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Surprise! General Hospital’s Maurice Benard Adds a New Member to the Family That He Never Expected
Friday, December 16th, 2022
The Daytime Emmy Award-winning actor always has room for one more in his big heart.
It’s been four years since General Hospital’s Maurice Benard (Sonny) had to say goodbye to his beloved dog Cain and as most pet owners know, our pups are part of the family and sometimes the pain hurts too much to open our hearts again to another. This started out as the case for Benard but with a little push from his daughter Cassidy, he was able to make room in that big heart of his for one more…
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“I didn’t want another dog after Cain died,” the ABC soap vet admitted. “My daughter Cassidy kept sending me pictures of dogs and I would say no, no, no, but I could not pass up Mr. Vito.”
Benard then introduced the world to his new pal Mr. Vito, who he adopted from Roadogs Rescue in Southern California, by sharing a video from the waiting room of the vet’s office.
Though he didn’t think Mr. Vito wanted to be at the doctor’s, and he probably didn’t, seeing the sweet little bulldog giving his new papa those puppy kisses was enough to melt our hearts!
More: Soap vet sends message from a hospital room
However, it took a long time for Benard to get to the point of welcoming a new dog after life had thrown him “a curve ball” — more like “a home run” — back in 2018 when he lost his “partner” and “best friend…” his “sweet boy” Cain.
And though Benard will never forget his precious Cain, we can already tell that Mr. Vito will fit into his family very well. And hey, maybe we’ll even get to see his introduction to Buddy the Goat?!
Now that we’ve given you a peek at Benard’s new family member, take a look at the gallery below filled with over 50 of soaps’ all-time greatest families.
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Image: CBS/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
1/55
<p>From the Abbotts’ introduction in the 1980s, cosmetics mogul John (Jerry Douglas) had his hands full with his children, sister act Traci (Beth Maitland) and Ashley (Eileen Davidson), and womanizing Jack (then Terry Lester). Thank heavens back then the mansion still had servants to pick up their dirty laundry!</p>
Image: Jill Johnson/JPI
2/55
<p>“May the sneakiest man win!” may as well be the motto of the backstabbing DiMeras, Chad (Billy Flynn), EJ (Dan Feurriegel), Stefan (Brandon Barash) and Tony (Thaao Penghlis), all of whom dress for the job they want. Which is, apparently… pallbearer? Wait, can that be right?</p>
Image: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
3/55
<p>It’s been too long since we saw the Spencers together, as in this 2006 portrait of Luke (Anthony Geary), his “angel” Laura (Genie Francis) and the next generation, Lulu (Julie Marie Berman) and Lucky (Greg Vaughan, now Eric, <em>Days of Our Lives</em>). Come to think of it, it’s been too long since we saw three out of four of ’em at all!</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
4/55
<p>What to wear for a photo op — or for any reason, really — has never been an issue for fashion-biz family the Forresters: Mommie Dearest Stephanie (Susan Flannery), frequent husband Eric (John McCook) and <span style="text-decoration: line-through">mannequins</span> kids Thorne (Winsor Harmon), Kristen (Tracy Melchior) and Ridge (then Ronn Moss).</p>
Image: Paramount Network
5/55
<p>Nope. As proven by this image of the Duttons — Kayce (Luke Grimes), adopted brother Jamie (Wes Bentley), twisted sister Beth (Kelly Reilly) and daddy-O John (Kevin Costner) — you can’t make anyone in this family look at the camera unless they damn well want to.</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
6/55
<p>Baseball and apple pie only <em>wish</em> that they were as all-American as Pine Valley’s fine, upstanding Martins. Shot here in 1989, that’s dependable dad Joe (Ray MacDonnell), doting mom Ruth (Mary Fickett) and their boys, Jake (Michael Brainard), a future doctor like his pop, and… oh dear… “Tad the Cad” (Michael E. Knight). OK, so they were only <em>mostly</em> fine and upstanding.</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
7/55
