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General Hospital Just Opened a Pandora’s Box Full of Possibilities With the Reveal That Felicia *Isn’t* Esme’s Mother
Thursday, July 28th, 2022
We can’t wait to see what’s inside.
For months, General Hospital had been setting us up to believe that somehow Esme’s mother was Felcia, aka the onetime object of Daddy Dearest Ryan’s affections. But the July 27 episode (recapped here) pulled the rug right out from under us when he admitted that he didn’t even know the real name of the mystery woman with whom the she-devil was conceived.
We were shocked. And beyond that, intrigued. “What kind of woman,” we wondered, “would be the sort that a serial killer could feel like he could be himself around?” Immediately, we started trying to guess her identity. But seeing as it wasn’t that long ago that Ryan replaced twin brother Kevin, she can’t really be someone already in Port Charles. If she was, Ryan would have spotted his lost love during that reign of terror.
“No thanks, I already have one villain macking on me,” thought Liesl.
Credit: ABC screenshot
If it has to be someone new, that opens up a world of possibilities — one that includes the casting of a much-missed daytime vet, one who can play an enticing riddle wrapped in an enigma. Crystal Chappell (ex-Carly, Days of Our Lives) comes to mind. So does Roberta Weiss (once Flame on Santa Barbara). And Cady McClain (most recently Days of Our Lives’ Jennifer).
Not for nothing, but how much fun for fans would it be to see the real-life marrieds and former As the World Turns castmates throw sparks on screen again?
Could mom be the word for Chappell (left), Weiss or McClain?
Credit: Jill Johnson/JPI, Howard Wise/JPI
Whoever gets the part, Madame X is sure to stir up at least as much trouble as her conniving daughter — probably more. After all, what kind of off-kilter beauty finds herself drawn to the darkness that has always surrounded Ryan? And how sorry will Esme be to discover that perhaps Pop is the lesser of the two evils represented by her parents?
Return to the Golden Age of General Hospital and Love in the Afternoon with the below photo gallery.
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<p>Did any couple define Love in the Afternoon better than the one that made <em>General Hospital</em> a phenomenon? Luke Spencer (Anthony Geary) and Laura Baldwin (Genie Francis) — as if you didn’t know!</p>
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<p>In 1983, <em>All My Children</em> covergirl Erica Kane (Susan Lucci) took her pocketful of poses to New York City’s Metropolitan Museum to see if she could upstage the exhibits. She did, by the way.</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
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<p>Back in 1987, when soaps could still afford to go on location, <em>One Life to Live</em> went all the way to Argentina with Cord Roberts (John Loprieno) and Kate Sanders (future <em>Melrose Place</em> psycho and Desperate Housewife Marcia Cross).</p>
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<p>The clique that <em>everyone</em> wanted to be a part of in 1982 was the small, tight-knit <em>All My Children</em> one that included Greg Nelson (Laurence Lau), Jenny Gardner (Kim Delaney, now recurring on <em>General Hospital</em> as Jackie) and Jesse Hubbard (Darnell Williams).</p>
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<p>Maybe if they’d just stopped dropping clues… Hmm. As it was, intrigue seemed to follow around <em>The Edge of Night</em>’s Schuyler Whitney (Larkin Malloy) and Raven Alexander (Sharon Gabet) like it was their shadows.</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images (2)
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<p><em>All My Children</em> let “Tad the Cad” Martin (Michael E. Knight, now <em>General Hospital</em> lawyer Martin) sleep his way up one side of Pine Valley and down the other till he found true love with Dixie Cooney (Cady McClain). Side note: We were <em>there</em> for the shenanigans!</p>
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<p><em>Ryan’s Hope</em> let the Coleridges remember that they were rich in 1983 for a new opening-credits sequence featuring a dolled-up Jillian (Nancy Addison Altman), Roger (Ron Hale) and Faith (Karen Morris-Gowdy).</p>
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<p>It wasn’t just Luke and Robert Scorpio who fell for Holly Sutton when Emma Samms joined <em>General Hospital</em> in 1982. Viewers adored her so much, they accepted her as a kinda replacement for Laura.</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images, Diana Whitley/Getty Images
