♥ Ongoing Days 1993 ♥ Note on soap magazine publication dates and content of articles/interviews regarding multiple soap stars: Many of the monthly or every other month (and sometimes quarterly) magazines back in the 1980's would be on the newsstands a long time before the date on the actual magazine. We've noticed, for instance, that DAYTIME TV magazine did an interview with Drake in late 1986 about his upcoming wedding, which was scheduled for December 1986, yet the interview didn't appear until the July 1987 issue several months later. Therefore, it might be a bit confusing to read about his "upcoming" wedding in an interview dated July 1987 when you happen to know he was married in December 1986. We've tried to date the articles to match the date on the magazine, regardless of when the events talked about took place. Hopefully it will make sense as you go along! We've also edited some of the articles/interviews to just include John's storyline, since this is a Drake/John website. We've left out comments and sections about other actors or storylines unless they're involved with John's storyline. This too should be very apparent and clear when we've done that so it makes sense and you don't have to skim through a long article to find the "John parts." ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Drake's Most Revealing Interview Ever... Superman: ...The sweat is dripping off of Drake Hogestyn's body. One. Two. Three. Four...He has to push himself further...No pain, no gain...His lines are memorized. He's lifting weights... I clearly remember the first few weeks that Drake Hogestyn made his daytime television debut on NBC's DAYS. I didn't think he was going to last. After all, the odds were against him. He was, at the time, replacing one of the show's most popular actors and characters, Wayne Northrop's Roman, and the show was hoping that Hogestyn could, with his character John Black, match the chemistry that Northrop's Roman enjoyed with Deidre Hall's Marlena. He did, and now eight years later, long after Deidre Hall left the show and several other female co-stars entered and exited, Drake Hogestyn is enjoying a personal workout in the comfort of the DAYS studio as one of the show's most valuable possessions. But you wouldn't know it by him. He's pretty modest. But then again, he's a lot of things. He loves his wife like nobody's business. He has a habit of not answering questions. He's not afraid of dogs. But why is he afraid to admit that he's big box office for his soap? Perhaps it's the many changes that he's endured over the years. Since his first successful pairing with Deidre Hall, he's been paired with Genie Francis' Diana, then with a new actress and new character (Staci Greason's Isabella) who later died, followed by finding out that the person that he thought he was - Roman - he actually wasn't, when Deidre Hall and Wayne Northrop returned to the show to resume playing their roles. That's a lot to handle. However, he's made each situation work and his appeal has never wavered. From this vantage point, it seems that anything that he's involved in seems to work. Still, Drake Hogestyn is being very careful about his current storyline, which has John re-igniting his feelings for Marlena. Considering the strong show of support for John's relationship with Isabella, and how the fans mourned her death to cancer, he doesn't want viewers to think that he's betraying the integrity of the character. "I love working with Deidre," Drake mentions right off the bat, "I always have. And whenever a character changes, it's also exciting for the actor. But the other side of the coin is that in my own mind I wonder if we can capture the same excitement the second time around. It's been a touchy situation for John to pursue Marlena, despite the fact that she's a married woman, because the death of Isabella - showing how much John loved Isabella - makes it very difficult for John to be involved with another woman. When I first found out that John and Marlena would be getting closer, I couldn't help but think of what happened when Kayla and Shane became a couple after Steve's death - the audience had a real hard time with that." So what exactly is Drake hearing from his audience? "It's a coin toss," he relays. "I've been going through my mail and there are an enormous amount of supporters for John and Marlena..." I suddenly realized that it must be nice to be a fan of Drake Hogestyn, knowing that he actually reads all of his mail, and more importantly - he sincerely considers the opinions he reads in his letters. "...But then there are those who are very strong John and Isabella fans. I'd like to read you one letter if I may that's right in front of me. It says, 'I can't believe that John has forgotten Isabella so easily.' Then I get pro-letters that say that they understand that John must go on with his life," Drake laughs, "and then I get letters from fans who say they don't care what storyline I have, as long as I'm working!" Why do so many viewers like this guy? Staci Greason once told me, when asked why the audience liked Isabella with John, that she believes that the audience would