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Understanding Lago's Emmy Speech

Question: Last night, you said just being nominated was ironic. What’s it like to actually win in this situation?


David Lago: Ironic. The same. I can’t even begin to tell you. You know what, I have a really big family, and we’re lucky if we get to see each other once a year for the last 15 or 16 years. If anything, the Emmys will always be something that was able to reunite us at least one time a year. I have, not everybody, but I have 23, 25 people here with me. And it’s a joke because every time I call YOUNG AND THE RESTLESS, I’m like, “Hey, I’m calling to get my tickets,” they’re like, “Oh, great.” [I’m like] “What section do you have to reserve, because I have 400 Cubans here with me!” So, I don’t know, I don’t know if that even answers your question. You gotta understand, I’m crazy nervous right now.


Question: Your speech — what was that all about?


Lago: I’m a huge Christopher Walken fan, and I’m not a very good speechwriter. When I saw that movie years ago, I was like, “You know what, I should do it. That’s the perfect speech.”


Question: Was that from Pulp Fiction?


Lago: No, that’s from Catch Me If You Can. I’ve always kind of had a backup, in case I chickened out, like, “I’d like to thank so and so.” But I know if I went to that speech, I would for sure forget a lot of people. Ironically, that speech makes more sense to me this year than any year of being nominated because I haven’t been on the show for seven or eight months, so that speech just means a lot more this year, and I think that was the way it was supposed to be and this is the year that I was supposed to use it. I had no backup speech, and I had plenty of friends of mine watching going, “If you don’t do that speech, don’t even come home.” It worked out I guess.


Question: Had you stayed in touch with any of your Y&R friends since you’d left?


Lago: Oh yeah, all of them. Every single one of them. Thad [Luckinbill] and I, who plays J.T., we continued to be best friends. Greg [Rikaart], who plays Kevin, and Mike Graziadei (Daniel), who plays — Oh jeez, I don’t even want to go through a list. All of them. We keep in touch. I still go back there and say, “Hello,” and spend time with everybody. It’s one big family, which I was extremely grateful to be a part of.


Question: Are you working on any projects right now? Considering going back to Y&R?


Lago: You know, I finished two independent films. One called A Couple of Days and Nights. One was a short film called Artistic License, which they’re going to be taking to the L.A. film festival in June or July. I’m in a band right now, which I have been mostly paying a lot of attention to. Ever since I got off the show, auditioning has been pretty slow, so I’ve just been spending a lot of time on the band. We finished our demo, we’re going to Canada next week. We have three radio spots that we’re doing. I’m trying to become a rock star so I can make money or produce my own projects because this auditioning crap, I’m telling you right now, I’m sorry. This auditioning thing is not working out, so I’m think I’m just going to produce my own projects, but I need money so I think I’m going to go the rock star route first.


Question: This is kind of a bittersweet thing. I thought you were awesome on YOUNG AND THE RESTLESS, and I didn’t understand why your character was suddenly being written off. Tell us what the actual story was. You totally called out on stage that you were fired. Why did they fire you? Obviously, that was a bad decision. So why?


Lago: There’s a lot of things that…see I can’t give you a straight answer. Honestly, if I knew the answer, bro, I would give you an honest answer, but I don’t know the real answer and I probably will never know the real answer. It’s just the weird thing that it is. I was told many different reasons. I don’t know why. I honestly would tell you. It might have been the budget, it might have been the storyline, it might have just been whatever. Ultimately, it was supposed to happen when it was supposed to happen, a year before my contract was over. You know, I never talked to the press about it. Everybody wanted to know, “Are you leaving? Or were you fired?” Everybody wanted to know, and I didn’t talk, not because I was mad or anything, just because I was still trying to figure it out myself, you know. I never gave a straight answer, so I went ahead and I used today as the time to let everybody know I was let go.

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