Exclusive: Patrika Darbo Dishes About Her ‘Short But Sweet’ Return to DAYS
Patrika Darbo (l.) and AlexAnn Hopkins
Nancy Miller arrives in Salem for a quick visit on Tuesday, October 22 with her daughter Joy (AlexAnn Hopkins), who’s suddenly all grown up and quite the handful. It marks Patrika Darbo’s first time back on Days of our Lives since 2022, when Nancy discovered her longtime husband, Craig, is gay.
Joy To The World
“I’m back to introduce Joy,” explains Darbo, who remembers her last interaction with the character, who was born on screen in March 2003. “I carried her in — it was a little under-five girl — at Chloe’s wedding to Brady; the first Brady [Kyle Lowder]. We had not talked about her anymore [until 2022], when we referred to her being in grad school. Then all of a sudden the show called and said, ‘We’d like you to come back,” I’m reading the script and it said Joy. I went, ‘Oh, this is nice.’ And, of course, it was basically the story where she hates me.”
Darbo describes Nancy’s relationship with her younger daughter, who’s in town to audition for Body and Soul, as “contentious. Joy still thinks that Craig and Nancy only had her to save Chloe and that Chloe is the favorite daughter,” she notes, referring to Joy being conceived with the hope that she could be a bone marrow donor for her ailing sister. “Nancy’s whole thing is like, ‘Oh my God, honey. How many times do we have to tell you that we love you equally? We were blessed to have you and that you saved your sister, but you’re just as important in our life. ’”
Behind the scenes, Darbo found interacting with Hopkins to be a delightful experience. “She was darling, and she looked a lot like Nadia [Bjorlin, ex-Chloe]. She’s a wonderful little actress,” raves Darbo, who notes that they had little time to really bond. “We really didn’t get a lot of visiting time. We just had those little scenes where we were arguing back and forth, but it’s sometimes much easier when you don’t know the person to have the contentiousness.”
Although her run in Salem is brief, Darbo, as always, was happy to return. “They called my agent and asked me to come back,” she says. “I was available at the time. So I said, ‘okay,’ sat down and started memorizing my lines. DAYS has been a big part of my life theatrically. I’ve got fans that I’ve had over 30-something years now; some who have become practically family. So I mean, if DAYS called, I’d go again. If I’m available, I’m there in a heartbeat.”
What makes the job all the more inviting is that the DAYS studio is close to Darbo’s home. “That’s the best part, although I can’t quite get my 10,000 steps in,” she delivers with a laugh. “I just walk a few blocks and I’m there.”
In the past, she’s even hopped on her bike and peddled over to the studio. “I did that a couple of times,” Darbo reports. “One of my fondest memories is Kristian [Alfonso, ex-Hope] putting my bike helmet on properly. She said, ‘No. You’ve got to do this and pull that down.’ She was buttoning me up to ride my bicycle home.”
Alfonso is among many of Darbo’s former co-stars that she’s remained in touch with over the years. “I see Eric [Martsolf, Brady]. I just did a weekend event with Greg Vaughan [Eric] raising money for Camp Dream in Georgia. And Kristian and I talk all the time,” Darbo rattles off. “We tweet back and forth, have lunch together, stuff like that… And we run into each other at different places. I haven’t seen much of Nadia since she moved to North Carolina, but she’s coming out here to do a fan event on November 1st, which I’m also doing with her and Emily [O’Brien, ex-Gwen/ex-Theresa] and Stacy [Haiduk, Kristen] and a couple other people. I keep in touch with people as much as I can. Everybody’s got a busy life, but there’s a bond there, because we’re still family in some aspect of it.”
Reconnecting with that family at the actual DAYS studio is always special for Darbo. “My visit is short but sweet,” she sums up. “But it was nice seeing everyone again. Anytime I see the cast it’s a great thing. Of course, some people were gone, and it’s kind of like a whole new generation came up. I was going, ‘Who the hell do you belong to?’ There’s so many kids, and sometimes they belong to somebody that I’ve never worked with before. It’s always fun to see my hair and makeup people too, and that’s where you can get the scoop on everything all the time.”
Bundle Of Joy: Nancy and Craig (Kevin Spirtas) cuddled with their new addition, who’s now all grown up, back in 2003.
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