ALL: Best performances by Black actors on soaps

[titan1978]

Haven’t seen this in years. Just beautiful work all around. I miss Drucilla. Thanks for posting it!

Watching most of Curlee’s run on GL during COVID was such a gift. All those Black characters had a purpose and a point of view and felt like part of the fabric of the show. David and Bridget had such a special friendship.

GH had their one shining moment with Labine and the Ward family. I applaud them for at least employing a number of Black actors now, even if they have the worst stories.

An unforgettable story for me (and it is admittedly over the top, but that’s soaps), was Olivia/Nathan/Keesha on Y&R. Those confrontation scenes are etched in my memory. Tonya Lee Williams deserved better from Y&R.

 

[Darn]

I can't express to you how deeply this scene is ingrained into my psyche. I can hear Dru's "you're not too big now!" echoing in my head. Every scene between VR and Davetta's Lily was just so...BLACK. I can't explain it but if you know, you know.

For as many black actors we've seen on daytime Dru is the one character who was unquestionably a black woman at all times. There was no whitewashing of her, no laborious efforts to make her more palatable to the audience. Even as she evolved, got into modeling, mended her relationship with Olivia, moved up in society, she never once lost the essence (on newsstands now!) of who she was and that's entirely due to Victoria Rowell layering her performance with certain acting decisions that spoke to the black American audience in such a subtle, understood, nuanced way.

Was Dru hood? Yep. But she was equal parts hood and siddity, the way she weaved in and out of their characteristics was a sight to behold. We were lucky to have her for as long as we did. No other black performer was afforded the opportunity to so shape their character. Dru, and the entire black portion of Y&R was so important for me to see when I did, I think I was about 14 when I discovered the show and after years of the ABCD soaps where the black characters were very very obvious secondary seeing black characters so prominently featured, their scenes given the same level of prestige and attention was revelatory to me as a young person. They regularly got episode ending cliffhangers! They intermingled with the whole cast!

As much as I loved Angie and Jesse it often felt like "And here are our black friends!". They were wonderful and both Debbi and Darnell (my namesake and him especially) imbued their portrayals with plenty of "black" qualities having them so isolated limited them. You see, Dru, Neil, Malcolm and Olivia at least had each other to interact with. Their child should not have been the only other black person they knew!

To bookend this, here's another Dru and Mini Dru scene that lives RENT FREE in my head:

[Khan]

Thank you, @BoldRestless, for posting that scene between Dru and her mother.  Even as a casual viewer, which is what I was at that time, I felt that story and those performances were truly powerful.

[Liberty City]

Davetta Sherwood understood the assignment. She, much like Sabine Singh on All My Children, got real fücked by their soaps.

[titan1978]

Sometimes soaps get offspring casting 100% correct, and Davetta was a great example. And I didn’t hate Christel during her original run. But when Davetta was cast, she just fit so well it felt like this was what it was always supposed to be.

[Liberty City]

COMPLETELY! She just slid right into the role, made it her own and dominated!!

[Contessa Donatella]

Probably my single most favorite black performer was Petronia Paley as Quinn on AW. Also Morgan Freeman & the young adults Grant & Thomasina. 

Certainly i loved Angie & Jessie. Also half of the cast of GENERATIONS. Just learned that MVJ wrote the best catfight ever on it. Mary Mae & Justus on GH.