accept any woman with John as long as that woman was good to him. "That's flattering," Drake responds, "but that's not true. Because each woman has something special, but that something special has to come out, and it did with Isabella, and that's when the characters started to gravitate towards each other. The interesting thing is that the last months of the show, when Staci knew that she was leaving, we both had a really good time with the storyline. That storyline was foolproof. There was nothing that could be done wrong - Isabella was going to die." Did Drake have any idea that it was going to turn out as well as it did? "No. But then I would start picking up the scripts, and even if it wasn't in the dialogue, it was there - just the idea - whoa! It was just so overwhelming, and I don't know if I was substituting by saying, 'Oh my God, what if this was happening to my child, or what if it was my wife,' but there were scenes that we couldn't play out in dress rehearsal because you would become so overloaded with emotions that you would have to wait and experience it for tape." Coming off of the dramatic punch of Isabella's death, and now tackling the equally powerful relationship with Marlena, I wonder how Drake Hogestyn is feeling about this stage of his DAYS career. Was his job the cat's meow for him a couple of years ago? Or is it now? Is he restless? "Last night they were testing for a role and Morgan Brittany was in here." Drake begins answering a question in an indirect way as he often does, "and I've watched Susan Seaforth Hayes (Julie) leave and right now my agent has two scripts for pilots. One is Lois and Clark - a SUPERMAN story - and the other one is ADVENTURES INCORPORATED, which is like MOONLIGHTING. They are good pilots, but in the same breath, I have to tell you that I enjoy doing DAYS, and I want to keep doing it. In my mind, I think of someday taking my kids to a cabin in the mountains in Indiana." Drake corrects himself by mentioning that there aren't mountains in Indiana, but we get the picture he's painting. "I'm not anxious to leave the show. It's a great job. I don't get home until 8:30, sometimes 9:30 PM which is bad if the kids have already gone to bed," he sighs, then offers, "but this weekend we are all getting away to a cabin, where there is a mountain," he laughs, "so we can play around in the snow and catch up on what their last month has been like." What their last month was like? Does that make this father of four feel guilty? "I try to spend every minute that I can with them," he informs without saying yes or no, "because they're growing up and you can never get that time back." Drake's mention of returning to Indiana makes me wonder if he's getting tired of the rat race of Hollywood. "Luckily, I avoid a lot of what goes with Hollywood, because we live in Malibu. I couldn't tell you what restaurants to go to in Hollywood, or clubs and I don't go for awards banquets. We have a lot of neighbors in Malibu who are much bigger in the business than myself - like Mel Gibson - his kids play with my kids. I just try to keep my kids' heads screwed on straight." Women admire men that are good fathers like Drake Hogestyn. But what do they see in John? "I think that they know they can rely on him for whatever the problem is," Drake believes, "and I think that women want that quality in real life from men. I don't know whether they are finding that quality in men, but they like that in John." Has Drake Hogestyn changed since his childhood in Indiana? "I think that I've kept a lot of the morals that I had then," he answers. Morals, Hogestyn mentions morals. Some people don't even know what morals are. Or they do, and they avoid them. "We've never sought any outside help," Drake continues, unaware of my interruptions. "We do it all ourselves. In fact, if you try to call my wife Victoria right now, you couldn't talk to her because she's picking up Alex from pre-school and then Victoria comes home and has to play taxi if anyone has any functions like basketball; the girls are in ballet. It's one thing after another." So she's unloading the dishwasher. Drake fixes whatever needs to be repaired around the house... "Yes, and she makes a list of things for me to do on my day off." I tell Drake that I think that he once told me that if he couldn't act, he would be a carpenter. There's a dead silence in the conversation and I have this horrifying flashback to the time that Diane Sawyer interviewed Katharine Hepburn and asked Katharine to reveal something that she once alluded to, but said that she couldn't talk about. Katharine shook her head and exclaimed something to the effect of, "Diane, I don't have the slightest idea as to what you're talking about!" Was Drake Hogestyn going to pull a Katharine Hepburn on me? Suddenly, he kicks in, "Oh yeah, I think that I probably told you that during one of my down times on the show when I was puttering around the house." So the Plan B of being a carpenter has changed? "Yeah, but I love that stuff. I love to work on houses and see something be completed. It's like the storyline with Isabella: the filtering process until she