If you’re acting on a soap, chances are you shouldn’t quit your day job.
Not that working on daytime is anything to be ashamed about — because it’s not. Daytime work can be relatively lucrative and a usually secure gig if you’re lucky — but as most industry insiders and pundits know, it’s not easy out there for an unemployed soaper.
However, while the soap opera industry boasts the distinction of discovering the superstar likes of Julianne Moore, Anne Heche, Ryan Phillippe, Judith Light, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Lindsay Lohan, Josh Duhamel and Meg Ryan, it’s rare for daytimers to make it outside the land of super-villains, heroes, and couples.
Thanks to Billy Miller’s splashy performances recently on The Young and the Restless, TVGuide.ca wondered which other current soap stars have the X-factor to sculpt a career on the big screen or nighttime TV.
So what does it take?
“That’s the million dollar question,” laughs General Hospital’s Emmy-winning casting director Mark Teschner, who discovered many a future boldface name. “There isn't a magic formula. You need the right actor in the right place at the right time. The stars have to align — pun intended.”
“Talent,” answers Soap Opera Digest columnist Carolyn Hinsey, who has certainly seen her share of actors come and go throughout her career as a magazine editor.
“You need the same thing to make it in daytime as you do in Hollywood: acting chops,” Hinsey continues. “Yes, young good-looking people have an edge on soaps, but if they can't cut it, eventually they'll be out. Former model Shemar Moore was hired on Y&R because he was ‘purty,’ but he developed skills, grew into the role, [won an Emmy], and took his ‘criminal mind’ to prime time.”
However, that’s usually the exception, not the rule. Yes, for every Robin Wright Penn, Melina Kanakeredes, Antonio Sabato Jr., and Vanessa Marcil, it’s often the actors who don’t make the cover of Digest or win Daytime Emmy Awards that tend to land the big jobs outside of daytime.
Remember Brandon Routh? Spencer Grammer? Brad Pitt? Leonardo DiCaprio? Susan Sarandon? Eva Longoria? Paul Wesley? Ryan McPartlin? The list goes on and on …
After less-than-spectacular stints on soaps, the careers of the aforementioned actors broke out almost immediately, while our best and brightest — actors like Kim Zimmer, Maurice Benard, Darnell Williams, Michael E. Knight and Anthony Geary — had to eat crow and return to their day jobs after striking out in Hollywood.
“It’s the luck of the draw who lands a job in Hollywood,” explains La Hinsey. “But they'll need talent to [survive]. If they’ve previously worked on soaps, they’ll be ahead of the game. Especially after memorizing 40-plus pages of dialogue a day with no rehearsal.”
Or is it? In this youth-obsessed industry, soap manager Michael Bruno claims it’s less about talent and more about the casting “couch.” He states emphatically, “Youth — and great representation are key. The younger the soap star leaving daytime, the better.
Ideally, the kids who have done three years or less are more desirable and have the best shot at fame,” Bruno continues. “After 25, It’s much harder to break out outside of soaps. Also, you need to ensure you have representation with connections in order to get into those impossible-to-get-into series regular auditions.”
Making it more impossible is if you’re a highly recognizable soap star and/or identified with a certain role. For instance, producers and directors don’t want their audience screaming, “There’s Victor Newman!” (FYI — Braeden did appear in Titanic.)
With that said, TVGuide.ca presents the Top 25 actors we’d ask to leave soaps and join our Soapywood Agency.
Our criteria? First, we left out actors who previously left daytime of their own volition only to return (Jonathan Jackson and Nadia Bjorlin, for instance), despite their reasons for coming back to daytime. However, actors who took a brief hiatus were considered. Also, we excluded former prime-time/film actors (Michael Muhney) since they already found relative success and/or followings outside of soaps.
Our list is mostly compiled of younger actors who are either new to the daytime world or have never quit their day jobs to pursue other career interests.
And before you Otalia fans get your panties in a twist, Crystal Chappell is not present on our list because she’s enjoying mainstream attention thanks to Venice — and can do whatever she damn well pleases. She’s on daytime because she wants to be.
So, considering a mix of beauty, talent and the almighty It factor, we present the actors we’d be proud to be a part of our Soapywood Agency.
And yes, we demand a 10 per cent cut!
Click here to find out who are Soapywood's Top 25 ideal clients!
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Nelson Branco is a Toronto freelance entertainment journalist, who regularly contributes to Hello! Canada, The National Post, The Los Angeles Times' theenvelope.com, TV Guide USA, tvguide.com, Inside Entertainment, OUT, and fab magazine, along with spearheading the soap coverage for TVGuide.ca's popular daytime TV hub. After graduating from Ryerson University in 1997, he moved from Toronto to New York in 1998 to take on the roles as senior news editor at Soap Opera Update. Branco first freelanced for Soap Opera Weekly as an intern in 1994, and after leaving Soap Update to help create and launch Bauer Publishing's In Touch Weekly in 2003, Branco continued to freelance occasionally for its sister publication, Soaps In Depth. Most recently, he helped create and launch Canada's first celebrity magazine, Weekly Scoop in 2005 as its news and entertainment director. Branco is also a contributor to a new TV show titled Planet Soap to air in Canada and America.
