Robin Strasser
Though we always regarded it as hyperbole when the residents of Llanview called One Life to Live’s Dorian Lord a witch, it does appear that her enchanting portrayer knows the spell for remaining forever stunning. Hmm…
One Life to Live Goes On: Then and Now Photos of the ABC Soap’s Cast
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Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Jill Johnson/JPI -
Roger Howarth
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, ABC Hair today, gone tomorrow. It’s a cleaner-cut but no less handsome version of the Emmy winner who played Todd Manning that later brought to life Austin Gatlin-Holt, the ill-fated most recent addition to the Quartermaine family on General Hospital.
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Kristen Alderson
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Jill Johnson/JPI Bing Crosby’s “You Must Have Been a Beautiful Baby” might as well have been written for Starr Manning’s real-life alter ego, who landed her pivotal part when she was just 6 years old and played it from 1998-2015 (along the way crossing over to General Hospital, where she eventually originated the role of Kiki Jerome).
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Jessica Tuck and Joe Lando
Image Credit: Emiley Sweich/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Dee Cercone/Courtesy of the Everett Collection Megan Gordon and Jake Harrison’s love outlived… well, sadly, Megan. But at least the actors who made us swoon during the supercouple’s doomed early-’90s romance are still looking as vivacious as ever. Where are their Dorian Gray portraits, anyway?
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Hillary B. Smith
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Jill Johnson/JPI The saying is “older and wiser,” but we’ll be damned if the actress who gave Nora Buchanan her quick wit and radiant smile isn’t turning the phrase so far that it’s become “older and lovelier.” We should all be so lucky as to age this gorgeously.
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Robert S. Woods
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, John Paschal/JPI No matter the decade in which the photo was taken, Bo Buchanan’s portrayer still has that trademark twinkle in his eye. And admit it — it’s hard, isn’t it, to look at these pictures of his infectious smile and resist the urge to crack one of your own!
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Tonja Walker
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Jill Johnson/JPI “Mad about you” took on a whole new meaning when the onetime Miss Maryland USA took federal agent Alex Olanov right off the rails in her pursuit of her estranged beau. Er, Bo. Well, both, technically. Bo was the beau, you’ll recall, over whom the future Mob moll lost her marbles.
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Thorsten Kaye and Susan Haskell
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Denis Guignebourg/JPI After playing poet Patrick Thornhart, the soap-hopper went on to appear on Port Charles, All My Children and now The Bold and the Beautiful (as Ridge Forrester). But he remains true to the real-life leading lady whom he met when he was tapped as a love interest for her Marty Saybrooke.
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Erin Torpey
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Evans Ward/JPI Just 8 years old when she joined the cast of One Life to Live, the charismatic child star grew up before our eyes — and along the way blossomed into a striking young woman — as Clint and Viki Buchanan’s headstrong daughter, Jessica.
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Nathan Purdee
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Jill Johnson/JPI Mustache or no mustache, the soap vet who played Hank “The Cannon” Gannon still carries himself with a gravitas that turns heads when he enters a room. Probably when he leaves a room, too, but we haven’t checked that to be sure.
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Renee Elise Goldsberry and David Fumero
Image Credit: Jill Johnson/JPI, ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Priscilla Grant/Courtesy of the Everett Collection They made the cutest of couples as One Life to Live’s Evangeline Williamson and Cristian Vega — but only on screen. Behind the scenes, the hunk wasn’t falling for the Hamilton Tony winner and Girls5eva scene stealer but a certain other co-star…
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Melissa Fumero
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Priscilla Grant/Courtesy of the Everett Collection Adriana Cramer’s portrayer — Melissa Gallo prior to her marriage — probably wouldn’t have looked so pouty way back when if she’d known that she was going to end up raising a family with her hunky co-star and headlining a hit primetime sitcom (Brooklyn Nine-Nine).
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James DePaiva
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Jill Johnson/JPI Yeah, go ahead and put on your glasses. All you’re going to discover is that the actor who made Max Holden such an irresistible devil is as attractive now as he was when he made his daytime debut. And as an added bonus, that mullet-adjacent hairdo is a thing of the past. Mind you, the way that time has stopped for him is nothing compared to the way that it has for his better half…
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Kassie DePaiva
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Jill Johnson/JPI We wouldn’t lie to you. These pictures of the soap vet who replaced Mia Korf as impetuous Blair Cramer were taken decades apart, not mere minutes. It just so happens that the actress, more recently Eve Donovan on Days of Our Lives, only grows more beautiful as time goes by.
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Sherri Saum and Kamar de los Reyes
Image Credit: ABC, Jill Johnson/JPI Keri Reynolds and Antonio Vega may not have had the kind of relationship that stands the test of time, but their portrayers sure did. The former Llanview denizens and primetime mainstays were married from 2007 until de los Reyes’ passing in December 2023.
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Judith Light
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Howard Wise/JPI The Hollywood legend has received enough accolades to throw her own award show. But to those of us who were glued to One Life to Live in the heyday of Love in the Afternoon, she’ll always be most vividly remembered as Karen Wolek, the respectable married lady whose courtroom confession that she’d turned tricks won her portrayer a Daytime Emmy.
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Nathan Fillion
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, ABC Somewhere between his big break as teenage dream Joey Buchanan and his primetime successes on Castle and The Rookie, the rising star went from boy-next-door adorable to leading-man handsome. Kinda makes you wonder how dashing he’s going to go on to get, doesn’t it? The mind boggles!
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Gina Tognoni
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Howard Wise/JPI Though Dorian’s niece Kelly Cramer was initially a wild-maned pot-stirrer, her look calmed down considerably once the powers that be realized that the future Emmy winner playing her didn’t need gimmicks to hold anyone’s attention. By the time The Young and the Restless tapped her as its Phyllis Summers recast, everyone knew that Tognoni could focus eyeballs with nothing more than a pointed gaze.
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Christopher L. McKenna
Image Credit: Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images, Getty Images Kids — they grow up so… hot? Wow. The moppet who played an adolescent Joey Buchanan from 1990-93 — and was central to the soap’s Billy Douglas storyline focused on Ryan Phillippe’s gay teen — morphed into a hubba-hubba hunk. These days, the alum of The Young and the Restless (as Mark Harding) appears mostly in movies like King of the Ants and its sequel, Suitable Flesh.
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Andrea Evans
Image Credit: George De Sota/JPI, ABC She’s come a long way from the youngster that One Life to Live chose back in 1978 to play Victoria Lord’s eventual half sister (and frequent headache), Tina Clayton. Yet Evans is to this day such an effervescent presence on screen that even champagne looks upon her with envy. Oh, and don’t freak because Viki’s included here, too. As if we wouldn’t give an individual slide to…
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Erika Slezak
Image Credit: ABC/Courtesy of the Everett Collection, Jill Johnson/JPI When we think of One Life to Live, let’s be real, it’s the six-time Emmy winner’s alter ego — or should we say alter egos? — who lived that life. And somehow, even all these eons later, Slezak carries herself with a poise that almost demands she be given a whole other award for admirable presence. If not #lifegoals, certainly #OneLifeGoals.
