

“I think that Spencer is maturing,” he says, adding with a chuckle, “as much as someone can on a soap opera, of course.” He was recently nominated for a Daytime Emmy and, now that he’s been in the role for over a year, has reflected on his character’s trajectory. They knew Luke and Laura.” But, the actor caught on quickly.

“I would say that, for the most part, Laura approaches Spencer with empathy and understanding and a gentle caring that Spencer really, really values.”Ĭhavez says he didn’t know anything about the show when he auditioned. There have been some tough love moments but they are few and far between,” says Chavez. I think she’s been maternal and infinitely loving towards him and gives him the benefit of the doubt at every turn. Spencer’s relationship with his grandmother, though, has become a source of stability in the character’s life. Longtime fans have watched stars like Francis, who joined the cast as a teenager, grow up on the show as a slew of new characters plant their roots in Port Charles.Ī little over a year ago, Nicholas Alexander Chavez stepped into the role of Spencer Cassadine, Laura’s college-aged grandson who returned to town from boarding school with a host of entitlement issues and a fraught relationship with his father, Nikolas. Where pop culture franchises typically rely on prequels, sequels and reboots to amp up the nostalgia factor, daytime soaps don’t need to do that.

“It takes them right back to their college days,” he says, “when they were skipping classes and watching Laura and Luke and Scotty run around and get in trouble.” Nostalgia, Shriner says, is likely a key component to the soap opera’s success after nearly 60 years in existence.
GENERAL HOSPITAL EPISODES 2020 TV
“They can still turn on the TV as they’ve done for over 40 years and say, there’s Laura, there’s Scotty.” That, he says, contributes to the soap opera’s longevity with fans. “A lot of us are still hanging around,” says Shriner on a recent phone call. In fact, whether you last regularly watched in the ‘80s, ‘90s or ‘00s, you could tune in on any random day and spot at least one familiar face. You’ll still see Genie Francis as Laura, Kin Shriner as Scott, Leslie Charleson as Monica Quartermaine and Zeman as Bobbie, all of whom are celebrating their 45th anniversaries with the show this year. With so much history inside “General Hospital,” even regular viewers might need to refer to the soap’s wiki just to keep up with the characters’ marriages and ever-expanding family trees, let alone the number of times they’ve been presumed dead and/or kidnapped by a member of the ruthless Cassadine family. “You turn on a soap, and it affects your heart. “Soaps are about relationships, as you know if you’ve watched over the years, and I think that people still relate,” says Jacklyn Zeman, who plays Bobbie Spencer, during a phone conversation. It’s incredibly fun to try and deduce who will return from the dead or which set of rivals will turn out to be long-lost siblings or parent-and-child, and extremely satisfying when you’re right.Īs wild as the storylines might be, though, watching characters evolve as they interact with each other every weekday, over the course of years, is what keeps me, and probably a lot of other viewers, tuning in. I love the outrageousness of the storylines. Today, it’s the only show that I regularly watch. I’ve spent my adult life dropping in and out of the “General Hospital” universe, catching up with characters on days off or when I could take a lunch break at 2 p.m. The show served as a launchpad for many careers, its famous alumni including Demi Moore, John Stamos, Rick Springfield and Amber Tamblyn, and has attracted celebrity guest stars, most notably Elizabeth Taylor, who originated the character of villain Helena Cassadine to stir trouble at Luke and Laura’s wedding. “General Hospital” made its 1963 debut as a medical drama, but in the decades that followed, it has morphed into a weekday chronicle of life in Port Charles, a town rife with mob drama, spy adventures and family feuds.
GENERAL HOSPITAL EPISODES 2020 SERIES
Related: During the pandemic, ‘General Hospital’ star Maurice Benard launched a mental health web series (Breaking news, however, could preempt and alter that date.) Yet, there is much that remains the same for the show, which is scheduled to celebrate its 15,000th episode on June 21. Meanwhile, Scott Baldwin, Laura’s first husband, has found love with the delightfully devious Liesl Obrecht, and Bobbie Spencer, who once battled with Laura for Scott’s affection, now has a sisterly bond with the town’s mayor. These days in Port Charles, New York, Laura Collins, once known as half of the legendary soap opera couple Luke and Laura, is juggling her duties as mayor with those of family matriarch. A lot has changed on “General Hospital” in its 59 years on the air.