died. With most storylines, you have to play it like it's never going to end. Yeah, I'm remembering that carpentry comment now. In fact, my dad and my brother are up in Connecticut and I have often thought about getting a large parcel of land and building houses that are ecologically sound that would blend into nature." But what if once Drake relocated to Connecticut, he received a call - they wanted him on the New York-based cop drama LAW AND ORDER? "That's a good show. I haven't seen the show a lot, but I've enjoyed what I've seen. I've always liked that kind of work - building houses." Drake isn't answering the question. He laughs, "It's hypothetical." Let's rephrase it and make it less specific: If Drake was building houses in Connecticut, would he start acting again in New York? "I think once I stepped out of the business, that would be it." Let's review what we know about Drake Hogestyn so far: He cares passionately about his character. There's nothing more important to him than being a good father. He loves his wife, as he'll later tell you, "desperately." He could leave the glitz of show business and connect with the land. He's got morals. He's giving that guy with the tights, cape and monogram "S" a real run for his money. But Drake Hogestyn describes himself as, "Honest. I'm the type of person that you can trust. I'd like to think that I can be a hero in my children's eyes." Sort of the same qualities as John Black. "A lot of the same qualities as John," Drake agrees, "until what I taped last week when John slept with Marlena. The producers were saying that I was taking a chink in the armor, but I said that it was more like a fire axe doing the damage. We're talking adultery here," Drake stresses with the emotion that would make a great sound bite for an afternoon talk show. "But this is soap opera," he reasons about the adultery, "so this has to be exciting." But it was much more than just a burning in John's loins. "Yes," Drake sobers up. "He had a lot of difficulty with it. John was going to leave town and was on the jet, and Marlena asked him why he was leaving, and John wondered what could they do - see each other at functions and kiss each other on the cheek and make idle chit-chat? I don't think so," he remembers his character's mood that day. "It wasn't actually written for the two of us to clash together, but we had to work hard to show how desperate we were emotionally. I remember when I first found out that John told Marlena that he loved her. I was faxed an audition scene for the Rebecca character and on the top of the page it said, 'After John professed his love for Marlena,' and I called Becky Greenlaw (a DAYS producer) and told her that I realized that there was no turning back. I wanted some rewriting so that John could hold back more, and he could explain that he didn't know why he was feeling what he was, that maybe it was because Marlena knows him so well. That's a lot like Drake too - a lot of people don't know me because I hold a lot inside. I wanted it to be clear that Isabella knew that Marlena and John shared something very rare and something very indestructible...and that's why she trusted Marlena to keep an eye on John. That helped me take the responsibility off of the character's shoulders," Drake explains. "So when I get nervous and when I think about what I was telling you about Kayla and Shane, I have to remind myself that John shared a life with Marlena, where Shane and Kayla didn't share a previous relationship. But then the Libra in me says it's always better to move forward than take a step back." I tell Drake that one of my friends doesn't like John's current storyline because she says that DAYS seems to always be afraid to take John's story forward. Instead they always feed off of his past. That may be a valid point but can you ignore two characters who have unfinished business in their past? Does Drake think that John slept with Marlena too quickly? "It came at a time when I thought, 'Oh, couldn't we have three more weeks of simmering emotions.'" But can he put on his producer's hat and understand that it was a strong move for ratings? "Yes, I understand that. I want to get the most out of these scenes. What I need to get that character to do." Drake volunteers after a short pause, somewhat akin to someone that you're sharing a car ride with, who's just verbalized a mental note that they have to pick up their dry cleaning next week, "I need to get that character stronger." What about Drake Hogestyn's strength? Where does it stop? What does he find himself worrying about? "Keeping my kids in shoes," he says seriously. "Luckily, I have a very strong relationship with my wife. I love her desperately. But she did leave me when I was eighteen..." Is he glad that it happened in retrospect? "Yeah, I'm glad. It made me go out and see the world and appreciate her more. There wasn't a day when I didn't think about her." Why did they break up? "I felt that I couldn't provide for her if I stayed in Indiana. I knew that I had to get out. When the offer came along to play baseball for the Yankees...