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<p>No, but in the early ’80s, as <em>Dallas</em> caught fire, <em>One Life to Live</em> made sure that cowboy hats abounded. Luckily, the powers that be figured that Glamazon Dorian Lord (Robin Strasser) wouldn’t share the same taste in headgear as Asa Buchanan (Phil Carey) and son Bo (Robert S. Woods).</p>
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<p>Style for miles was on display at the 1982 shindig that <em>All My Children</em>’s Montgomery Burns, Palmer Cortlandt (James Mitchell), threw for daughter Nina (Taylor Miller) and husband Cliff Warner (<em>Young & Restless</em>’ Jack, Peter Bergman). As for Phoebe Wallingford (Ruth Warrick)… well, she was Lady Whistledowning the whole affair!</p>
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<p>So kickass was the chemistry between <em>Loving</em>’s Mike Donovan (James Kiberd) and Shana Sloane (Susan Keith) in 1984 that their portrayers would go on to marry two years later. And <em>stay</em> married!</p>
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<p><em>General Hospital</em> struck gold with the pairing of Jack Wagner and Kristina Malandro as Frisco Jones and Felicia Cummings. The on-screen sweethearts married in 1993 (and divorced in 2006).</p>
Image: Diana Whitley/Getty Images
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<p>All it took was a glance, and you knew that anywhere that <em>One Life to Live’</em>s Tina Clayton (Andrea Evans) went, trouble was going to show up like an uninvited guest at a pot-luck. Without a casserole, even!</p>
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<p><em>Ryan’s Hope</em> enthralled viewers in 1981 with the love triangle centered around bigwig Rae Woodard (Louise Shaffer), boy toy Michael Pavel (Michael Corbett) and the boss’ daughter, Kimberly Harris (Kelli Maroney). So of <em>course</em>, the show killed him off and sent Kim packing. That makes… sense?</p>
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<p><em>The Edge of Night</em> shrewdly acknowledged the value and appeal of seniors in 1984 by keeping front and center Lois Kibbee’s Geraldine Saxon, who was kinda like the Katherine Chancellor of Monticello.</p>
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<p><em>General Hospital</em> let shippers of Laura (Genie Francis) and Scotty Baldwin (Kin Shriner) think that they were endgame. Actually, not just think it, <em>believe</em> it — deeply. The thing was — spoiler alert! — they weren’t.</p>
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<p>When <em>Loving</em> debuted, nothing stood between Jack Forbes (Perry Stephens) and Stacey Donovan (Lauren-Marie Taylor). Except, that is, for Lily Slater (Jennifer Ashe) and her multiple personalities.</p>
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<p>Oh dear. <em>General Hospital</em> scene stealer Tiffany Hill (Sharon Wyatt) might have thought that Robert Scorpio (Tristan Rogers) was, you know, The One. But for him, she was just, er, one of many.</p>
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<p>In the grand scheme of things, John Stamos was only on <em>General Hospital</em> for a brief time as trouble magnet Blackie Parrish. Yet we still remember him and his amazing hair. Vividly.</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images, ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
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<p>Never mind that <em>General Hospital</em> revealed that Jimmy Lee Holt (Steve Bond) and Celia Quartermaine (Sherilyn Wolter) were kinda-sorta family. He was the man that she really wanted, not Dr. Grant Putnam (Brian Patrick Clarke)… who turned out to be a Russian spy, anyway!</p>
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<p><em>All My Children</em> beauty peddler Opal Gardner (Dorothy Lyman) turned no one away from her salon, the Glamorama. That is, unless they were broke or she hated ’em. Hey, rules are rules.</p>
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<p>Not sure what so entranced <em>One Life to Live</em>’s Viki Riley (Erika Slezak) and Clint Buchanan (Clint Ritchie) in this 1981 photo. But you can rest assured that they soon returned their gaze to one another.</p>
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<p>From <em>The Edge of Night</em> to the break of day, the Karrs — Nancy (Ann Flood) and Mike (Forrest Compton) — watched over Monticello. Sometimes, as in this shot, <em>literally</em> over.</p>
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<p>Once <em>General Hospital</em> paired Felicia Cummings (Kristina <span style="text-decoration: line-through">Malandro</span> Wagner) and Frisco Jones (Jack Wagner), the audience started eyeballing their TVs as intently as they did each other.</p>
