Last Van Standing
Soap Opera Weekly had such a nice, long chat with AS THE WORLD TURNS’s Van Hansis about Luke’s closing storyline that we saved some of the best of it for last. Here, Hansis reflects on his years in Oakdale, and how he and Luke have both grown up.
Soap Opera Weekly: The last weeks of the show for Luke are incredibly intense!
Van Hansis: Yeah, they are; it’s incredibly intense. I remember, before I even knew what was happening, somebody said, while reading the script, “You’re in for a roller coaster at the end.” Part of me, at first, was like, “Oh, come on, it’s the last couple weeks. Can’t it just be light and fun?” But, in the end, as sad as the story is, I’m really, really honored to have been able to play it — especially the day that Reid dies. It’s the episode that I feel personally most proud of my work in.
Weekly: Are you at that point where you’re looking back on your experiences on the show with a little distance?
Hansis: A little bit. I think it’ll happen more when the show’s not airing anymore. I was talking with Colleen [Zenk, Barbara] at the Paley Center event for the show. She’s been on the show much longer than
I have, and she said something that was really interesting. She said, “It’s almost like it never happened.” I told my parents she said that, and they were like, “That’s kind of just how it is — whenever you leave a job, it’s weird when something that’s so much a part of your life becomes a part of your history.” I think when October rolls around, there will be much more of a distance.
Weekly: Of course, it will take far longer for fans. They’re devastated!
Hansis: I know. Soaps are a unique thing within this industry, in that you get to see these characters on the screen every day. You get to watch them grow. People like Bob and Lisa and Kim and Barbara — you watch them their entire lives. Although they’re played by actors, they’re real characters to a lot of people. There’s a sort of friendship that I think people have with soap characters. It’s like if you read a really good book and you really identify with the character, and you’re sad when you put that book down. This is like reading a book for 54 years, and then it’s over.
Weekly: Your character is another that people have watched grow and connected to. What do you think of the impact of Luke?
Hansis: I think I’ve said this a lot, but it’s a real blessing to have worked on something for almost five years that people really do connect with. I really do feel like we were helping people, that the story we were telling is important. It’s been great.
Weekly: You’ve also said before that ATWT was basically your first job. What have you taken away from this professionally?
Hansis: On a professional level, I think that this gave me a credibility that I never would have had without this. It’s opened some doors for me to do some other stuff, which has been very nice. But that’s on just a very technical level. What I really took away from it is just the knowledge of the craft. Whatever my next job is going to be, I don’t feel like I’m going to go in and have no idea what I’m doing. Like when I shot my movie [Occupant] this spring; even though I had never done a movie before, I had been a working actor for the last five years. So there’s just a professionalism that comes with that. It’s a great way of building your career brick by brick, laying the foundation and then building it up. It’s rare that you get to have a job that lasts for five years in this business, so I’m grateful for that. Also, when I started, I was pretty much just out of college. So there’s a lot of growing up that happened. I was watching an old tape from when I first started, and I was like, “Wow, I was such a kid!” I was in my early 20s at the time, but I still feel like I was a kid.
Weekly: Do you think Luke has changed, as well?
Hansis: Oh, definitely. I think he’s changed from being a sweet kid to a complicated young adult in the last five years. Through the mistakes he’s made and the challenges he’s overcome…with that comes knowledge. I do think he’s very different. He’s much more sure of who he is now, and he’s much more sure of his own power than he ever was. In the beginning, and even up to a couple of years ago, I think he was a victim a lot. In the last few years, even though I do think he’s made some pretty big mistakes — sometimes he doesn’t look at situations in any other way besides how it’ll help him, or what he deems is right — going through these situations has forced him to grow up.
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