(He had already turned down the Orioles and the Cardinals, and the Cardinals' offer was the number two pick in the nation.)...We were going to open a dental practice together, then I was drafted by the Yankees and it was, 'Oh my gosh, it's the Yankees.' I remember calling her and saying, 'You have to understand that I sat on your couch when I was fifteen, squeezing a pillow - displacement activity for you - saying that someday I was going to play in Yankee Stadium.'" Victoria hung up the phone. Eight years later, Drake drove eighteen hours straight to her house. He arrived at three in the morning. She wouldn't let him in, so he climbed the tree outside her bedroom and knocked down the window. "She couldn't go with me," Drake tells. "She said, 'Where was the station wagon and the white picket fence in this scenario?'" It was the most difficult time in Drake Hogestyn's life. "But I could see her side of the story. Baseball is okay if you're single and you can work another job on the off-months - training attack dogs, like I did." What made Drake take that job? "It was a job," he explains. Was he afraid of dogs? "No, especially when they wrap you up in ten inches of cotton, but then the dogs would charge at you from fifty feet away and bite the first thing that they saw. One of my crazy jobs," Drake recollects, "but I know what it's like on the other end." A contract from Columbia Pictures Television and an injury took Drake away from baseball and back to Victoria. Now firmly planted in a field that makes him a national celebrity with interview requests, it's obvious that show business is just an interesting backdrop to his very grounded life. "I don't have to start taping until three," Drake informs, "so I told the producer that I'm going to work out for five hours. I did the half-hour of aerobics and then a half-hour of abdominals, and then Victoria called me and said, 'When are you going to call Richard? You are not making a good reputation for yourself.' And I said, 'Victoria, you know how I am with interviews. I feel apprehensive because I never know what to say, and I keep thinking, What do I have to say that anybody would want to hear?'" Sounds like something Clark Kent would say. Richard Spencer, SOAP OPERA UPDATE, 3/9/93 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

♥ Born Again DAYS' Drake Hogestyn Talks About The Rebirth Of John Black His Pairing With Deidre Hall And The Woman He Can't Live Without... In A League Of His Own: While his DAYS character often suffers identity crises, Drake Hogestyn always knows who he is. He is daytime's master quick-change artist, an actor who's endured a never-ending flux of new names and identities during his seven-year stint on DAYS OF OUR LIVES. "All this without therapy," laughs Drake Hogestyn, who debuted as "The Pawn" back in 1986 and has since answered to John Black, Roman Brady, John Stevens, Forrest Alamain and, coming nearly full circle, John Black - again. "The character has changed a lot from when I first came on the show," he continues, that assessment making the actor a master of understatement as well. "He's gone from being a rough and tumble guy to, all of a sudden, a Donald Trump-type character, which I don't really think suits him well or makes him feel comfortable. I want to see him toughen up." "John's turned into a very emotional character," continues Hogestyn. "I try not to let him wear it on his sleeve around people. I like private moments where I can indicate his feelings, when he's by himself. Soap opera is a very emotional format. If the writers find an actor who can hit those beats, they'll write a lot for you, and that changes the shape of the character quite a bit. I mean, I don't want to be the person who goes around and sobs every day on the show. It's not good for a 'manly man,'" he jokes in his deepest voice. The biggest turning point for Hogestyn came in 1991 when DAYS' producers approached him with a blockbuster idea: bringing back Deidre Hall as Marlena and Wayne Northrop as the real Roman Brady. Hogestyn, who was playing Roman at the time, insists he wasn't threatened by the possibility of his predecessor's return. He'd just signed a new multi-year pact with DAYS and felt his position was secure. From an acting standpoint, Northrop's return even intrigued him. "I'd wake up some mornings and think, 'Would it behoove me to lose the character of Roman, after playing him for five-plus years?'" says the actor, who realized the move would remove him from his prominent position in the Brady family. "Family is a very important part of our core here; losing Roman would take Kayla away, Kimberly away, Bo away, the cop shop away..." he says. "As I started peeling off the layers, I started thinking it would be a challenge, and very interesting." "I'd be the man without a name again, and we'd start from scratch," he adds. (When his character first appeared on the show, he had amnesia so he made up the name John Black.) (OOPS! This is wrong. "The Pawn" wandered into a soup kitchen and met a man named Brother Francis and asked him about a job. Brother Francis asked him what his name was but he couldn't remember. Lucky for him, Brother Francis was called away and The