Even after all the huge movies he did, Robin Williams would have people yelling “Mork” at him in the streets. And his explanation, someone once said, was basically: “It’s TV. TV makes you family.” Can you relate to that — especially given that soaps are on not just once a week, but five times?
Absolutely, that’s my experience. It was then and it remains that. And I am so thrilled that the audience has always been there. Even after we went off the air and even after I’ve done other things — and people will remark on that — it’s Erica that I hear most about.
And it was a multigenerational audience, so people have great memories themselves of watching with their moms or their grandmothers, their aunts or their friends or their babysitters. So, I am quite used to, for my whole life, walking down the street and people yelling out, “Erica! Erica!” But also, because of Regis Philbin, I’m really, really used to . . . like, truck drivers will go by and say, “La Lucci!” [Laughs]
Listen, you can’t be an actress just in your room with the door shut. You have to be out there. And they could be throwing tomatoes . . . so, I’m really happy that they’re not.
Are there any specific, memorable fan encounters that stand out?
I was in Italy last fall, and there was a woman standing in an adjoining room of this restaurant. I saw in the corner of my eye that she was just standing there and she was really staring at me . . . I didn’t expect this outside of America or Canada. The waiter asked if that woman could come over and meet me. And I said, “Of course!” She just was really taken with the Erica Kane character — and now seeing me in-person, she was crying. That was very dramatic, to be so far from home . . . Gosh, that also happened on top of a ski resort in Austria.
Also, for the first book I did 15 years ago called All My Life — which I know is not all my life, and that’s why I wrote this new book, La Lucci — but at that time, I remember one evening a gentleman came through the line at my book signing and he said, “You know, Susan, they tell us that cotton is the fabric of our lives — but really, it’s Erica Kane and All My Children.” [Laughs]
Have you gotten used to people just calling you Erica as opposed to Susan? Do you react without skipping a beat?
I do respond right away, because I know how people were so invested and I know that they’re really happy to have a chance to say a few words. And I admire their poise to come up to someone. I could never do that. I grew up admiring Sophia Loren so much. But I saw her in a boutique in Paris — the first time I was ever in Chanel was in Paris and there she was . . . and I could not speak to her. I just admired her from afar. I so admire the poise of people who come up.
But yeah, I’m equally used to [fans saying Susan or Erica]. Some people say to me, “You know, you look a lot like Susan Lucci,” and sometimes I will say, “Well, there’s a good reason for that!” And they say, “No, you are? You really are?” So, I also understand it would be a surprise for them to encounter someone they didn’t expect to encounter. But it’s all so good. I’m so lucky.
Looking back to when you first landed the role, what was your North Star for playing Erica? How did you ground this human being amidst all the larger-than-life situations the writers put you in?
Well, Agnes Nixon’s writing was there from the beginning, even from the audition scene. It was right there on the page. You probably heard the expression, “If it ain’t on the page, it ain’t on the stage.” That’s what Agnes brought to it, and that was my North Star.
And I have to say that the other thing that really made me able to see all this good stuff in the character of Erica Kane . . . because she was the bad girl in town, she was not the protagonist ingénue . . . and I loved Scarlett O’Hara when I read Gone With the Wind. My friends all seemed to like Melanie very much, but I liked Scarlett. I guess I had an attraction to playing such a character.
What was it like learning how to function in a fast-paced soap opera production? I’ve heard other actors describe it as an acting boot camp. You have to learn a ton of lines, and you mostly only get one take . . .
“Boot camp” is a good expression, because it really is relentless. You know, there was a Dolly Parton song, “9 to 5,” and we used to laugh and say no, it’s “5 to 9.” But, yeah, it’s a very good way to get your professional self in gear, when you go to this boot camp. But on the other hand, sometimes I feel a little bad when people say, “Oh, it’s a stepping stone [to other opportunities].” You better be prepared. If you don’t know what you’re doing, you’re probably not gonna last very long.
When you sit down to write a memoir, which you’ve done twice now, as much as it’s all based on your own memories, does the process of analyzing and organizing those memories into a narrative inherently give you a new perspective on your life?
You may have noticed on the cover of La Lucci and also, of course, on the cover of my first memoir — Laura Morton’s name is on there [as co-author]. It’s Laura who helped me very much to write all these words. I knew that I loved Laura’s process for the first book, and I definitely wanted to have her be involved in the second one. And I’m so glad I did, because I’m not somebody who just jumps up and opens up and says, “This happened and that happened and blah blah blah.” She has a way of asking me questions in such a way that I opened up and I told these things. She is very much responsible for the organization, and she would see the threads that followed through. For example, light. I talk about, in the book, my dreams when I was 17 years old and just standing on stage in a theatre in the ghost light; my name, Lucci, is Italian — and a derivative comes from the word “light.” And when each of my children left for college, I just couldn’t bear to walk past their bedrooms that were dark now because they weren’t here. So I would go in and turn the lights on, even though they weren’t here, because seeing their rooms lit up just fed me, just made me feel better and just seemed more alive. That kind of thing. She could look at it from 35,000 feet and have an overview. She was so wonderful to work with.
Looking back on the infamous streak of 18 Daytime Emmy noms before finally winning in 1999, did the public and the media make more of that than you did? Was it water off a duck’s back, or did it really affect you?
I felt so honoured to be nominated, because I could look around and see what good work was being done by everybody involved on not only our show but the other shows — and I know how gruelling the work was. The fact that they thought my work was worthy of notice was just fantastic. The not winning part . . . I can tell you winning is much better! Winning is a much happier experience. But we didn’t think about it much from year to year . . .
Then, I remember I was so touched that the press and the public were so engaged in my losing and wanted me to win — I would be hearing this on the streets, in restaurants, from the press corps — and I felt like I got whipped into a frenzy every year being hopeful, because they were so hopeful and they were so nice and they were saying such positive things to me. And I didn’t wanna go there [allow myself to think about winning], especially after some nine years in a row of getting your hopes up. Even the last year when I won, it was the night before the Emmys, I was laying in bed and thinking, “Wow, everybody is telling me what a great year this was. I better start thinking about what I might say if . . .” But I didn’t wanna go there. So, just the night before, I started thinking about what I would want to say if — by a wild, crazy chance — I won. And then I did, which was amazing.
All My Children streams on Pluto TV
MEMORABLE ROLES:
While spending over half your life on a soap tends to keep an actor pretty tied-up, Susan Lucci has managed to venture beyond Pine Valley here and there, making guest appearances on such classics as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, The Fall Guy, Dallas and playing herself in five episodes of Hot in Cleveland. She also hosted SNL in 1990 and competed on Dancing With the Stars in 2008. A few years after AMC was cancelled, she joined the cast of Devious Maids as a series regular. Most recently, she shared the screen with Keanu Reeves in Apple TV original film Outcome. The native of Scarsdale, New York, furthermore released a memoir in 2011, titled All My Life. Just recently, she published a second called La Lucci — a reference to the affectionate nickname bestowed upon her by Regis Philbin.
CURRENT GIG:
Described as an antiheroine, a feminist icon and the most famous soap opera character of all time, Erica Kane spent over four decades as Pine Valley’s resident “bad girl” on ABC’s All My Children. Playing her every step and misstep of the way was the indelible Susan Lucci. While it may seem odd to call this a “current gig” given that AMC was cancelled in 2011, streamer Pluto TV recently launched a dedicated, 24/7 All My Children channel, airing classic episodes from throughout its 41-year run.