Constance Towers is good-natured about her bad-to-the-bone character
"The other day when we were on the docks, I was trying to walk away and Nancy Lee Grahn (Alexis) just wouldn’t let me go. I didn’t expect that. So my only course was to push her over… but there was no water and no mattress to catch her." And so is the playfully mischievous life of Constance Towers (Helena), whose spontaneously funny yet always class act persona is light years away from her evil, maniacal alter ego Helena Cassadine.
Me Vs. Her
Towers knows that the contradiction of her real personality with that of Helena’s can be startling to some. Although she would never dream of putting on her "Helena" face to get a better table at a restaurant, it certainly has gotten her a better hotel room. "My grand nephew was getting married and my plane was late. I arrived at this little hotel outside of Chicago. I had fifteen minutes to get dressed for the wedding. I just stood there. The girl was eating her lunch and she wouldn’t come to the desk. I finally rang the bell and said, ‘Maybe you could stop eating just long enough to give me my room?’ She was indifferent. Suddenly the girl with her whispered in her ear. I think she said, ‘It’s Helena Cassadine.’ The girl’s demeanor changed immediately. She came out, tried to find the room and she was very nervous. I thought, I think this is one time not to say, ‘Look, I’m not as mean as you think I am.’"
Alexis Vs. Helena
"It would be interesting if you and I started vying for Jax’s attention," Towers joked with Grahn to the whoops and hollers of agreeing nearby fans. "Would you like for Helena to have a love story? Jax is back and I’m sure I’m going to go passionately after him… but it will not be fulfilled. They don’t really feel that there should ever be a fuller exploration of Helena’s life. It’s only about the angst between Stefan and Helena, and now Stavros, about playing the part of the mother in a relationship with a man."
Good Vs. Evil
Thinking past the obvious one-dimensional soap opera sketch of an amoral, millionaire, "royal" on a quest for world power, Towers reaches for the possibilities of where Helena could go without painting herself into the corner so many daytime villainouses have feared to tread. "I do think that one redeeming thing for Helena is if she suddenly realizes at some point that it’s not Stefan who has been her enemy, but that her enemy is Stavros. She might even realize that the little girl that she banished to the kitchen, Alexis, is somebody who is smart enough to help her. She was never going to admit it to Alexis, but what if Helena had a situation where she really needed brilliant legal work and that the only person who could do it was Alexis? And what if Alexis did it for her?"
Squelching fears that have spread the Internet that the Cassadine/Spencer showdown would lead to her character’s death, Towers says with a knowing gleam in her eye, "Half the drama is about the bad guy threatening Luke. Tony Geary (Luke) said the other day to me, ‘What would I do, who would I have [if Helena was killed?]’ I rather appreciated him saying that!" — Rosemary Rossi
Constance Towers
