Deep Soap: Getting Lucky

Lucky Day

Monday brought the year’s most surprising daytime casting news. After a ten year absence, Jonathan Jackson is returning to the role of Lucky Spencer on General Hospital. Greg Vaughn, who played the role for the past six years, has been let go. Kudos to Daytime Confidential for breaking the story and leaving ABC no choice but to quickly confirm it. Jackson was both critically acclaimed and wildly popular during one of GG’s golden eras. He won multiple Daytime Emmys. Lucky and Lizzie had one of daytime’s greatest teen romances. He and Rebecca Herbst melted the hearts of the most cynical viewers.

Jackson began booking film roles while he was still on the soap. Everyone assumed that he would go on to primetime and feature stardom. While he worked steadily, he never broke through. It was his former teen co-star Amber Tamblyn that went on to star in two primetime television series. So Jackson, who is now a married father of two, has decided to return to the best role he ever had.

I loved Jackson’s Lucky. He was the perfect combination of Luke and Laura. He had Laura’s big heart and Luke’s urge to subvert the dominant paradigm. Jackson was a prodigy, holding his own with Tony Geary and Genie Francis as a pre-teen. He developed into a highly original actor that many thought could never be replaced. Though they are both talented, neither Vaughn nor his predecessor Jacob Young ever seemed like the same character to me.

However, Vaughn has many fans who have voiced their disapproval of his firing. He is a hard working team player who lost his job simply because TPTB decided to make a change. Vaughn shone in scenes where he interacted with Lucky’s children. The guy is also really, really good looking. ABC’s statement claims that it was his choice to leave. Vaughn twittered that he was fired, and his fellow cast members backed him up. I appreciate the network’s efforts to avoid another “real Greenlee” debacle, but there is no reason to lie. Give the fans and the actors a little credit for intelligence. With the show’s ratings down, they decided to reach out to a popular former star in the hopes of reigniting viewer interest.

It may be an awkward transition. Jackson has not played the role as an adult. I cannot picture Jackson’s Lucky growing up to become a cop. While he surely would have stayed away from the mob, I imagined him becoming a musician or an entrepreneur. Lucky has been written as the village idiot for the past year. That’s in part due to GH’s anti-cop stance, but also reflects that the writers had lost interest in the character. There were rumors that Lucky would be written off and the repugnant Ethan would get all his screentime. Clearly, TPTB brought Jackson back to play a front burner role. They are going to have to do a lot of work to reestablish his identity. I have read comments on line that Jackson still looks like a kid. He is nearly a decade younger than Vaughn. As someone who enjoyed his work as the very manly Kyle on The Sarah Connor Chronicles, I am quite confident that he can play a mature Lucky. He and Rebecca Hearst both bathed in the Tuck Everlasting river of eternal youth, and will look fine together. There is no way his Lucky will come across as the boring brother who Liz is staying with out of a sense of obligation. The show was consistently good when Jackson was on it. I cannot help hoping that this is the start of a return to the show’s roots. Jackson may even inspire Tony Geary to start acting again. The past three days of GH have been unexpectedly sweet, funny and romantic. It is time for a 90s revival.

Victor Has Left The Building

Monday’s other big casting news, broken by TV Guide Canada, was that Victor Newman has been written off of The Young & The Restless while the show attempts to renegotiate Eric Braeden’s contract. My advice to Victor fans: don’t panic. Yet. Y&R just went through similar protracted negotiations with Melody Thomas Scott and Jess Walton. They decided to stay with the show. It is unfortunate that Braeden did not realize his contract allows the show to renegotiate at the end of designated “cycles.” Apparently, he thought he was safe until late 2010 and was blindsided when TPTB informed him otherwise. Given Y&R’s major budget cuts, it may come down to whether Y&R’s highest paid actor would rather retire than accept a pay cut similar to those other soap A-listers have taken.

If Braeden leaves Y&R, he in all probability will be relegated to the occasional primetime guest star role and an annual Hallmark Channel movie. There are not that many leading roles for actors in his age range in primetime. Other soaps cannot afford him. Even if they could, he would not have nearly as major a role. Victor is the rare character over the age of 60 who is front burner all the time. Victor is Y&R’s alpha dog. Victor always wins and rarely suffers the consequences of his actions. Women constantly lust after him. There is no way he is going to get to play such an ego gratifying role on any other show.

Braeden has temporarily left the show before over contract disputes. I am sure that his pay cut will still leave him at the top of the current daytime pay scale. I am cautiously optimistic that, like Thomas Scott and Walton, he will weigh his options and realize Y&R is the best offer he is going to get in 2009.

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