Brynn Thayer, a candidate for a Daytime Emmy, remembers an intense OLTL plot.
From 1978 to 1986, Brynn Thayer portrayed Jenny Wolek, a beloved character on One Life to Live. The actress recently spoke with Soap Hub about her recent show, Let Me In, which she wrote and produced, as well as about one of her more moving experiences while living in Llanview.
Brynn Thayer Recalls Baby Mary on OLTL
In daily shows, soap opera baby switch plotlines are commonplace. Jenny Wolek was carrying Brad Vernon’s (Steve Fletcher) child back in the early 1980s. Katrina Karr (Nancy Snyder), whom Brad also conceived, chose to place her infant for adoption. Around the same moment, both ladies delivered birth. After Jenny’s daughter passed away soon after giving birth, Jenny’s sister Karen (Judith Light) and Marco Dane (Gerry Anthony) made the heartbreaking choice to exchange Jenny and Katrina’s newborn girls in the hospital nursery.
However, Katrina subsequently admitted that she intended to retain the child despite not being aware that her daughter was still alive and residing with Jenny. If you believe modern tales go on for too long, consider the lengthy timeline of the Mary saga, which eventually involved toddler Mary. (And the audience members were firmly seated.) When the reality was revealed, Jenny was forced to painfully decide to give Katrina’s daughter back.
According to Thayer, “We played that tale out for, I believe, three years.” Mary was three years old when [Jenny] returned her. That was amazing.
A Memorable Story of Two Mothers
Thayer praises the show’s creators and co-star Snyder for giving the story such gravitas. She is such a fantastic performer, adds Thayer. “She’s unlike anyone else. Her actions showed how distinct she was from other people. She was not a “soap drama.” She is such an intriguing person. I like her a lot. Off-screen, Snyder is married to Stephen Schnetzer (Marcello Salta), a former OLTL co-star who is best known to soap opera viewers as Cass Winthrop from Another World.
It might have seemed like Katrina and her child would never be reconnected at times. The OLTL writers, under the direction of the late, great chief writer Gordon Russell, never neglected the plot, but it wasn’t always a priority. Nothing would occur for months, but Thayer remembers that it was always present. “In my opinion, that was a brilliant approach to create a soap opera.”
In 1997, ABC ran a limited series called A Daytime to Remember after The City’s series conclusion but before Port Charles made its premiere. Reba McEntire, a country singer/actress/devoted soap opera fan, narrated half-hour shows that replayed dramatic sequences from enduring ABC plots. This series featured Jenny entrusting Mary to Katrina, which speaks to the significance of the tale as well as the outstanding writing and performance that were a part of the Golden Age of daytime drama.
Brynn Thayer Talks Let Me In
In order to start their new, renewed life together, Mary and Katrina decided to relocate to Florida. A few years afterward, Jenny and David Renaldi relocated to Europe (Michael Zaslow). Jenny was thought to have perished in a landslide in 1997. (In other words, a way was left available for her to come back.)
Let Me In, a play that Thayer wrote and produced, was motivated by the tragic death of Thayer’s closest friend in an automobile accident. She recently discussed the play’s history and her recollections of co-star Zaslow with Soap Hub.
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