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Closeted (gay) actors formerly on the soaps

DNBursky

By DNBursky
in DTS: Cancelled Soaps

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Chris B Mentor

Chris B

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Wait, the guy who played Snapper and Mitch Blake was gay?! I had no idea lol. Such a good looking and talented guy. In retrospect it shocks me that Y&R never brought him back like in the 90s considering he had such success on Another World. He was a great leading man from what I saw on that show.

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vetsoapfan Mentor

vetsoapfan

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William Gray Espy was HUGELY popular on Y&R, even more than he was on AW. The trouble was, he openly admitted that he felt confined on daytime TV and did not enjoy working in the medium. He put his fist through a wall once while working on Y&R, out of frustration. 

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vetsoapfan Mentor

vetsoapfan

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He had kept his orientation quiet, himself, and had steadfastly refused to talk about his personal life with the press. Dano took it upon herself to out him in an interview, laughing about how he was not thrilled with their kissing scenes and how shaking hands instead would be more his preference.

 

 

No. Espy was a HUGE megastar and a prime reason why the show became a hit. He soared right to the top of all the readers' polls in the soap press. There was a tremendous backlash when he was replaced. Hasselhoff never attained the same popularity. You should have read some of the letters to the editors in the soap mags of the day. It was similar to Rosemary Prinz being replaced by Phoebe Dorin on ATWT. Fans were livid.

 

Espy never returned because he refused to do so. He only accepted the role of AW for a few years because he wanted to be in NY. He did not like the grind of daytime TV and made that VERY clear.

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vetsoapfan Mentor

vetsoapfan

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Well, he originally agreed to appear on AW in a short-term capacity (Mitch Blake was intended to be a villain), because NBC wanted to capitalize on his immense popularity (the way ABC had lured Rosemary Prinz to ABC for the first six months of AMC). Later, the network offered him big buck$ to return for a longer contract. In interviews, however, Espy openly admitted that he was only there for the money and the ability to make a living in NY. Rosemary Prinz loathed working on ATWT, by her own admission, but played Penny Hughes for 12 straight years for similar reasons. Back in those days, NBC was known for paying their actors a lot higher salaries than the east-coast ABC soaps or Y&R. But the reason Espy kept coming and going was because he just didn't really want to be there.

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John Grand Master

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Epsy did visit in 2003 but it was short

I know Brian Kerwin hated his time as Greg at YR but enjoyed being OLTL''s Charlie

 

I believe Wings Hauser (Greg) also had issues with YR

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Kerwin once said that while he was playing Greg Foster on Y&R, the producers came to him out of the blue and announced that they were going to give the character an extended rest, meaning that Kerwin was about to be unemployed.

 

He asked if the character was scheduled to return to the canvas later on, and they said yes, so his next, logical question was, "When Greg Foster returns to the show in six months, a year, whatever, am I going to be playing him?"

 

The producers hemmed and hawed and replied, "Well, we'll certainly CONSIDER you for am audition...."

 

Kerwin was angry because it was a wishy-washy way of firing him. He would rather have been told flat-out that TPTB were firing him instead of leaving him with false hope about a possible return.

 

Unfortunately for Kerwin, he was the second-worst actor in the role. (Being bland and colorless, he was not as repulsive as Wings Hauser, whose casting as Greg Foster still boggles my mind.)

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