<p>Money couldn’t buy happiness, but it <em>could</em> buy a trip to <span style="text-decoration: line-through">Banwa Private Island</span> Universal Orlando Resorts for Richie Rich Phillip Spaulding (Grant Aleksander), occasional wife Beth Raines (Beth Chamberlin) and their offspring, James (Zack Conroy) and Lizzie (Emme Rylan).</p>
Image: Aaron Montgomery/JPI
8/55
<p>Holidays could get a little tricky for the Winters family since dad Neil (Kristoff St. John) had slept with Olivia Barber (Tonya Lee Williams), aka the sister of mom Drucilla (Victoria Rowell), and Mom had slept with Malcolm (Shemar Moore), aka Neil’s brother. So really, the best gift that Lily (Christel Khalil) and Devon (Bryton James) could ever receive was just, ya know, not talking about any of that!</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
9/55
<p>Say “Thank you!” fellas, ’cause dad John Black (Drake Hogestyn) clearly passed down the genes for enviable good looks to sons Brady (Eric Martsolf) and Paul Narita (Christopher Sean). On the other hand, their old man also passed down the genes for attracting trouble on the regular…</p>
Image: Walt Disney Television
10/55
<p>He’d escaped his past and secured his future. Sigh. If only Franco Baldwin (Roger Howarth, now Austin Gatlin-Holt) could have kept from exploding the nuclear family that he’d formed with bride Elizabeth Webber (Rebecca Herbst) and her boys, Cameron (William Lipton), Aiden (Jason David) and Jake (Hudson West).</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
11/55
<p>This 1998 picture really gives no indication of how wild and wacky it was for Macy Alexander (Bobbie Eakes) and C.J. Garrison (Mick Cain) to have as their mother the one and only original Sally Spectra (Darlene Conley). Then again, perhaps no picture <em>could</em> give an adequate indication of how wild and wacky it was.</p>
Image: Courtesy of the Everett Collection
12/55
<p>If you’d ever tasted anything whipped up by Maeve Ryan (Helen Gallagher), you’d understand why crowded into the tiny kitchen of Ryan’s Bar were husband Johnny (Bernard Barrow) and their grown children, Siobhan (Sarah Felder), Patrick (John Blazo), Frank (Daniel High-Kelly) and Mary (Kathleen Tolan).</p>
Image: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
13/55
<p>Oil baron Asa Buchanan (Phil Carey) didn’t need a horse to ride as tall in the saddle as sons Clint (Clint Ritchie) and Bo (Robert S. Woods) or grandson Cord Roberts (John Loprieno). He wouldn’t say no to a lift back to Llanfair, however.</p>
Image: Columbia Tristar/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
14/55
<p>Caught during a rare moment of harmony in 1999 are corporate bigwig Victor Newman (Eric Braeden), wife Nikki (Melody Thomas Scott), kids Nicholas (Joshua Morrow) and Victoria (Heather Tom, now Katie, <em>The Bold and the Beautiful</em>), Nick and later Victor’s wife Sharon (Sharon Case) and her and Nick’s daughter, Cassie (Camryn Grimes, now Mariah).</p>
Image: Mitchell Haaseth/NBC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
15/55
<p>Such an imposing presence did DiMera patriarch Stefano (Joseph Mascolo) possess that, years after his latest passing, his portrait still looms large over his family, including sons EJ (then James Scott) and Tony (Thaao Penghlis).</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
16/55
<p>How long-MIA momster Alexis (Joan Collins) managed to finagle herself a spot in an official Carrington family portrait with ex-husband Blake (John Forsythe), his new wife Krystle (Linda Evans), kids Steven (Al Corley) and Fallon (Pamela Sue Martin), and their significant others, Sammy Jo Dean (Heather Locklear) and Jeff Colby (John James), we’ll never know. Then again, major-domo Joseph Anders (Lee Bergere) made the cut, too, so perhaps the picture wasn’t all <em>that</em> “official.”</p>
Image: ABC
17/55
<p>Hmm. If both father <em>and</em> son are smiling, it’s safe to assume that either Victor Cassadine (Charles Shaughnessy) is plotting against reluctant heir Valentin (James Patrick Stuart) or the other way around. Possibly both. OK, probably both. OK, who are we kidding? It’s both. It’s always both.</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
18/55
<p>The Avants delivered to the show not one but two things that it had never had: an African-American family — in Julius (Obba Batatunde), Vivienne (Anna Maria Horsford) and their daughters, Nicole (Reign Edwards) and Maya (Karla Mosley) — and, in Rick Forrester’s future wife, a transgender character.</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
19/55
