As Young & Restless’ Ashland Throws a Hail Mary to Save His Marriage, Robert Newman Unpacks His Character’s Feelings for Victoria: ‘Even He Doesn’t Understand It’

Is “Ashtoria” doomed?

What The Young and the Restless’ Victor Newman wants, he tends to get. And right now, what he most wants is daughter Victoria’s conniving new husband out of her life. So Ashland is facing an uphill battle to keep a wedding band on his bride’s finger.

“He and Victoria are really on thin ice,” portrayer Robert Newman recently acknowledged to Soaps in Depth. And to Ashland’s surprise, he cares as much about their future as a couple as he does about the threat to his corporate agenda. His “unexpected love for Victoria is changing him. He can’t erase the things that he’s done in his past, but he’s trying desperately to save his relationship with her.

“She is the most important thing to him right now,” he added, “even more so, perhaps, than the business. His love for her is real, and he’s never felt like this about someone before. I think even he doesn’t understand it. She’s really turned his world upside-down.”

Can Ashland actually keep his marriage afloat, given what his father-in-law has discovered (a lie so monumental, it immediately made our list of soaps’ all-time biggest)? He “is pedaling as fast as he can,” Newman said. “He’s trying to stay half a step ahead of any number of people, starting with Victor on this. He’s got to answer for things he’s done in the past, but he can’t really own up to those things, because he’s trying to hang on to what he has with Victoria. It’s very complicated.”

That’s putting it mildly! Spoilers for the week to come reveal that Ashland is about to plead his case to someone who might be able to turn the tide in his favor. (Find out who here.) But is it all too little, too late? On your way to the comments to weigh in on the fate of “Ashtoria,” stop off at the below photo gallery, which follows the steps that the couple took from business to pleasure.