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<p>In the early days of <em>Loving</em>, Curtis Alden (Christopher Marcantel) and Lorna Forbes (Susan Walters, now Diane on <em>The Young and the Restless</em>) looked like they’d been up to no good even when they hadn’t been.</p>
Image: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
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<p>M.D. meant “mad dashing” once <em>General Hospital</em> started Noah Drake (Rick Springfield) making the rounds. Occasionally, he even took out an appendix as well as every single lady in Port Charles.</p>
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<p>Don’t mind if we do. In fact, it’s impossible to think of <em>General Hospital</em> at all without conjuring up images of the heroine that Genie Francis has played since 1977.</p>
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<p>In the early 1980s, <em>All My Children</em> struck a match that <em>really</em> caught fire between straight-laced Angie Baxter (Debbi Morgan) and streetwise Jesse Hubbard (Darnell Williams).</p>
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<p>Fans of <em>General Hospital</em> mobster Sonny Corinthos owe a debt of gratitude to his forerunner, Roscoe Born’s Joe Novak, the conflicted don of <em>Ryan’s Hope. </em>He wrote the book on brooding mafiosos.</p>
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<p>Ordinarily, <em>The Edge of Night</em> had Preacher Emerson (Charles <span style="text-decoration: line-through">Flohe</span> Grant) looking more like he was embracing than manhandling Jody Travis (Lori Loughlin, decades away from <em>When Calls the Heart</em> and the college bribery scheme for which she’s now infamous).</p>
Image: Diana Whitley/Getty Images
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<p><em>General Hospital</em> was such an outta-the-park hit in the ’80s that at one point, a rival soap offered Jacklyn Zeman (Bobbie) a quarter of a million dollars just to not re-sign her contract. (<a href="https://soaps.sheknows.com/general-hospital/news/639201/general-hospital-jacklyn-zeman-kin-shriner-death-threats-bribes-golden-age-soaps/" target="_blank">Read all about it here.</a>)</p>
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<p>Only a true fashionista like incorrigible <em>Loving</em> vixen Ava Rescott (Roya Megnot) could pull off the kind of outre headgear that she put on in 1986.</p>
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<p>We <em>want</em> to say that this 1980 still from <em>One Life to Live</em> embodies the delight that Dorian Lord (Robin Strasser) felt at never having had to admit in court that she was a hooker like Karen Wolek (showbiz legend in the making Judith Light). But that probably isn’t right.</p>
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<p>Everybody was really moved by the 1980 <em>Ryan’s Hope</em> storyline in which lonely Delia Coleridge (Randall Edwards) was kidnapped by the gorilla that she’d befriended. And by “everybody,” we mean “everybody who’s typing this caption.” (<a href="https://soaps.sheknows.com/soaps/news/593910/ryans-hope-delia-gorilla-drop-tower-soap-opera-storyline/" target="_blank">Read our defense of the plot here.</a>)</p>
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<p>It wasn’t his bedside manner that made philandering <em>General Hospital</em> doctor Alan Quartermaine (Stuart Damon) such a hot commodity, it was his antics <em>in</em> bed.</p>
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<p><em>All My Children</em> let Kent Bogard (Lee Godart) think that he might actually have a future with Erica Kane (Susan Lucci). Until, that is, she shot him for sleeping with her half sister who turned out to be an imposter!</p>
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<p>In 1980, the Quartermaines of <em>General Hospital</em> — Lila (Anna Lee) and Edward (David Lewis) — welcomed into their midst grandson A.J. (Eric Kroh). Little did they suspect what a scheming screw-up he’d turn out to be!</p>
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<p>Alone time could be hard to come by for the Whitneys of <em>The Edge of Night</em>. Such a devoted manservant was Gunther Wagner (David Froman) that he hated to be away from Sky (Larkin Malloy) and Raven (Sharon Gabet).</p>
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<p>Technically, the Love in the Afternoon era was over by the time <em>All My Children</em> paired Nico Kelly (Maurice Benard, on his way to <em>General Hospital</em> as Sonny) and Julie Chandler (Lauren Holly) in 1988. But c’mon — they would’ve totally fit in, right?</p>
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<p>We may never have seen a more 1980s-riffic photo than this one of <em>General Hospital</em> wonder women Tiffany Hill (Sharon Wyatt), Celia Quartermaine (Sherilyn Wolter), Heather Webber (Robin Mattson), Holly Sutton (Emma Samms), Bobbie Spencer (Jacklyn Zeman) and Claudia Phillips (Bianca Ferguson).</p>
