Thursday, November 14, 2024

Soaps: Chandler Massey, Killed off On Screen, Returning to “Days of Our Lives” with Alison Sweeney

Share

If only headwriters of soap operas wrote our own lives. No one ever really dies, unless the actor actually shuffles off this mortal coil. Otherwise, you can be shot point blank, stabbed several times, drowned, beaten, exploded, even succumb to a terminal disease. Still, there is hope!

Three years ago “Days of our Lives,” a show that likes to kill off its main characters, stabbed Will Horton to death. That was it. Dead. The guy who played him had replaced three time Emmy winner Chandler Massey. But he hadn’t caught on. So off he went!

But Will had been the first gay character on the very, very uptight “Days of our Lives,” where they still hang Christmas ornaments every year even if the character’s contract has long ago expired. So now new head writer Ron Carlivati — who restored “General Hospital” by reviving a bunch of favorites from the other world — is at it again. Massey returns as Will in September after a presumed very deep sleep.

This explains why Alison Sweeney, who plays Will’s mother, is returning to the show after leaving a couple of years ago. Carlivati is going to turn “Days of our Lives” around just to spite producer Ken Corday. Sweeney, by the way, is 40 and has a grandchild on the show. Massey is 26. But what the heck! This will keep our minds off of Trump and friends!

(I’ll never forget years ago, in college, hearing a girl scream — shriek! — down the hall in my dorm. Her favorite character on “The Edge of Night” had returned after supposedly being most seriously dead for quite a while. Turns out the actress had been on island, being held by her agent until there was more money. That’s entertainment!)

Roger Friedman
Roger Friedmanhttps://www.showbiz411.com
Roger Friedman began his Showbiz411 column in April 2009 after 10 years with Fox News, where he created the Fox411 column. His movie reviews are carried by Rotten Tomatoes, and he is a member of both the movie and TV branches of the Critics Choice Awards. His articles have appeared in dozens of publications over the years including New York Magazine, where he wrote the Intelligencer column in the mid 90s and covered the OJ Simpson trial, and Fox News (when it wasn't so crazy) where he covered Michael Jackson. He is also the writer and co-producer of "Only the Strong Survive," a selection of the Cannes, Sundance, and Telluride Film festivals, directed by DA Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus.

Read more

In Other News