Pawn took this opportunity to find a Vietnam War memorial plaque on the wall and decided that he'd claim the first name on the plaque as his own - this name was John Black. So clearly, John didn't make up the name John Black like this article states.) "Either the audience would bite on it or say, 'Okay, enough is enough.' Then the writers would set the character of John Black adrift, and I'd just go back to waiting tables or whatever it takes." In retrospect, the move turned out to be a bonanza: Hogestyn has been enjoying front-burner storyline action ever since. "I've been really lucky," he admits modestly. "Since (Hall and Northrop) came back (in the summer of 1991) - aside from the Mayan stuff, which I thought was kind of out of left field - I've pretty much gotten into the real soap opera stuff, starting with the death of Isabella (Staci Greason). Next to my first five months on the show as The Pawn/John Black/Roman, that was one of my favorite storylines," he says. "It was foolproof to begin with. It didn't matter what they wrote. The girl was going to die. The emotions were raw and real." During the six weeks in which that poignant story was told, Hogestyn believes John and Isabella became "very, very strong and riveting characters. It was something I wanted to watch. By the same token, an interesting thing evolved. People who were never sold on John Black and Isabella...all of a sudden became John and Isabella fans." The story became so powerful that Hogestyn wondered how it could be topped. The answer materialized when James Reilly became a Co-Headwriter (with Sheri Anderson, who has since left) and decided to take another look at the John/Roman/Marlena triangle. "When Deidre Hall first came back, viewers' response was pro-John and Marlena. They were going to do the story, then it got nipped in the bud," says Hogestyn, citing the constant change of writers during that period as the reason. "There were too many cooks in the kitchen, and they each had their own ideas. That's when the story should have been told. It could have written itself. But instead, John, Isabella and their baby, and Roman and Marlena all went walking off into the sunset in opposite directions. Now we're back to it a year-and-a-half later, but it's picking up steam." The overnight revival of John and Marlena, however, sometimes has made it difficult for Hogestyn to remain true to his character. He particularly remembers the scene in which they were on the pier reminiscing about Marlena's return to Salem, when "out of the blue" John professed his love. "The way it was written, there was no mention of Isabella. It was just, 'I've always loved you,'" says Hogestyn, noting that with the help of producers Francesca James and Tom Langan, the scene was rewritten. He recalls that impassioned speech vividly. "John said, 'Isabella knew me so well. She knew I would be lost and wandering around. She also knew that you and I shared a love so rare and indestructible. That's why she asked you to keep an eye on me.' That included Isabella, and almost took a lot of the responsibility off John for moving into a storyline that fast and with that much heat, right away." Tossing another woman - Rebecca (Dani Minnick) - into John's bed may have spiced up the pot for viewers, but not for the actor. "I can't justify that. I don't think John would do that. I've discussed this upstairs," says Hogestyn, referring to the producers at DAYS. "I can understand going back to a first love. Marlena really pulled John through a hole in the wall when he was out there looking for something, grasping at straws. A very strong bond was formed that turned into love. With children and everything else, that has obviously tightened," he notes. "But to fool himself into thinking he can dive into another relationship to forget something else...John's core person would not do that." Hogestyn believes John's relationship with Rebecca not only taints his character but also sends out a bad message. "I'm not saying I'm making any social statements, but in this day and age of safe sex, monogamous relationships, and not just using someone, there is a responsibility there," he says. "There is a responsibility to my character also that I've voiced throughout the years. I really am passionate about who I bring to the screen. When I see things going against my grain, it's difficult to play." Material like this may be one reason Hogestyn wishes his children would not tune in to see his daytime antics. "I prefer that they don't watch, but they do see the show," he says. "My little four-year-old, Alexandra, knows John Black. She goes to preschool from nine to twelve. When she comes home, it's DAYS OF OUR LIVES time, and she wants to see me. If I'm kissing other women, she'll turn to my wife, Victoria, and say 'Yukkk!'" "When I was trapped in the pit with Marlena, had beams on top of me and was all torn up, she saw it on television and wanted to call Daddy," he continues. "So Victoria called my dressing room for her. I was there and picked up the phone. Alex said, 'Daddy, are you okay?' I said, 'Yes, pumpkin. I'm fine.' Then she asked, 'Where are you?' I said, 'In my