Exclusive: Kristian Alfonso On Her DAYS Return And Hope’s Heartbreaking Loss

Days of Our Lives superstar Kristian Alfonso makes what she calls a “very bittersweet” return to Salem this week. The actress, who last aired in April 2023, will be back on the canvas as part of the emotional farewell to Doug Williams, Hope’s father, played by the late Bill Hayes. Hayes passed away in January at the age of 98.

Looking Back

Alfonso, who was only 19 years old when she assumed the role of Hope back in 1983, was hard-hit by Hayes’s passing. “I remember exactly where I was when I got the call,” she says. “I was in the car and I was on my way home and it was raining and I found myself not being able to make my way home…. I was just driving around because I couldn’t believe it.”

As the show began to make its plans for an on-screen sendoff for the beloved actor and his Salem alter ego, Alfonso was one of the first alumni they reached out to. “DAYS approached me very early on [about returning for the arc of Doug’s death] and of course, my answer was yes,” the actress recalls. “I knew how difficult it would be, but I was very happy and elated that they reached out to me to include me since I was no longer on the show. They didn’t need to; they could have said [in scripts], ‘Oh, Hope is somewhere else.’ So I really very much appreciate that.”

Lean On Me: The actress opposite Bill Hayes as Hope and Doug in 2019.

Alfonso’s in-person reunion at the studio with Susan Seaforth Hayes (Julie), Hayes’s DAYS leading lady and real-life widow, was an emotional one. “I had spoken to her before, obviously, when everything had taken place,” she notes. “But when Susan and I saw each other, we just kind of fell into each other’s arms.” The actress has great admiration for her friend and on-screen stepmother, saying, “Susan is a true, beautiful warrior. She really and truly is, to live this loss off camera and then come to work and have to live it again on camera.” Hayes’s performance, she declares, “is a beautiful legacy and tribute to her incredible, amazing, loving husband.”

Daddy’s Girl

Due to a scheduling issue between Alfonso and DAYS, there is a brief delay in Hope’s arrival in Salem after getting the devastating news of her father’s death. “By the time Hope makes it to Salem, some time has passed; she’s trying to get there, and there’s been a lot of conversations [with her loved ones back home],” Alfonso previews.

As fans know, Hope has been steadfastly at the side of her comatose true love, Bo, since he was shot last year by the couple’s son, Shawn, the result of a horrible misunderstanding — and she commends the show’s writers with how how they explained the delay in Hope’s arrival. Explains Alfonso, “They were trying to figure out how to do that, because Hope would never leave [Bo’s] side, yet Hope would never not say good-bye to her father [Alfonso’s voice cracks]. I’m getting choked up because she called Doug ‘Daddy,’ always, which is what I called my dad, so there’s that very close connection that always made [Doug and Hope’s relationship] feel real for me. So they did figure that out, and Hope does find out on camera … and then something takes place that Hope can’t immediately head to Salem.”

When Hope does arrive in her hometown, “I decided that I wanted Hope to be strong for Julie when they saw each other,” Alfonso shares. “Julie is just powering through,” putting on a stoic front, “and Hope, of course, doesn’t want to be falling apart, crying, because Julie’s [not]. She’s like, ‘Okay, I’m going to meet you there, where you are emotionally.’ You know, we all cover up our pain sometimes until you are alone, and then you crumble.”

Alfonso with Bill Hayes’s widow, Susan Seaforth Hayes (Julie), on the DAYS set in April, when the aftermath of Doug’s death was filmed.

In addition to her scenes opposite Seaforth Hayes, Alfonso will share scenes with other Salem-ites with important ties to Hope, including Jennifer, who will once again be played by Melissa Reeves. “I was so happy that Missy was going to be included,” Alfonso smiles. “I was thrilled. That’s what I loved about returning and the scenes I had, is that history. I’ve always been about the history — continuity and history. Jennifer and Hope are best friends. They’re cousins, but they’re also sisters and best friends, and in times [of loss] they really need to hold each other up. They’ve always been there for each other — through the good, the bad and the ugly.”

Continues the actress, “Hope runs across so many people who will be in those episodes, of course,” including her children, Brandon Beemer’s Shawn and Victoria Konefal’s Ciara, “and I got to work with Josh Taylor [Roman] and Mary Beth Evans [Kayla]. And then,” Alfonso hints, “there is a new character that makes Hope’s back immediately go up and she is not very trusting of.”

Together Again

Hope’s relationship with her son remains strong despite the tragic shooting of Bo, Alfonso assures. “Hope knows it was an accident, that Shawn thought he was saving his mother and didn’t know what was really happening. All he saw was that there was a gun trained on his mother and he was doing what he thought he needed to do. So Hope has no ill will toward her son at all and she is trying to help him, I would think, alleviate some of that guilt and that heaviness that [he] carries every single day because his father is still in a coma.”

Behind the scenes, Alfonso’s reunions with her co-stars were, she notes, “very bittersweet. It’s always lovely to see everyone, but the circumstances were extremely sad. So sad, because it was so real” to be saying good-bye to Doug, and by extension, Hayes. “He was such a huge part of the show.”

Still, the dynamic between her and the other actors “just picked up right where we left off,” she says. “I mean, I was there for 27 years!” Even with so much DAYS experience under her belt, she admits, “I’m always nervous when first coming back. It’s just who I am. But being there for a brief amount of time, everyone’s knocking on your door and you’re seeing everybody — Mary Beth and Eric [Martsolf, Brady] and Lauren Koslow [Kate] and Stephen [Nichols, Steve], and Susan, of course.”

While it meant the world to Alfonso to participate in the loving tribute DAYS pays to Hayes, she still harbors some sadness over the fact that she didn’t get to share a special set of scenes with the actor during her return to the show last year. “When I was back last time, Hope did not make it back to Salem,” she reminds. “She was still in a very faraway land, somewhere in Europe with fabulous clothes. The story that was going to be told was that Hope would return to Salem, Bo and Hope would return to Salem to reunite — even after the shooting, he would be fine, and all these good things were going to happen and we would reunite with our families.”

Ultimately, that story was scrapped and Alfonso and Peter Reckell’s (Bo) comeback ended with Bo still in a coma. “I will never get over that I didn’t get the opportunity [to play that] because I would have had scenes with Bill and Susan together as a family. So that, I am very sad about. The whole story idea was great and I was looking forward to it. But anyway, things changed and were out of our control. But that would have been joyful and super-fun to shoot.”

As for whether there will be an update offered on Bo’s condition, Alfonso winks, “Possibly — with an exclamation point and a question mark!”

End Of An Era: Hope is devastated when she gets word of her father’s passing.