<p>In 2004, Harmony’s filthy-rich Cranes took a break from undermining and overwhelming one another to pretend that they could stand to be in the same portrait. Mom and dad Ivy (Kim Ulrich) and Julian (Ben Masters) nailed it. But son Fox, thanks to Justin Hartley’s handsome mug, took it to a whole other level.</p>
Image: Paul Skipper/JPI
20/55
<p>Paul Williams (Doug Davidson) would have been honored just to be nominated for Father of the Year. But neither homicidal son Ricky (Peter Porte) nor his half sister Heather Stevens (Jen Landon, now Teeter on <em>Yellowstone</em>) were inclined to put him forward for the award.</p>
Image: NBC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
21/55
<p>It’s a black-a-white photo, but make no mistake: The Hortons were a colorful lot, even in the 1960s. Here’s doctor dad Tom (Macdonald Carey), devoted wife Alice (Frances Reid) and their offspring, Mickey (John Clarke), Marie (Maree Cheatham) and Bill (Edward Mallory).</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
22/55
<p>One night of passion with Fertile Myrtle Sonny Corinthos (Maurice Benard) was all it took for the mobster’s attorney Alexis Davis (Nancy Lee Grahn) to wind up pregnant with his child, daughter Kristina (Lexi Ainsworth). If the story sounds familiar, it should: Sonny’s gotten more women pregnant than a case of defective condoms.</p>
Image: Sean Smith/JPI
23/55
<p>Tuxedos and the Forrester living room? Obviously, a wedding was the occasion that drew big daddy Eric (John McCook) together with <span style="text-decoration: line-through">his favorite ex-wife</span> one of his favorite ex-wives, Brooke Logan (Katherine Kelly Lang), and their children, Bridget (Ashley Jones) and Rick (Jacob Young). ’Cause, contrary to popular belief, not all wealthy people like to splurge on unnecessary extras like venues or staff.</p>
Image: New World Releasing/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
24/55
<p>Why so serious? Perhaps because there was never a daytime clan more fascinating and fudged up than the Capwells, omnipotent C.C. (Jed Allan), true love Sophia (Judith McConnell) and their children, Eden (Marcy Walker), Kelly (future movie star Robin Wright) and Ted (Todd McKee). Oh, and black sheep of the family Mason (Lane Davies). Can’t forget him, no matter how hard C.C. tried!</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
25/55
<p>Parenting was so much easier for newspaper publisher Viki Riley (Erika Slezak) and her editor husband Clint Buchanan (Clint Ritchie) before sons Kevin and Joey hit puberty and discovered that girls did not, in fact, have cooties.</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
26/55
<p>What could Dina Mergeron (Marla Adams) say? Mama was a rolling stone. So she didn’t always have what you’d call close relationships with kids Traci (Beth Maitland), Jack (Peter Bergman) and Ashley (Eileen Davidson). Heck, at times they didn’t even have what you’d call relationships, period!</p>
Image: Paul Skipper/JPI
27/55
<p>The 2011 wedding of “reformed” baddy Victor Kiriakis (John Aniston) and saintly Maggie Horton (Suzanne Rogers) drew a mixed crowd that included his son Justin (Wally Kurth), godson Daniel Jonas (Shawn Christian), who turned out to be the bride’s <em>actual</em> son, Daniel’s daughter Melanie (future <em>Law & Order: SVU</em> detective Molly Burnett) and Henderson the Butler (Ron Leath). Because what are servants but relatives whose pay you can dock if they displease you!</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
28/55
<p>This shot from 2000 of Scotty Baldwin (Kin Shriner), daughter Serena (Carly Schroeder) and Lucy Coe (Lynn Herring), who carried the little girl to term for her doomed mother Dominique, only makes us wonder anew why <em>General Hospital</em> has yet to bring on the former moppet as a regular.</p>
Image: Gilles Toucas/CBS
29/55
<p>No, you haven’t stumbled onto Stylecaster.com. This uber-chic photo is just the 2021 portrait to which Taylor Hayes (Krista Allen) and her kids, Steffy (Jacqueline MacInnes Wood) and Thomas Forrester (Matthew Atkinson), were hoping to add her ex and their dad. Good luck with that, y’all!</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
30/55
