After years of playing a gamut of wild and wonderful characters on DAYS — the quirky, obsessive Nick, a Halloween zombie, and, most recently, the gatekeeper to hell — Blake Berris is tackling something new and different: a bona fide leading man. And he’s finally ready to embrace it.
“I’ve sort of been fighting that my whole life,” admits Berris. “From an early age, I’ve played so many different things. I played the drug addict for years. I was on BREAKING BAD, and I did this movie called Meth Head and a couple other things. In my heart, I think I’m more of a character actor. My dad is always like, ‘You’re more of a leading man.’ And I’m like, ‘No. I’m not. I like shape-shifting.’ So it’s been fun to lean into a more romantic side [of a character] and take on the responsibility of keeping the audience on Everett’s side. I really don’t want to lose that.”
Berris doesn’t feel pressured by the task. He’s simply geared up for a “new challenge. When I was on the show before as Nick, I approached it very much from what was interesting to me,” he explains. “There was some rebellious part of me that was maybe fighting the genre a bit and wanting to do something my own way, and I was younger. This time around my challenge has been how to embrace the genre of daytime and soap opera … I’m trying to lean in rather than fight it.”
Everett, the new editor-in-chief of The Spectator, presents the perfect opportunity. “He’s such a brilliant character, and the storyline is so good,” raves the actor. “Everett has such a warm, beautiful heart. There’s some real goodness in him. He’s [in Salem] to win back Stephanie, the love of his life. I’m so excited for people to see it.”
It’s a far cry from his previous DAYS alter ego. “Nick was such an amazing character,” reflects Berris. “But I’m glad they sort of wiped the slate clean. There were so many incarnations of Nick, but the homophobia stuff and some of [the other things] he did became a little hard to redeem. It was becoming a difficult job, and I was all over the place. And there were so many different writers who took their crack at him. I’m really glad to have a whole new character with Everett.”
JPI
He had his first conversation about the possibility with then-Co-Executive Producer Albert Alarr after he appeared in the Peacock special A VERY SALEM CHRISTMAS in 2021. “It felt like something was coming,” he recalls. “Albert said something like, ‘Don’t wait by the phone, but expect a call.’ I never heard anything. Then the quick, little heaven thing came about. While I was there, I got to the point where I was thinking [returning for a lengthier stint] would be fun.
“In a lot of ways I’d sort of moved away from acting,” Berris continues. “I started doing a lot more writing and producing. I was about to make a feature that I was going to direct in August. Then the writers’ strike kind of complicated that. It hit me that it would really be great to be back in the daytime world, and I’d been having such a good time every time I went to DAYS. It felt like home.”
Once the idea entered his head, Berris “went on a full-force campaign” to return to the soap. “I talked to Deidre [Hall, Marlena] about it. I scheduled another meeting with Albert. I pitched three different storylines that Nick could conceivably have in order to make his way back to earth, because I’m a writer, too,” delivers Berris with a laugh. “I think the way Albert put it to me was, ‘Everyone here is really on board, but, at the end of the day, Ron [Carlivati, head writer] needs to write it.’ ”
Having never met the top scribe and not having any kind of relationship with him, “I had to go through envoys,” says Berris. “Deidre Hall was really wonderful. She was like, ‘We’ve got to get you back on the show.’ She was texting Ron. There was this whole sort of campaign, and I embraced it. I was just like, ‘I’m going to go hard. I don’t really care where the chips fall. I’m going to make it clear to people that I’m [eager] to come back.’ ”
Berris didn’t hear anything for a while. “So I forgot about it. I was really focused on making my movie last year,” he notes. “Then I was leaving the grocery store one day and got a call from Marnie [Saitta, DAYS casting director]. This was in March or April. She said, ‘It’s a 13-week thing.’ I started the end of April. I’m still there, so it’s longer than that.”
Which suits Berris just fine. As for the most fun part about his return, he cites “being older and being able to appreciate the work in this format as an adult, as a man with three kids. When you’re younger, you have all these ideas about what you want to do and how it’s going to be. Back when I was on the show before, I always viewed it as cutting my teeth in a way. I’m really embracing it as my life right now. I love the high-pressure [aspect] of the job. It is so hard-core that you have to memorize so much material and just be ready to do it in one take. I feel like I’ve grown a lot as an actor. I know the format so well, and my confidence has grown. As hard as the job is, it’s a lot easier than taking care of three kids and working from home. It’s been sort of a dream come true. It’s great being able to have the job, such an incredible storyline and character, and such great people to work with. Being able to appreciate it and not take it for granted has been really wonderful.”
