me the same way." She pauses for a dramatic moment and then says comically, "He's better miss me!"

Now she's taping "High Hopes" in Toronto and living at home. It's an irony that two of her sons are grown and have left the nest.

"Tim, the eldest (21), has gone back to the university to study music. Brian, the second son (19), has done that 'magical' thing - saved up all his money and left for Europe, where he's going to stay as long as the money holds out."

So sharing Nuala's unaccustomed at-home lifestyle these days are her husband and youngest son, Noah (10 1/2).

Nuala's content with the changes. "I love being in town," she reveals. "I'm a city person. As much as I love being in the theatre and playing out 'God-knows-where,' if you're a creative person, you need input from other creative people. I want to go to art galleries, shows and movies. I'm a very social creature and have a great many friends, whom I like to see. And of course, being able to be with my husband so much, that's not just incidental."

All the things she loves to do, can now be done in Toronto. But it wasn't always that way. When she first came to Toronto (from Halifax) with her two small sons, after her first marriage had ended, "Toronto was a desert. I can't describe how hideous it was! But I had to go where the work was. When the children's television show I was doing moved to Toronto I went with it and I've never really regretted it. It's grown very quickly and really well - it has a lot of vitality. We have theatre, a good opera company and our national ballet company is extraordinarily good. I saw Baryshnikov in his first appearance with our National Ballet of Canada. Toronto is like a relative who's not terribly good-looking, but who's charming - there's a very endearing quality about it. Montreal is much more sophisticated and chic, with a different kind of ambiance, and I like that, too, but I love Toronto!"

Another thing she can now enjoy at home is her garden. This is the first year she was able to see the blossoming of things she planted three and four years ago.

But since nothing in life is perfect, along with her newly-rediscovered pleaslures, are some things that don't please her too much:

"When I'm away, I give a big push, throw in all the ingredients and the machinery (of running the household) somehow seems to take care of itself. But when I'm home, I often have to cook dinner, sometimes when I don't feel like doing it. It may sound selfish, but there are times when I just crave to be alone. My husband understands that and is very good about it. So I just go and shut myself up for a while. We all have a place in the house where we can go and shut the door, and it's sacrosanct. We all respect each other's need to have some 'space' and time alone.

One does wonder if playing one character, instead of many, will bore her. She ponders the question carefully.

"I don't think so. But if I get bored, then we'll all start doing something about it because I don't think it's a good thing to be bored with what you're doing. There are several things on the television horizon which may materialize and I'll still be able to go on with 'High Hopes.' Taping other shows would be fun, a wonderful combination and would give me a break. But unless the show becomes really boring or unpleasant, or something happens to the character, I don't see myself getting bored too quickly. The show is an outgoing thing - it's like life. Every day is a new show.

"And I love Paula," she says enthusiastically. "She's really terrific. At the beginning, no one gave me any idea about what she was supposed to be, except she was supposed to be the 'baddie' of the show. I think I've made her a little more sympathetic than she was intended. Paula is 40'ish, so she has grown up not being liberated. She knows about it, but it's not something that comes easily to her. In a sense, there's a conflict there, but in another sense, she makes it work for her. She uses both the old and the new. She's very successful - has forged a career for herself and is obviously very good at her job and respected by everybody she works with. She has a lot of problems and a lot of difficult people to cope with. She does tend to dip into the scotch from time to time when she's distracted, but I chose not to be too heavy on the drinking. She's snappy, sometimes almost to the point of rudeness with people and probably misunderstood by many of them. But I have a great deal of admiration for a person like that (I've known many of them) because I always know where I stand with them."

What she particularly liked about being on the soap, her first experience with the genre, was that the directors let the actors experiment with their roles. "It's been very interesting. We all had guidance, but we really did create the characters star ourselves. The writers worked with us and we changed things we thought didn't seem to fit in with the characters. It was exciting - like creating a painting!"

She has adjusted well to the regimen and the requirements of daytime soap acting, because, in addition to her formal training in theatre in Dublin (where she was born), she has done so much work in film, theatre (over 100 roles) and television (over 200 appearances).

She never watched soap operas, which are also popular in Canada, because she was always working.

