Young & Restless’ Allison Lanier Unpacks the Twist ‘That Rubs Summer the Wrong Way’
Thursday, August 4th, 2022
“She doesn’t like to be underestimated.”
Nobody has to tell The Young and the Restless’ Allison Lanier that Summer is stuck between a rock and a hard place. She’s well aware that if her character’s mother Phyllis and mother-in-law Diane “are going to go head-to-head and battle it out… that isn’t good,” the actress tells SoapCentral. “That’s why Summer has had to be so stern with her mother.
“I know that’s sometimes hard to see in a mother/daughter relationship,” she adds, “and I know that it may seem like Summer is siding with Diane, but that’s not really what’s going on in Summer’s head. [She] is siding with her relationship with Kyle, because that is the most important thing to her. And she knows that her mom can be the instigator in these situations. So she just wants to tamp that down for the sake of her marriage.”
“An instigator? Well… OK, maybe I do resemble that remark.”
Credit: CBS screenshot
A lot of folks in Genoa City have jumped to the conclusion that Summer trusts Diane. But it ain’t necessarily so. “I think that she’s just giving her the benefit of the doubt because of Kyle,” says Lanier. “Summer is pragmatic in the sense that Diane hasn’t done anything, she is really trying — that’s what she’s seeing now. She’s trying to give Diane a clean slate, but no, she doesn’t think she is the angel that maybe Phyllis thinks she’s been fooled into thinking.”
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So it kinda ticks off the Marchetti exec that her mom and grandma Nikki are riding her so hard when it comes to Diane. “That rubs Summer the wrong way. She doesn’t like to be underestimated,” says Lanier, “and I think she’s just like, ‘This is Kyle’s mom. Give her a break. She’s not doing anything right now, so just back off. Why does it affect you?!’ That’s where she’s coming from in these moments, but they’re trying to get her to come over to their side, and she’s just like, ‘Let’s let this play out!’”
In case Summer needs a reminder of what Diane is capable of, all she need to is peruse the below photo gallery, a veritable litany of her sins.
Image: CBS/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
1/21
<p>When <em>The Young and the Restless</em> introduced Alex Donnelley as Diane Jenkins in 1982, the scheming Cheryl Tiegs wannabe pursued Jabot Cosmetics honcho Jack Abbott with the singleminded goal of becoming… um, Genoa City’s top model. Hey, it was certainly better than being Genoa City’s <em>second</em>-best model!</p>
Image: Sean Smith/JPI
2/21
<p>After Jack married poor, innocent Patty Williams to prove to dad John that he was a big enough boy to run their cosmetics dynasty, Diane kept right on sleeping with him and finally blackmailed him into making her — <em>yesss</em>! — Wisconsin’s most prominent poser. On the downside, the affair not only resulted in Patty losing Jack’s baby but her marbles, too. As you can see, even decades later, she wasn’t able to get them back. (Or maybe you can’t see; that veil is <em>hella</em> thick!)</p>
Image: CBS/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
3/21
<p>By and by — or by and <em>goodbye</em> — Diane moved on to Andy Richards, who should’ve known better, what with working alongside Patty’s brother Paul and all. But he fell lunkhead over heels for the conniver, going so far as to put a ring on it… which in no way, shape or form slowed her roll when she decided to take up with Jack yet again.</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
4/21
<p>A decade after losing both Andy and Jack, Diane returned to Genoa City to start a new career as an architect. Oh, who are we kidding? The only designs with which she came back were the ones that she had on Jack. Mind you, they’d only been engaged for about the length of a commercial break before she threw over her fiancé to marry his nemesis, Victor Newman.</p>
Image: CBS/Courtesy of the Everett Collection
5/21
<p>Did Diane manage to steal Victor out from under true love Nikki? Yes. Did Diane manage to keep Victor away from true love Nikki? Of course not! But the master manipulator was nothing if not resourceful. Upon learning that Victor had had his sperm frozen, Diane swiped a sample and got herself pregnant. The joke was on her, however…</p>
Image: John Paschal/JPI
6/21
<p>Victor turned out not to be the father of Diane’s son Kyle at all. Apparently, sperm samples get stolen and switched on the regular in Genoa City, so — what are the odds?!? — Diane wound up giving birth to a baby boy who should’ve been calling Jack Dada.</p>
Image: Sean Smith/JPI
7/21
