GH: Tristan Rogers
Kirsten Donohoo
OK, I've been debating about emerging from lurker-dom, but I just had
to post this.
The following is taken, without permission, from the People Online
"Where are they now?" page:
[Look for the part where he says he doesn't rule out a return to GH!]
SCORPIO RISING
Tristan Rogers
It was a two-day role that lasted 11 years. Tristan
Rogers, who
played Robert Scorpio on "General Hospital," became so
popular
that Soap Opera Digest recently listed the actor as
irreplaceable if
the character were ever to be resurrected. Even
Elizabeth Taylor
doesn't have that distinction -- her role on "GH,"
that of Helena
Cassadine, is now being played by Constance Towers.
Rogers, a native of
Melbourne,
Australia, left the
soap opera by
choice in 1992. "It
was time," the
actor-writer, now
52, tells PEOPLE
Online. "I didn't
see there was
anywhere for the
character to go. I
had been talking
about doing it for
some time. Probably I would have left a year before if
Gloria
Monty hadn't returned as producer and said, 'Tristan,
I need you.'
I instantly regretted my decision."
The actor was part of the most famous story line in
soap history
-- the adventures of Luke and Laura (Tony Geary and
Genie
Francis). "That was when it was fun to do," he says.
"It was a
whole lot looser. The plots were stupid, but we were
having an
absolute blast doing it, and that's what sold it. It
was a rare
moment in time, and you'll never see it again -- a
producer
[Monty] with vision, good directors and writers who
could
interpret that vision onto paper. Then they handed it
to the actors,
who said let's change it all now. We were allowed to
-- and an
entertaining story popped out."
On a set that included Geary, Francis, Finnoula Hughes
and
Emma Samms (later of "Dynasty"), improv was a large
part of the
process, unlike today, Rogers says, where the actors
are "reined
in." The free-wheeling atmosphere almost caused a
problem when
Elizabeth Taylor joined the cast briefly in 1981. "I
was one of the
only people who had a one-on-one scene with her,"
Rogers
recalls. "I was warned, 'Tristan, do not ad lib.
Elizabeth has never
worked with a five-camera set-up. We got on the set,
and she
had cue cards. I was warned about that, too -- don't
change the
lines! I said, OK. I walked into her dressing room and
introduced
myself.
"As we talked, it became apparent to me that she knew
the script
probably better than I did. I said, 'Look, I've made a
couple of
changes here ...' She roared with laughter. She'd been
told the
whole set was a monster of improvisation. She said,
'Just do what
you do,' and we did it." Fans can still remember
Scorpio's
entrance into Helena's suite. Gazing at Taylor,
glamorous in her
trademark purple, he says, "I swear you do it with
mirrors."
Rogers left Australia in 1979 after working steadily
there as an
actor through the '70s. He carefully rid himself of
his heavy
Australian accent, only to find he needed it again in
the role of
ex-secret agent Scorpio. Today his accent doesn't
concern him,
as he concentrates on work behind the camera.
"After 'GH,' I started
looking for an idea and
trying to develop it. I got a
show off the ground called
'Fast Track' for Showtime
in 1997. We moved to
Canada for nine months
and produced episodes. I
had a part in it as well, that
of Harry the bartender. It's
all about motor racing,
which I still do. The show
was my basic concept. I
didn't get a producer's
credit, but I had a credit as
technical consultant. I've
now gotten involved more
with writing, and I'll have something else going, I
think, before
Christmas."
Rogers lives in Los Angeles with his second wife,
Teresa, and
their two children, a girl born in 1992 and a son born
in 1996.
The couple's daughter was the flower girl at their
1995 wedding.
"We did the whole thing backwards," he admits. He was
married
from 1974 to 1984 to Barbara Meale.
Will Robert Scorpio return to "General Hospital?" He
was, after
all, blown up on a boat, and his body was never
recovered -- a
sure sign the producers wanted to leave the door open.
The actor
doesn't rule it out but says it will never be like the
old days. "Tony
Geary and I were like perennial clowns," he says.
Recalling a
shoot in San Antonio: "We couldn't film in a cemetery,
so we
used the yard of a guy who made headstones. He let us
use the
house as a dressing room and gave us a bottle of
tequila. In the
center of the coffee table was a pewter urn which
someone said
contained the ashes of his wife. So we didn't sit near
it.
"Then someone came in from outside and said, 'That urn
on the
table -- unscrew the top and invert it and it becomes
a flower
vase.' It didn't have ashes in it at all. When Tony
came in, I
poured a shotglass of tequila into it. He started
screaming at me,
'You sacriligeous bastard, it's his wife's ashes.'
Everyone else was
in on the joke and laughing so hard we had tears
running down
our faces. I forgot I was still miked, so everyone on
the street
heard the whole thing. There was a scene being filmed
elsewhere,
and the sound guys laughed so hard they wrecked the
scene."
Coming back to "GH," claims Rogers, is not up to him
but up to
the "corporate world of the network." But if he does
ever return,
it will just be a job. "Daytime TV is all about
entertainment. We
seem to have gotten away from that in the last five or
six years.
We were about adventure and romance. Now it's all
about -- I
don't know what it's all about. Social issues, I
guess. I don't
watch it."
-- MARIA CIACCIA (pronounced "cha cha")
PHOTO: Tristan Rogers then (ABC), Tristan Rogers
now
(courtesy Tristan Rogers)
Kirsten "Maybe if we wish really hard" Donohoo
don...@ils.unc.edu
snj
don...@ils.unc.edu (Kirsten Donohoo) wrote:
>OK, I've been debating about emerging from lurker-dom, but I just had
>to post this.
>The following is taken, without permission, from the People Online
>"Where are they now?" page:
(great interview......some snipping......hated to do it)
> "That was when it was fun to do," he says.
>"It was a whole lot looser. The plots were stupid, but we were
>having an absolute blast doing it, and that's what sold it. It
>was a rare moment in time, and you'll never see it again --
That was so true. It really was great to watch GH back then. You
knew they were ad libbing and it made it so much fun! Not that there
haven't been terrific days since then, but the light hearted banter is
gone for the most part. The actors don't seem to be enjoying
themselves, and it's a shame (IMO).
Jane