"Actually," she admits, "it may have been an advantage, because I didn't go into it with any preconceived ideas. I was delighted when they asked me to do it. I like working in television and films, but roles for women are not terrific as a rule. That's why I stopped doing television a couple of years ago - I got tired of just standing around, smiling sweetly and being a bright housewife or a long-suffering woman. The only thing I regret about starting with the show was that I had to give up doing a film and the reason I was sad about that was I would have been working with John Ireland, which would have been nice."

The funny thing about Nuala's devotion to theatre is that it was actually her third choice of career.

"My first fantasy," she remembers, "when I was 6 or 7 and going to dancing school, was to be Anna Pavolva and then Moira Shearer in 'The Red Shoes.' My second fantasy was to be a singer in grand opera. Actually, I can't sing. It's all inside my head like ice skating. I feel as though I could just take off on the ice, but my ankles are weak and turn over and I can't sake at all! My voice was so low, and I guess so bad, I was put into the back of row of my school choir because I was upsetting the balance. Even when we did word poems, I was made to disappear - I was told to mime and not speak."

But once she started her theatre training and acting, she never again had to take a back seat to anything or anyone or "disappear."

Nuala points out there are several things about taping "High Hopes" that are similar to live theatre.

"There's no stopping once you start taping. So from that point of view, there's a great sense of urgency about it and its's like working in theatre, because you have got to get it right the first time or it's a total disaster!"

Even the pre-performance actor's "butterflies" are there. Although, as she describes it, "it's not' buttflies' exactly. It's more like sheer, unadulterated panic! There are things you can do to overcome it, and you try, but it's like that last little surge when you're in your car and driving a bit too fast. There's the feeling of excitement, but at the same time you feel you may be dead in two minutes."

She laughs at her analogy and pauses for a moment. "This is such a complex thing - and no one's ever asked me to describe it before." Again, a slight pause for reflection before she continues. "I feel as though I'm going to be sick or I won't remember first lines or what I'm supposed to do. In the first episode of the show, I had all of that plus the pussyfooting around with each other trying to find a style and technique. My first line was to say my name. 'Hello, I'm Paula Myles' when I answered the phone. I had a moment of panic! I couldn't remember 'Who am I?' But then, of course, once you get started, it's always wonderful!"

And "wonderful" is precisely the word to sum up Nuala Fitzgerald's feelings about her career, her new lifestyle and her new role. And as "High Hopes" daily acquires more viewers, "wonderful" is the word they'll use to describe her performance.

- DOROTHY VINE

Edited August 23, 201114 yr by CarlD2

Thanks for this article. What an interesting aspect. She has such an interesting outlook on her character's personality. In other articles, Nuala Fitzgerald is said to be one of the show's strongest actress. I can see why. She really seems to be into her role.

Did she do any other soaps?

Getting to build a character over time, from her point of view, and having so much input, it's one of the benefits of lower budgeted soaps.

I don't think so, but, given her Irish brogue, she could have popped up as one of Maeve's younger sisters on 'Ryan's Hope.' She looks like Maureen Garrett in the topic pic of the article.

October 1978 Daytimers.

Edited October 26, 201114 yr by CarlD2

Also from this issue.

It's hard to believe that there was no work for Dorothy in the 70's.I mean,a syndicated soap taped in Canada? Maybe she had to be in Hollywood and hustling to land roles in series and TV movies.

I always remember the surprise of seeing her in Basic Instinct.

Dorothy had some scandals throughout her tenure on Peyton Place. I wonder if that hurt her career.

Please elaborate!!!

Well Wikipedia says she filed suit against 20th Century. I can't remember now, so don't take it from me, but the TV magazines of the day I think talked some about a custody battle, or she was arrested. They basically painted her as being some type of mess, complete with various despondent photos.

I didn't know she was asked to replace Barbara Bel Geddes as Miss Ellie.

April 1978 Digest

Interesting, Sabina Maydelle is listed as playing 'the doctor's former sister-in-law, and leader of the local jet set." This is Paula Myles, the role Nuala Fitzgerald ended up playing. It seems she dropped out pretty late in the game. As I said earlier in the thread, I saw the pilot at the Paley Center and Fitzgerald had a cast on her foot or her arm.

It's also funny that 'Roots' and 'Rich Man, Poor Man' are listed. In another article I was reading on 'Executive Suite,' these miniseries were listed as the reason for the rebirth of the primetime serial.

June 1978 Digest

Thanks for the article. I love how they said they were going to watch the first few and then focus on the premier. The show seems fairly clunky until the last few weeks or so when they began to pull it together.