<p>Eventually deciding to make lemonade out of lemons, Diane (then Susan Walters) pursued Jack anew. The fact that by this point Kyle’s pop was happily hitched to Phyllis Summers was of no consequence to the vixen. Seriously, when had a little thing like a wedding band given her pause? That had always been a challenge that she couldn’t wait to meet… in bed.</p>
Image: Jesse Grant/JPI
8/21
<p>Determined to drive a wedge between Jack and Phyllis, Diane went so far as to burn down the Abbott pool house with herself in it. If he thought that his new love had tried to fricassee his old one, Diane reckoned, surely their romance would be set aflame again. It was not.</p>
Image: Jesse Grant/JPI
9/21
<p>Diane briefly flirted with both Andy and the idea of giving their relationship another go. But upon remembering why she’d cheated on him in the first place, she opted to just go herself, leaving town and taking Kyle with her.</p>
Image: Paul Skipper/JPI
10/21
<p>In 2010, Diane returned to Genoa City played by future <em>General Hospital</em> star Maura West (Ava). Jack’s ex <em>said</em> that she wanted to let him connect with his son, but let’s be real, the only connections that <em>really</em> held her interest were with the local menfolk.</p>
Image: Sean Smith/JPI
11/21
<p>Once more, Diane exchanged vows with Victor that carried all the weight of a napkin in a stiff breeze. At the same time, the mantrap proceeded to test the bounciness of bedsprings with everyone from Ashley Abbott’s husband Tucker McCall to stepson Nick. If only she’d realized that the kind of “laid” that she should have been focused on was…</p>
Image: Sean Smith/JPI
12/21
<p>In no time, Diane had turned all of Genoa City against her. Well, at least the parts of it that weren’t against her to begin with. When she turned up as dead as a doornail, everyone who was anyone was a suspect. Ultimately, it was discovered that Nikki, the wife for whom Victor had dumped Diane (yes, again), had put a bit too much emphasis on the “fatal” part of “femme fatale.”</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
13/21
<p>In the years that followed, Jack went from one doomed relationship (Genevieve Atkinson, anyone?) to another (Phyllis, Round 11), while Kyle grew up and was recast so often that it was a wonder he didn’t have an unusually handsome identity crisis. Through it all, Diane, what with being dead and all, was neither seen nor heard from.</p>
Image: CBS screenshot
14/21
<p>… who the heck is Taylor Jensen? We had to ask when Walters returned to <em>Young & Restless</em> in March 2022 as a woman interested in buying the home of Jack’s late son, Keemo. A woman who — you’d have to be blind not to notice — looked exactly like Diane. Or, well, like the Diane before the last one. Weirder still, she really <em>was</em> Diane. What the… ?!?</p>
Image: Sonja Flemming/CBS
15/21
<p>Turned out, Deacon Sharpe had helped Diane fake her death before anybody got the bright idea to kill the town pariah for real. She’d intended to come back for Kyle, but… what’s that saying? Life after death got in the way? Something like that. At any rate, Jack wanted nothing to do with his ex. She may not have been dead, but she was sure dead to him.</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
16/21
<p>Approximately 12 seconds after finding out about Diane’s resurrecton, Phyllis hit the sheets with Jack as a way of staking her claim. “I feel so <em>used</em>!” he all but gasped when he found out why she’d so suddenly wanted to tuck him in. Then he re-dumped the supposed love of his life and thawed toward Diane so fast that she scarcely had time to gloat to her rival.</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI (3)
17/21
<p>While all of Genoa City offered Diane a warm… well, a <em>heated</em> welcome back, there was only one person whose reaction to her presence mattered to her.</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
18/21
<p>If Kyle was willing to give Diane a chance, she was <em>more</em> than willing to put up with the crap that everybody else gave her. And, though initially wary, her son did indeed open his arms to her. He even hired her to do PR at Marchetti. What could possibly go wrong? Daughter-in-law Summer Newman could also put <em>her</em> mom Phyllis on the payroll, thus turning the office break room into an unintended Thunderdome.</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
19/21
<p>After Phyllis formed the I Hate Diane Club with Nikki and Jack’s sister Ashley, she brought to Genoa City her foe’s shady former partner in crime, Jeremy Stark. But his arrival on the scene had exactly the opposite of the intended effect.</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
20/21
<p>The threat that Jeremy posed only served to bring Diane and Jack closer — to the point that he popped the question. Finally, Phyllis had to concede defeat.</p>
Image: Howard Wise/JPI
21/21