dressing room,' and she went, 'Boy, it sure is a mess!'" "Whitney, who's seven now, knows what's going on, too," Hogestyn continues. "Rachael and Ben, the older kids, know what it's all about...especially Rachael. All the kids at school watch." "My wife hears it, too. It doesn't matter where she goes - people are saying, 'Boy did Drake have a scene with...WOW!' I don't believe my wife wants to hear that...But the spirit of our marriage is very strong. We're inseparable friends," he says. "Besides, work is work, and home is home. I treat it like a job. When I'm home, it's just us and the kids doing whatever we're doing." As far as career aspirations, Hogestyn, who claims he "couldn't be luckier or happier," simply says, "I never chose to be an actor to begin with. It just happened. If I'd known what it was all about, I wouldn't have been in it." He is referring to the now well-known fact that he was a minor league baseball player with the New York Yankees when he decided to enter an essay contest - sponsored by Columbia Pictures Television - about why he wanted to head for Hollywood and become a star. (Please Note: The word "Columbia Pictures" was changed to "Columbia Pictures Television" in several places in this article to keep consistency throughout our website. We always refrain from using short-cuts or abbreviations, even though the magazine chose to do this for space constraints.) Of the fifty-thousand applicants, Hogestyn was among thirty chosen to participate in an intensive three-month training program, and one of five to land a contract. (OOPS! This is wrong. This should say that Drake was one "of the seventy-five-thousand applicants" not "of the fifty-thousand applicants" like the reporter has said in this article.) He earned his SAG card from the one line he delivered to Kim Basinger on the television series FROM HERE TO ETERNITY. In 1982 he was cast in SEVEN BRIDES FOR SEVEN BROTHERS. When that series folded in 1983, he and Richard Dean Anderson (Ex-Jeff Webber, GENERAL HOSPITAL; he also starred in SEVEN BRIDES FOR SEVEN BROTHERS) were up for the much-talked-about pilot GENERATION. (Please Note: The words "SEVEN BRIDES" were changed to "SEVEN BRIDES FOR SEVEN BROTHERS" in several places in this article to keep consistency throughout our website. We always refrain from using short-cuts or abbreviations, even though the magazine chose to do this for space constraints.) (Despite the West Coast hype, the show never made it to a primetime series slot.) Whoever didn't get the role would get another series, MACGYVER. While Hogestyn didn't get the break that time, he did finally get lucky in January 1986 when he auditioned for a guest spot on CRAZY LIKE A FOX. Doris Sabbagh, DAYS' casting director, spotted him and thought he would make a great "Pawn." Little did she know he would also make a great Roman, and John, and... Hogestyn admits there have been times during his years on DAYS when he's thought about packing it all in, heading back to his native Indiana and leading a simpler life. "There's a lake in Indiana..." he muses. "It's got this little general store nearby and a tiny marina that fixes little open-engine bass boats. There's a nice rolling hill where I could bring in some horses..." Realistically, though, Hogestyn knows he will be an actor until he retires. "I enjoy what I do immensely. I put my heart and soul into it, and I'm constantly working on it," he says. "I want people out there watching the show in Oregon or Iowa or ironing clothes in North Dakota to burn some shirts when they're watching my three-minute scenes," he adds. "I want my point of view to come through. I want them to pick up the phone afterward, call Ethel, and say, 'Did you see that?'" Even if he had never written the essay that got him to Hollywood, Hogestyn insists he has the insight to know exactly where he'd be today - both professionally and personally. "I had two different options," he says. "One was dental school at Tufts University in Boston; the other was chiropractic school in Logan, St. Louis." (OOPS! This is wrong. Typo alert! This should say "Logan School of Chiropractic near St. Louis," not "chiropractic school in Logan, St. Louis.") Personally, he's certain his life could only have followed the path it did: marriage to his high school sweetheart, Victoria Post. "If it hadn't happened yet, I'd still be single. I'd still be waiting. It would have been one of those stories where, 'Well, they got married when she was sixty-nine and he was seventy-three.'" Despite Hogestyn's deep conviction regarding his marital destiny, he admits to sometimes harboring thoughts in his sleep about losing it all. "I have a recurring dream that she leaves me," he confides. "It's the same dream over and over. It's so real and it's so sad. I hate this dream, but it's so nice to look over, see Victoria, and know, 'Oh, you're here,'" he adds softly. "It's an incredible feeling." Janet Di Lauro, SOAP OPERA WEEKLY, 5/4/93 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