<p>Talk about a growing family. By 2011, Pine Valley’s Martins included Amanda Dillon (Chrishell Stause), Jake (Ricky Paull Goldin), Ruth (onetime Catwoman Lee Meriwether), Joe (Ray MacDonnell), Krystal Carey (Bobbie Eakes), Jamie (Justin Burning), Opal Gardner (Jill Larson), Tad (Michael E. Knight) and his true love, Dixie Cooney (Cady McClain). And a coupla kids that we’re going to assume were about five minutes away from being SORAS’d.</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
31/55
<p>In 1982, Rae Woodard (Louise Shaffer) thought that she had a real shot at forming a family with scheme-queen daughter Kimberly Harris (Kelli Maroney) and long-lost babydaddy Hollis Kirkland III (Peter Haskell). His wife… erm… thought <em>otherwise</em>.</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
32/55
<p>The Fisher-Baldwins can’t even take a picture without looking like they’re making mischief — and we wouldn’t have it any other way for Kevin (Greg Rikaart), brother Michael (Christian Jules LeBlanc), mom Gloria (Judith Chapman), Michael’s missus Lauren Fenmore (Tracey E. Bregman) and the Baldwins’ son, Fen (Max Ehrich).</p>
Image: Paul Skipper/JPI
33/55
<p>Back in 2009, long before Kristian Alfonso and Peter Reckell left the show “for good,” they and Lauren Boles sat prettily to make a sweet memory of Bo and Hope Brady with daughter Ciara, who would eventually trade her stuffed animal for husband Ben Weston.</p>
Image: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
34/55
<p>Once Lesley Williams (Denise Alexander) started playing doctor with Rick Webber (Michael Gregory), her daughter Laura Vining (Genie Francis) finally had some stability in her life. If that wasn’t enough, the teen could always lean on family friends Peter Taylor (Craig Huebing) and Steve Hardy (John Beradino).</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
35/55
<p>Want to get a “cents” of the kind of man that “Dollar Bill” Spencer (Don Diamont) could be if he really tried? Get to know his kindhearted sons, Wyatt (Darin Brooks) and Liam (Scott Clifton).</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
36/55
<p>Representing Harmony’s have-nots in 2002 were the Lopez-Fitzgeralds: matriarch Pilar (Eva Tamargo) and her children, Luis (Galen Gering, now Rafe on <em>Days of Our Lives</em>), Miguel (future <em>Chesapeake Shores</em> star Jesse Metcalfe), Antonio (Christopher Douglas) and Theresa (Lindsay Hartley).</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
37/55
<p>OK, we get it: The Hubbards were a close, close family. From left, that’s Frankie (Cornelius Smith Jr.), mom Angie (Debbie Morgan), dad Jesse (Darnell Williams) and his daughter, Natalia Fowler (Shannon Kane).</p>
Image: Getty Images
38/55
<p>The Ewings would be quick to say that there was no bad blood flowing through their veins, only oil. So, um, bad oil, then? Surrounding Jock (Jim Davis) and Miss Ellie (Barbara Bel Geddes) are his bastard son Ray Krebbs (Steve Kanaly), legitimate son Bobby (Patrick Duffy), his wife Pamela (Victoria Principal), bastard-in-a-different-way son J.R. (Larry Hagman), his wife Sue Ellen (Linda Gray) and lil’ Lucy (Charlene Tilton), the shortest supermodel this side of Erica Kane.</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
39/55
<p>Too much of their storyline played out off screen, but we’ll still never forget Hilary Curtis’ twin sister, Amanda Sinclair (Mishael Morgan), and her fateful introduction to long-lost mother Naya Benedict (Ptosha Storey) and sister Imani (Leigh-Anne Rose).</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
40/55
<p>The title of the soap was misleading where the Forbes family was concerned. Affection was hard to come by in the 1980s between Roger (John Shearin), unhappy wife Ann (Shannon Eubanks) and their kids, manipulative Lorna (Susan Walters, now Diane on <em>The Young and the Restless</em>) and squeaky-clean Jack (Perry Stephens).</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
41/55
<p>Way back when, a blue-collar alternative to the hoity-toity Lords and Buchanans of Llanview was the O’Neill clan: pop Harry (Arlen Dean Snyder) and his girls, Connie (Elizabeth Keifer), Didi (Barbara Treutelaar) and Joy (Kristen Vigard).</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
42/55
<p>Gathered here <span style="text-decoration: line-through">today</span> in 1995 for the remarriage of Edmund Grey (John Callahan) and Maria Santos (Eva LaRue) were Wildwind maid Peggy Moody (Anne Meara), the bride’s folks, Hector (Raul Davila) and Isabella (Socorro Santiago), and Maria’s siblings, Anita (Darlene Tejeiro), Matéo (Mark Consuelos), Julia (Sydney Penny) and Rosa (Catherine Gardner).</p>
