Lucky Lady
PORT CHARLES’ Elizabeth has sexy men falling at her feet and everlasting life to enjoy them. Good fortune isn’t exclusive to the femme fatale — her portrayer, Elizabeth Staab, is feeling it, too! "I’m happier now on this show than I was before because I do like this challenge, this [fast] pace, and I love this character," she enthuses. "I like that I get to flesh her out, add new dimensions, and trip and fall with her!"
Having tied an eternal knot with sexy, fang-bearing rock star Stephen, Elizabeth thought she’d sealed her fate. "Elizabeth loves him, and she has that constant inability to leave him because she’s also connected to him — which is what makes it scarier," Staab observes. "She melts and loses all logic when she’s around him because he’s got that blood supply that she needs." Yet Ian’s negative reaction to the "gift" of being bitten made the vampire bride see things in a new light. "When Elizabeth’s with Ian, that’s the closest she comes to setting herself free. She’s never had somebody with that kind of strength and his kind of logic; she usually grounds herself with men who aren’t grounded at all!" Staab explains.
Next In Line
Yet it’s when she’s away from Stephen’s influence that Elizabeth comes to her senses. Will she prove strong enough to face the newest challenge on her plate — crossing paths with power-hungry Joshua? It’s a storyline Staab can’t wait for viewers to see. "It’s so clever and so witty; we had great fun shooting it," Staab enthuses. "These two characters are [both] so extreme and so used to winning. From the first scene we have alone together, we just clicked!"
In fact, she confides, their unrehearsed, film noir-style repartée even took PC’s crew so by surprise that they burst out in applause after the taping. "It was magic!" she marvels.
Good For Giggles
It looks like soon Nolan North’s Chris won’t be the only provider of comic relief on the canvas — Staab’s got a few tricks up her sleeve for Elizabeth, and PC’s letting her use them. "The best comedy I do is really wicked dry humor like I did on UPN’s LIVE SHOT, which was a newsroom drama," she reveals. That said, the opportunity to play it opposite the likes of talented daytime veteran Ian Buchanan (Joshua) turned out to be more than the actress could hope for. "He’s pretty goofy," she confides. "He appears so suave, but he’s just got to be the funniest person — you can’t rehearse a scene straight with him."
All in all, returning to daytime 15 years after she left the role of GUIDING LIGHT’s tortured teen, Jessie Matthews, has turned out to be a great decision. "The longer I’m here, the more interaction I have with other characters and the more storylines I get woven into," she marvels. "I’m still happy, I still love it, and [as Elizabeth] I’m still causing trouble — or at least getting in and out of it!" — Kelli M. Larson
Rebecca Staab