♥ The News DAYS' Drake Hogestyn Up For Film Role DAYS OF OUR LIVES' Drake Hogestyn (John) announced at his fan gathering over the Memorial Day weekend that he may be making the big move to the big screen, in a film starring Joe Pesci and Gary Busey. "The film is called PRY BAR," he explains. "It's about a real-life guy, a jewel thief who's been dogging this FBI agent who's been following him for twenty-five years." (OOPS! This is wrong. Typo alert! It sounds to us like the reporter heard Drake incorrectly when she played the tape in her tape recorder back. Drake is talking about how this jewel thief has cleverly and skillfully managed to avoid being captured by the FBI. In our opinion this should say "a jewel thief who's been dodging this FBI agent who's been following him for twenty-five years" not "a jewel thief who's been dogging this FBI agent who's been following him for twenty-five years." The reason is simply because the FBI agent is hunting and following the jewel thief, AKA dogging like a hound dog would once it picks up somebody's scent, while the jewel thief is moving from place to place in an irregular course or new direction, AKA as dodging.) Sources say Mickey Rourke originally was offered the role of the thief, but apparently he wanted too much creative control over the project. That's when the film's producers thought about perhaps using a soap actor for the part. Hogestyn's name was dropped by Malibu merchant B.J. Zuma, who owns a surf shop where the actor regularly rents equipment. Lucky for Hogestyn, Zuma knew several people involved in PRY BAR and he told them he knew the perfect guy for them: local daytimer Drake Hogestyn. "I had lunch with the producers the other day," says Hogestyn. "They gave me a copy of the script, and I'm reading it over now. I'm pretty excited about the whole thing." Janet Di Lauro, SOAP OPERA WEEKLY, 6/22/93 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

♥ The Update Report Private Lives Making News Acting Is Safer: Former Major League baseball player Drake Hogestyn (John, DAYS OF OUR LIVES) still has what it takes on the ball field. "I guess I used to be kind of a crazy player," he reminisces. "What I lacked in ability, I made up for in other resourceful ways - in flair and tricks - and kept things kind of alive." Unfortunately, things got a little too lively at a recent celebrity game at Yankee Stadium. Hogestyn hit a home run - but things went down-hill quickly after that. The actor was in the dugout sharing Hoagies (which is also his baseball nickname) with some of his old teammates when he was called up to bat. "So I picked up a bat and on the first pitch drove it into left center field. I'm thinking triple all the way," he recalls. Unfortunately, as he rounded first, Hogestyn was concentrating so hard and moving so fast, he didn't realize that a fellow teammate was already on second base until it was almost too late to stop himself. In a frenzied effort to "stop-start," Hogestyn completely tore his hamstring muscle. "You could just hear it snap," he recalls painfully. "Donald Trump was on first base, and he said, 'What was that?!' because I went right up in the air and came down on my face!" As we went to press, Hogestyn was still nursing this serious injury, which has left a football size bruise on the back of his leg. The unsightly injury came at a time when he had to perform several steamy scenes with co-star Eileen Davidson (Kristen). "I had to go through a hurricane in a rowboat, dive out of the boat, find Kristen, carry her up on shore...give her mouth-to-mouth, and then carry her back into the cabin." Sounds like a little much even for an actor with two good legs! "I think I was walking without a discernible limp," Hogestyn proudly adds. SOAP OPERA UPDATE, 10/5/93 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

♥ Dressing Up For DAYS: Behind The Scenes At Bo's Costume Ball Romantic couples and colorful costumes turned Bo's (Robert Kelker-Kelly) birthday bash into one of the liveliest events Salem has ever seen! Richard Bloore, head of wardrobe, says it took about two weeks to provide the attire for the party. One extra wardrobe person was hired and the budget for the party was ten thousand. While most of the costumes were rented, a number of items, including Deborah Adair's (Kate) Bonnie costume, had to be custom made. "Fitting people in everyday clothes is fine, but doing something different, out of the ordinary, is what we love," Richard says. Judging from the sneak preview of these costumes, DAYS viewers will feel the same way... Picture Captions: Drake Hogestyn gets a ghoulish facial and hair touchup by DAYS stylists... Dracula (Drake Hogestyn, John): "I'm actually a very modern Dracula. I don't want to suck your blood!" Lorraine Zenka, SOAP OPERA WEEKLY, 11/9/93 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

♥ DAYS OF OUR LIVES Redd Foxx Slept Here Drake Hogestyn's (John) dressing room has a fascinating history. It was used by Jack Klugman during his starring run on QUINCY, M.E. and by Redd Foxx while he starred in the hit comedy SANFORD AND SON. "Klugman had the steam room installed," says Drake. "The hot steam helped soothe his throat and vocal chords. At first, I didn't realize what it was or how to use it. I eventually figured it out." In addition to the shower-steam room, the dressing room has a makeup area and second room. Drake's sofa, television, boom-box and a sizable weight training system fill the second room snugly. Not bad, even if like most dressing rooms, it has no windows. SOAP OPERA MAGAZINE, 11/16/93 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