Image: Craig Sjodin/ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
43/55
<p>Everyone thinks of the quarrels when it comes to the Quartermaines. But there was love underneath <span style="text-decoration: line-through">all</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through">a lot</span> some of the shouting between Monica (Leslie Charleson), Alan (Stuart Damon) and Edward (David Lewis). Not Lila (Anna Lee), though. She would never shout!</p>
Image: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images
44/55
<p>Let’s hope that the Coleridges had somewhere to go, because in 1983, Jillian (Nancy Addison Altman) and her sibs, incorrigible Roger (Ron Hale) and long-suffering Faith (Karen Morris-Gowdy), were definitely all dressed up. And not in the kinda outfits that you’d wear to grab a beer at Ryan’s Bar, either!</p>
Image: CBS
45/55
<p>Somewhere, their late father had to be smiling to see how close his heirs were. At least for as long as it took for this formal shot to be taken of Jack Abbott (Peter Bergman) and his sisters, Traci (Beth Maitland) and Ashley (Eileen Davidson).</p>
Image: Fox Image Collection/Getty Images
46/55
<p>“Solid gold” appears to have been the theme of the room into which the music-making Lyons were packed for a portrait that included volatile patriarch Lucious (Terrence Howard), his fiercer half Cookie (Taraji P. Henson) and their sons, Jamal (Jussie Smollett), Hakeem (Bryshere Gray) and Andre (Trai Byers).</p>
Image: NBCUniversal/Getty Images
47/55
<p>This picture of the Reed siblings, Billie (Lisa Rinna) and Austin (Patrick Muldoon), is so cheerful, you’d swear that it had been ripped out of a J.C. Penney catalog and wasn’t at all a desperate attempt to cover up the scars with which their difficult upbringing had left them.</p>
Image: Sean Smith/JPI
48/55
<p>Nobody had to say, “Make room for Daddy!” in 2008. Stephen Logan (Patrick Duffy) fit in snugly between then-wife Beth (Robin Riker) and their daughters, Brooke (Katherine Kelly Lang), Katie (Heather Tom) and Donna (Jennifer Gareis).</p>
Image: Courtesy of the Everett Collection
49/55
<p>“Dysfunction… party of three? Your table is ready.” Iris Carrington (Beverlee McKinsey) despised stepmother Rachel Davis (Victoria Wyndham) as much as her father, Mac Cory (Douglass Watson), adored her. And let’s just say that Iris wasn’t shy about making her opinion of Rachel <em>exceedingly</em> well-known.</p>
Image: ABC/Getty Images
50/55
<p>They are women, hear them roar! They don’t come much fiercer or feistier than Llanview’s Cramers: Starr Manning (Kristen Alderson), her aunt Kelly Cramer (Gina Tognoni), her cousin Blair Manning (Kassie DePaiva), grand dame Dorian Lord (Robin Strasser), her daughter Cassie Callison (Laura Koffman), adopted Cramer Langston Wilde (Brittany Underwood) and yet another of Dorian’s daughter’s Adriana (future <em>Brooklyn Nine-Nine</em> star Melissa Fumero).</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
51/55
<p>It wasn’t until 2009 that Chance Chancellor (then John Driscoll) got to meet father Phillip (Thom Bierdz). The poor guy had run off on babymama Nina Webster (Tricia Cast) and played dead for years for fear of how Genoa City would react to his realization that he was gay.</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
52/55
<p>Once sibling rivals Carrie (Christie Clark) and Sami Brady (Alison Sweeney) stopped squabbling over hunky Austin Reed, mom Marlena Evans (Deidre Hall) breathed a sigh of relief. Well, a tentative one. She would never again be able to sleep <em>completely</em> easy, as unsure as she was of when some other guy would catch their eye!</p>
Image: ABC
53/55
<p>When Carly Benson (Laura Wright) got married to the mob — well, to mobster Sonny Corinthos (Maurice Benard) — she tied to his family and its “business” kids with other fathers, Michael Quartermaine (Chad Duell) and Josslyn Jacks (Eden McCoy). And who <em>are</em> their dads? Eh, fughedaboudit.</p>
Image: CBS/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
54/55
<p>You’d never guess from this image how hard it was for the Cooper kids, Frank (Frank Dicopoulos) and Harley (Beth Ehlers), to accept that for years, they’d been led to think that dad Buzz (Justin Deas) was dead when he was only dead in air quotes. It <em>was</em> hard, though. He was just such a charming rascal!</p>
Image: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
55/55
