Howard Wise/jpistudios.com
Final Answer: Ridge (Thorsten Kaye) grapples with the fateful decision he must make about his father.
Ridge faces the toughest the toughest decision of his life after Eric collapses and is rushed to the hospital, where he is placed on life support.
“When you have anyone that you love, you know that one day, they will not be there anymore,” begins Thorsten Kaye (Ridge). “We will all go at some point, and when you allow yourself to fall in love with somebody, you know that it won’t last forever. You know that someone is going to go first and that it’s going to be hard. But you don’t think about it until they collapse right in front of you.”
At the hospital, Ridge, along with Donna and a wide range of other loved ones who adore Eric, are understandably anguished at the prospect of losing the Forrester patriarch. And with machines keeping Eric alive, it falls to Ridge to make the fateful choice about whether or not to pull the plug. Explains Kaye, “Ridge has Eric’s medical power of attorney. So, he is the one who has to decide. There is a voice-over where you find out that Eric said to Ridge, ‘If things go south, you’ve got to let me go. You have to pull the plug when you think it’s over [for me].’ ” Ridge reveals this to Eric’s loved ones, arguing that the right thing to do would be to honor his father’s wishes, as much heartbreak as his death would cause them.
He is met with major resistance. “The two camps are basically Ridge, and then everyone else on the other side,” according to Kaye. “Donna, Bridget, Brooke, Steffy — they’re all on other side. They are all saying, ‘No, you can’t! You can’t let him die! We have to do whatever we can.’ And Ridge is saying, ‘No! He doesn’t want that!’ ”
But the opposing side’s arguments do make an impact on Ridge, who struggles to come to a final decision. Sighs Kaye, “Ridge wants to do what his father asked him to do — not to revive him, not to do anything out of the ordinary, ‘If it’s time to go, it’s time to go.’ But it’s hard, because everyone is against [the idea], and they’re crying and they’re upset…. It’s a real dilemma. He truly believes that this [being taken off life support] is what his father wants. But it’s a tough thing to let someone go, especially when there’s a slight chance that [he could recover]. Talk about playing God! That’s what this is. Ridge has to be the one to decide if it’s over for his dad, and that’s a big responsibility.”