♥ DAYS' Drake Hogestyn And John Black: A Study In Contrasts Handsome, single and wealthy, DAYS hero John Black is one of Salem's most eligible bachelors - in sharp contrast to the actor who portrays him, Drake Hogestyn, who's strictly a one-woman guy. Drake has been happily married close to nine years to his childhood sweetheart Victoria, and he doesn't envy his alter-ego's string of beautiful and willing women. "My situation is so totally different than most men's," Drake tells SOAP OPERA MAGAZINE. "I fell in love at a very early age. Victoria and I met when I was fifteen and she was twelve. It was love at first sight, and there is only one woman for me." Not that their love story was without interruption or obstacles. After high school, they were separated when Drake went off to college, then later played minor league professional baseball with a New York Yankees farm team. Meanwhile, Victoria married another man, but the marriage didn't last. "There were many painful moments because of the way my life was moving, and what I was trying to find," Drake recalls. "And there were restless hearts that couldn't wait. But I waited. I waited a long time, about nine years, for it to come around again. And as far as I'm concerned, Victoria and I have always been together. My life is complete. I'm glad I waited," he added quietly. "I've been very fortunate. I just wish people could experience even one day of what I live. I'm lucky and I know it." John Black's life is not so blessed. Although he's wooed a bevy of beauties, John hasn't been lucky in love. Isabella, a very special person in his life, bore him a son but later died of pancreatic cancer. Devastated, John turned to Marlena, but she was married to Roman. "John had to back away from Marlena," Drake points out. "To try to pursue that relationship would cause too many people hardship." Yet Marlena will always hold a precious spot in John's heart, because it was while he was with her that some of the blanks in his memories were filled in. "Marlena is the beginning of John's life as he knows it," Drake says. "She's the first pleasant emotion he remembers on his own. It's the start of his story and everything else is built upon that." John has also been romantically involved with Olivia, sister-in-law of the evil Orpheus; Yvette, the woman John moved out of town to protect; Diana, and Rebecca. "Frankly, Rebecca was convenient," Drake says. "She portrayed herself as a woman of the '90s with no attachments. That was attractive to John at the time. Even though that wasn't the way he usually deals with relationships, he was willing to try something new at that point." Despite all the women, Drake surprisingly maintains: "John doesn't like to go in and out of relationships. Considering his past, or lack of a past, you can understand John's need to connect with other people, to create intimacy in the here and now. That's very important to him." Now John is deeply involved with Kristen, but that romance may also be doomed. "John is always attracted to women who seem to have a mysterious persona, somewhat like himself. His past is filled with unknowns. So he's comfortable with these women's secret sides. John was intrigued by Kristen. He realized there was something going on that went beyond the iceberg façade," Drake says. "John is willing to take her on any terms because he's certain he can peel away the layers and find what's at her core." However, John was shocked to learn that Kristen is not only the adopted daughter of Stefano DiMera, the man who brainwashed John, but she's also engaged to Tony DiMera, the Phoenix's son. John's lost most of his memory of his previous life, except for some brief flashbacks. "But he remembers what Stefano put him through," says Drake. "And for that, he will never forgive Stefano. He hates him enough to be able to kill him and sleep like a baby that night." If he does kill Stefano, wouldn't that destroy Kristen's love for John? Is Kristen destined to become John's one true love, or just another link in his love chain? Those are the kinds of intriguing questions that fascinate viewers...and keep them tuning in to John's escapades on DAYS. Lorraine Zenka, SOAP OPERA MAGAZINE, 11/16/93 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Who's Wearing The Camel? Drake Hogestyn (John) and his wife Victoria enjoyed a costumed fan gathering in Connecticut. "The best-costume award went to a couple dressed as a camel," Drake says. "The funniest thing is that the crowd thought Victoria and I were in that outfit, and the couple who were inside played along! They deserved the award not only for the outfit but for their good acting." Did Drake wear a costume? "Only a rubbery mask that I took off soon after getting there. The fans want to see the real me." SOAP OPERA MAGAZINE, 11/30/93