The “Soapy Hosted by Rebecca Budig and Greg Rikaart” podcast continues in August with fresh episodes featuring the likes of Maurice Benard (“General Hospital”), Heather Tom and Lawrence Saint-Victor from “The Bold and the Beutiful,” “Desperate Housewives” creator Marc Cherry, and “The Young and the Restless” stars Christian LeBlanc and Tracey Bregman.

Benard will appear in the fifth episode of the audio/video podcast, releasing on Tuesday, August 5, while Tom and Saint-Victor’s episode drops on Tuesday, August 12. One week later, Cherry will speak with Budig and Rikaart on Tuesday, August 19, with LeBlanc and Bregman closing out August on Tuesday, August 26.

The joint interviews featuring Tom/Saint-Victor and LeBlanc/Bregman mark the first time the podcast includes joint interviews in an episode. Prior episodes have seen individual interviews, including Eric Braeden (“The Young and the Restless”), Deidre Hall (“Days of our Lives”) and “Beyond the Gates” executive producer Sheila Ducksworth.

More recently, the Tuesday, July 29 episode of “Soapy” sees Lauralee Bell from “The Young and the Restless” discuss her soap opera career, the stories her father, the late William J. Bell, wrote for her, and whether or not another soap tried to poach her from the long-running series. She also talks about starting on soaps as a teenager and her mother (the late Lee Phillip Bell) and father's working relationship.

Watch Lauralee Bell’s full interview below.

Hosted by Rebecca Budig (“The Bold and the Beautiful”) and Greg Rikaart (“Days of our Lives”), “Soapy” is a new audio and video podcast that dives deep into the legacy, fandom, and enduring appeal of soap operas. Available on Audacy or wherever podcasts are found, full video episodes are released every Tuesday through September 30 on the CBS brand YouTube channel.

Rebecca Budig, Greg Rikaart
CBS

“We decided, since we knew each other so well, that we should interview all the people that we know, and people that we don’t know, in this genre,” said Budig in the first-ever episode of “Soapy,” explaining why she and Rikaart decided to do the podcast. Chiming in, Rikaart noted, the podcast was also a way to “celebrate our genre, coming from a place of love and reverence, and respect, for the incredibly challenging, hard and fun work that we get to do in daytime soaps.”

Future episodes will include interviews with Scott Clifton (Liam Spencer, “The Bold and the Beautiful”), Eva LaRue (Natalia Ramirez, “General Hospital”), Cameron Mathison (Drew Cain, “General Hospital”), Karla Mosley (Dani Dupree, “Beyond the Gates”), Melody Thomas Scott (Nikki Newman, “The Young and the Restless”) and Tamara Tunie (Anita Dupree, “Beyond the Gates”).

Produced by the Paramount Multiplatform Production Group, “Soapy Hosted by Rebecca Budig and Greg Rikaart” is executive produced by Mike Benson. Andrew Pemberton-Fowler serves as producer.

Note: The post ‘Soapy Hosted By Rebecca Budig and Greg Rikaart’ Sets August Guest Lineup appeared first on the Soap Opera Network website.
 

 

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Marc Cherry is an...interesting choice... maybe he'll spill some 'tea' at least haha.

Nice lineup. 

July 10, 2025, Michael Fairman interviewed a bunch of Emmy nominees
in a live stream that lasted three hours and 26 minutes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2AvlYn9_dA
Greg Rikaart comes on at 57:19.

Before discussing his Emmy nomination, they discuss the Soapy podcast.

Rikaart:  We launched this week, and it was a really big success, and it's been a lot of fun. We did 13 episodes.  Well, you know, it's fun talking about . . .

Fairman: Now you know what it's like to do interviews.

Rikaart:  Well, the learning curve was hard and fast. You realize that what you do is hard work. The amount of work we have to do leading up to an episode surprised me. 

Fairman:  And you shot them all -- the first 13 -- in probably limited amount, a tight amount of time. 

Rikaart: We did. We shot three shows a day for three days; and then our last day was four episodes which was -- that was a humdinger, that was a lot of work.  Because they're not. . .  they're edited down to about an hour, but some of them have gone *way* longer.

------------------------


It looks like all the podcast episodes that will drop through most of September -- have already been recorded.

Edited July 29Jul 29 by janea4old

6 hours ago, alwaysAMC said:

Marc Cherry is an...interesting choice... maybe he'll spill some 'tea' at least haha.

I remember there was a story about Marc Cherry recording a video for Super Soap Weekend. In the video, he playfully invited Susan Lucci to join Wisteria Lane. But for some reason, the video never ended up being used at the event. This would’ve been during the middle of Desperate Housewives' run—well before All My Children was canceled and before Devious Maids was even in the works.

31 minutes ago, Jonathan said:

I remember there was a story about Marc Cherry recording a video for Super Soap Weekend. In the video, he playfully invited Susan Lucci to join Wisteria Lane. But for some reason, the video never ended up being used at the event. This would’ve been during the middle of Desperate Housewives' run—well before All My Children was canceled and before Devious Maids was even in the works.

Ohh this vaguely sounds familiar!!