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<p>In 1982, <em>Ryan’s Hope</em> reunited Rae Woodard (Louise Shaffer) with long-lost babydaddy Hollis Kirkland (Peter Haskell) — <em>and</em> introduced him to troublemaking Kimberly Harris (Kelli Maroney), the daughter he’d never known that they had!</p>
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<p>Where was Tinder when she needed it? <em>General Hospital</em> doc Monica Quartermaine (Leslie Charleson) was always looking for love in all the wrong places.</p>
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<p>“Forever” turned out to be not nearly as long as we wanted for <em>All My Children</em> sweethearts Greg Nelson (Laurence Lau) and ill-fated Jenny Gardner (Kim Delaney).</p>
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<p><em>General Hospital</em> only had Robert Scorpio (Tristan Rogers) tie the knot with Holly Sutton (Emma Samms) to keep “late” buddy Luke Spencer’s pregnant girlfriend from being deported. You can <em>guess</em> how that turned out!</p>
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<p>Arguably the most star-crossed lovers in <em>Ryan’s Hope</em> history, Frank Ryan (Daniel Hugh-Kelly) and Jillian Coleridge (Nancy Addison Altman) could only hope in 1979 that they’d one day be as happily hitched as the his parents, Johnny (Bernard Barrow) and Maeve (Helen Gallagher).</p>
Image: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection (2)
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<p><em>General Hospital</em> nurse Bobbie Spencer (Jacklyn Zeman) could cry, “I’ve done everything for you!” as much as she liked. But she could never convince Noah Drake (Rick Springfield) to be her permanent Dr. Feel-Good.</p>
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<p>As dearly as <em>All My Children</em>’s Brooke English (Julia Barr) loved Adam Chandler (David Canary), Lord, did that man try her patience. He had a lot of enemies, but he was always his worst one!</p>
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<p>As you can see in these real-vs.-reel-life snaps from 1979, Jane Elliot wasn’t nearly as tightly wound off screen as she was when playing tart-tongued Tracy Quartermaine on <em>General Hospital.</em></p>
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<p>The smart answer would have been no. But <em>Ryan’s Hope</em> conniver Delia Ryan (Ilene Kristen) had Roger Coleridge (Ron Hale) so enthralled that he probably bought whatever line of bull she was selling in 1977.</p>
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<p>… was something that the relationship between <em>All My Children</em>’s Cliff Warner (Peter Bergman) and Nina Cortlandt (Taylor Miller) never was. <em>Except</em> in these particular photos.</p>
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<p>After <em>One Life to Live</em> killed off Joe Riley (Lee Patterson), widow Viki (Erika Slezak) would’ve loved for him to have had a spare. And in a way, he did: Years after his death, his portrayer returned as his twin brother, Tom Dennison.</p>
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<p>By 1986, <em>General Hospital</em> had been turned completely upside-down by the arrival of Robert Scorpio’s “late” wife, Anna Devane (Finola Hughes). And the actress who played her? As you can see, utterly unfussed.</p>
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<p><em>Ryan’s Hope</em> married off probably its last supercouple in 1985 when it thrust Rick Hyde (future <em>Melrose Place</em> and <em>Dynasty</em> star Grant Show) and Ryan Fenelli (<em>Baywatch</em> babe-to-be Yasmine Bleeth) into an “altared state.”</p>
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<p>Why? Because although<em> All My Children</em> cad Tad Martin (Michael E. Knight) developed real feelings for bad girl Liza Colby (Marcy Walker), they weren’t real enough to keep him from shagging her mother!</p>
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<p><em>General Hospital</em> doc Jeff Webber (future <em>MacGyver</em> Richard Dean Anderson) was sure that Anne Logan (Susan Pratt) would be good for what ailed him. But the competition for the virtuous nurse was stiff — and included his pal Joe Kelly (Douglas Sheehan, en route to <em>Knots Landing</em>).</p>
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<p>In 1984, <em>Ryan’s Hope</em> tried to attract some of that huge <em>General Hospital</em> audience by recasting Delia Coleridge with Robin Mattson, who was (and again would be) Port Charles’ notorious Heather Webber.</p>
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