J. Eddie Peck Says Goodbye to Young and Restless And Cole: ‘Emotionally, It Was Hard for Me’ (EXCL)

When Cole Howard first fell ill with a serious cough on Young and Restless, viewers immediately began to assume the worst about the character’s future on the soap. But portrayer J. Eddie Peck admits to Soap Opera Digest that when his storyline took that particular turn, he wasn’t thinking along the same lines as his fans. “I wasn’t worried,” he says. “I wasn’t worried at all. I thought, ‘Ah, now this is a way in which they’re going to use Cole’s cough, and his illness is going to take a turn. He’s going to be living in the tack house, and Victoria’s likely going to nurse him back to health, and this is a way in which they’re going to accelerate their relationship quickly and deepen it quickly.’ ”

Last Hurrah

It wasn’t until about a week before shooting his final episode that Peck learned the fans who predicted that Cole was headed to the great big daytime graveyard in the sky were spot-on, as he was informed that Cole was on his deathbed and didn’t have long to live. “Lo and behold, the fans and everyone were much smarter than me,” the actor says with a rueful chuckle. “Maybe it was just my positive thinking.”

It was Head Writer/Executive Producer Josh Griffith who broke the news. Recounts the actor, “Josh had given me a call, and just the tone of his voice… he said, ‘Well, J. Eddie, you probably know where all this cough is going.’ So when he said that, I was like, ‘Oh, okay, now I know where it’s going.’ It’s not that I felt the entire time that Cole was going to dodge this — as time went on, I started getting a little wary. But truly, I didn’t really know until that time came and I was, ‘Oh, yeah, this is all kind of adding up that Cole is not going to survive this one.’ ”

Still, the actor is grateful that Y&R gifted him with another chance to bring to life the character he originally played from 1993-99 when they invited him to reprise the role in November 2023. “They could have killed him all those years ago,” Peck points out. “I’m so grateful that back in the day that Bill [Bell, Y&R’s co-creator and former head writer] wanted to keep that character. He always told me, ‘Cole will always have a place. Cole’s going to return.’ And I wasn’t always sure if Cole returned, if it was going to be me [playing him] or not after we went beyond 20 years. But fortunately and thankfully, when they did decide to bring him back, they decided to give me a shout first, and I really appreciate that.”

Farewell to a Friend

Given that the character of Cole Howard has been a part of Peck’s life since the ’90s, saying goodbye to him was difficult. “I’ve oftentimes thought, ‘Other actors, they must feel the same way that I feel towards a character,’ ” he muses. “It’s like an extension of yourself. But me being a father and having young adult sons, Cole’s almost like a child to me.”

When he returned to the role in the fall of 2023, the actor had personally filled in some of what he felt had happened to Cole in the decades he was away from Genoa City to inform his own performance. “I just felt a real personal connection to this character,” he says. “So much that I was emotionally locked and loaded from day one.”

From his perspective, Peck felt strongly that Victoria was the only woman Cole had ever loved, and he was pleased when the writers wrote that into the scripts. “She was the true love of his life,” he explains, “and also, he’s never had any other children. That’s why Claire was so important to him. I think obviously, with those two characters being so paramount in the scope of his life, it just really gave me, as the actor, so much more depth and meaning for that to play. You couldn’t ask for more, except a little more time. But I really, really enjoyed it. It was just such a great experience.”

The Last Goodbye

His final scenes on Y&R, in which Cole urged Claire and Victoria to move on and live their lives without him, were emotional for the actors to shoot. “I’m glad that he was given the opportunity to do that on screen, to say goodbye,” Peck notes. “And in a weird way, I enjoyed doing the scenes. I enjoyed the work. Emotionally, it was hard for me. Even when we were doing the rehearsals, it was very hard for me, emotionally, to keep it together.

“It wasn’t that I was leaving the show,” he clarifies. “The emotion was [because] Cole is going to be no longer. I think that was the hardest thing. He has lived in my heart for a long time, not just [during] the return, but over the years. It was really the loss of Cole and knowing, too, all of the fans and the viewers that love the character, they are going to not see the character anymore. This role meant so much to me.”

Missing You

Given the ongoing nature of soaps, characters evolve over the years, and that’s one of the main things that Peck says he will miss about being on Y&R. “Being an actor and playing a role that has depth, that’s what I miss,” he shares. “When I left acting for a number of years, you don’t realize how much you enjoyed it. When I got to return to this role, I realized how much I missed acting, how much I missed playing roles that have depth.”

But it’s not just Cole that he’s going to miss now that he’s left Genoa City. “Just being part of the Y&R family, to me, has always meant so much,” Peck declares. “I love my fellow cast members. I have so much respect for our cast members. And then our wonderful crew that we have there, that whole experience I just loved. And I think that’s part of the reason why, when I could, over the years when I was gone, I would tune in and watch the show. And I can’t tell you how happy it made me to see the show live on, continue to be what it was. That, to me, and anyone who leaves, no matter where you go to and you go to other families in the acting world or whatever, you really do miss that. That’s the biggest thing I think we miss.”

Towards the Future

While he would welcome the opportunity to bring Cole back to Y&R in the future for ghostly visits or in dreams, Peck would also enjoy adding another soap to his resume. (In addition to his years on Y&R, he played Howard “Hawk” Hawkins on Days of Our Lives from 1991-92 and Dr. Jake Martin on All My Children from 2000-03. “I really enjoy acting, and you want to do [a variety of] things,” he says, “but I will say, for whatever reason, I just love daytime. I know what the reason is — obviously, it’s the depth of the roles, it’s the feeling of the family. It’s playing characters long-term. I love daytime, and I’m so happy that we’ve picked up another show [CBS’s Beyond the Gates] to add to the daytime family because it gives me hope that the daytime industry is going to continue to grow from here. But I would love to go to another daytime show.”

Still, the actor is keeping plenty busy with other things, including his rescue animals. “I’m very active in trying to save the urgent dogs at about four different shelters in my area,” he explains. “These are the dogs that are on the 72-hour euthanasia list. That’s another thing that I do on a daily basis. So I’m super busy all the time, but I would love to act more. I didn’t realize how much I missed it until I went back and got a few episodes into this role. I must have been suppressing how much I missed acting. I’m at an exciting time in my life because I get to do whatever I want to do, and I don’t have to do what I don’t want to do.”

For the Fans

When Digest reported on Cole’s demise, the comments section on the article filled up with posts from fans who were heartbroken that the soap had killed off the character, something that touched his portrayer deeply. “Words can’t express how much it means to me that Cole was able to affect people enough that they have taken their time to write me personally or to comment on my Facebook page,” he shares. “That has meant so much to me that the role touched enough people to send such kind words and thoughts, and I just want people to know how much I appreciate that.”

Peck hopes that as he moves forward with his life and his career, the fans he’s made during his time on Y&R continue to take the journey with him. “A lot of the guy that you see in that role [of Cole Howard] is a lot like me as a person as far as my depth, the love and commitment to my family, and to things that are important to me that I’m passionate about,” he declares. “I take that with me wherever I go, whether I’m doing something on behalf of the dogs that I advocate for, or whether I take that to a [YouTube] channel or a podcast or wherever I take it. I promise you that it will come with heart, with depth, and with compassion for other people and the animal world. So if you like a little bit of that that you saw in Cole, you’ll see that in the next thing that I do.”