General Hospital’s Emma Samms Reveals That ‘I Would Never Have Left Voluntarily’ as Holly

There are so many stories we could have had.

Holly, as we all know, has spent the last couple years a prisoner of General Hospital’s Victor. And though she’s now back, she’s still under his villainous thumb – something for which Emma Samms hopes fans will forgive her!

But what if she hadn’t been kidnapped all those years back? What if, in fact, Holly had never left town at all? That’s the tantalizing possibility Samms offered us as she chatted with Maurice Benard (Sonny) on an episode of his vlog, State of Mind. Because, it turns out, Samms never wanted to leave.

Back when she first joined, she told her host, she had a blast. First off, the actress noted, Tony Geary “was so nice to me. And spectacularly patient. Generous, taught me basically how to act. Certainly taught me how to listen, which is more than fifty percent, I think.”

And ultimately, it was a great time to enter daytime and learn her craft. Sure, there was the whole being a part of the absolute juggernaut that was General Hospital in the ‘80s. That was pretty amazing, especially for a fresh-faced actress who’d only had a handful of credits to her name before joining the show.

But even better, she noted, “the pace was much slower, so there was time to hone things. I came in very naïve, and that was the advantage. I didn’t know how terrified I should have been.”

Samms had a blast back when she first joined.

Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection

We guess that fear never really caught on (other than her admitting that then-showrunner Gloria Monty was “terrifying, but brilliant.”) because the whole experience was, Samms concluded, “fantastic! And I absolutely loved it.”

In fact, she loved it so much that she admitted to a surprised Benard that she hadn’t intended to leave.

“I would still be there now,” Samms told him emphatically. “I mean permanently, if they would have had me all that time. I would never have left voluntarily. Ever.”

Wow. Imagine if Holly had stuck around all those years, vying, perhaps, for both Luke and Robert’s hearts. Imagine if Ethan had been raised in Port Charles. Well, grew up there until he was sent off to boarding school and came back all grown up. We know how these things works.

Imagine – no, maybe it’s best that we don’t. While Samms would have loved to have made General Hospital her permanent home, the show, as we know, chose otherwise.

She didn’t say why she was let go, but she revealed that she “got offered [Dynasty] whilst I was still doing General Hospital. And that show was enormous.”

So she hopped over to that and stuck around for five years, even bringing Fallon over to Dynasty spinoff The Colbys for a couple seasons. It was, in fact, “worldwide big. I’ve been very lucky.”

More: Will we get a Jason/Liz do-over?

And, indeed, Samms did pretty darn good for herself after General Hospital. There were TV appearances, movies with the likes of John Candy, a return to primetime with Models, Inc. All in all, her career didn’t turn out too shabby.

And now Samms is back where she began. Now if only we can get Holly away from Victor!

Take a look back at our photo gallery of ABC’s Love in the Afternoon heyday, when Samms’ first run kicked off!