Tamara Clatterbuck (ex-Alice, Y&R; ex-Barb, DAYS; ex-Tammy, GH)
Soap Opera Digest: First of all, how’s Spencer?
Tamara Clatterbuck: My baby just turned 2! Can you believe it? He’s skinny as a stick, but no less beautiful. Digest: Ready for the terrible twos?
Clatterbuck: He’s an angel. He’s such a good kid that it’s just not that hideous yet [laughs]. Digest: How did MY BIG FAT OBNOXIOUS BOSS come about?
Clatterbuck: Well, I auditioned five times [laughs]. I had no idea what that’s like. I never have to do that. That’s comedy, folks. Actually, every audition consisted of improvisation, so there was no script. Nothing. It was just getting in there with the producers and being thrown a situation and being funny. Or, trying not to be funny, which is what essentially ends up being funny [laughs]. It was a tough one to get, but it was great.Digest: How would you describe your role of the boss’s wife, Lynn?
Clatterbuck: Obnoxious [laughs]. Eccentric, over-the-top and obnoxious. But the difference from this role and all the other roles I’ve played in daytime is this character is not skanky or trashy. She has tons of money, so she gets to get all dolled up in nice clothes and have her hair and makeup done.
Digest: So, how did it go?
Clatterbuck: The only disadvantage was that I was on location in Chicago for a month-and-a-half with a toddler in a hotel, so I got no sleep and I looked like hell anyway [laughs]. She’s supposed to be well-rested and I was so not. I remember sitting in the makeup chair one morning and the girl looked at me and gasped! But there was no way I was going to leave him for almost two months. No way. Digest: Definitely different from your motherhood experience on a soap.
Clatterbuck: That’s the beauty of daytime, because he and the babysitter were in the dressing room. I was still nursing. He was 4 months old when I last did Y&R, so I went and did a scene with Sharon Case (Sharon), came back, [nursed], went back out there, did another scene. Eileen Davidson (Ashley) was doing the same thing. Digest: What’s it like for a dramatic actress to work without a script?
Clatterbuck: Scary. You have to absolutely trust yourself as an actor. You can’t be over the top or you’re going to blow your cover, so it is a fine line, but it is the best high when you achieve it — when you do something and you know it’s funny and you know it works. Then all you do at that point is pray they put it in the show [laughs].Digest: Tamara, can we ever get you back on daytime?
Clatterbuck: Absolutely, whether it be a new character or any of the [above] roles. People still go crazy over Alice. They want her back. I’ve seen it on Web pages, especially when I did come back for those two episodes [in 2003]. That just kind of ended. Digest: You mention in the 1/11/05 issue of Digest: that while you were filming BOSS in Chicago, you ran into Y&R Head Writer Kay Alden.
Clatterbuck: I did. How great is that? I freaked out. I hugged her and she’s like, “We were just talking about you.” And I’m like, “Really? Hmm….” Kay is so wonderful and the words she wrote for me … I think there is such an opportunity for that storyline to come back. I really loved all of the [daytime] shows I did. My experience in daytime was so phenomenal. And I’ve got such friends from every single show, like Kristian Alfonso (Hope, DAYS) and Sharon (Case, Sharon, Y&R). I would definitely be open to coming back to daytime.
Conversation
All comments are subject to our Community Guidelines. Soap Opera Digest does not endorse the opinions and views shared by our readers in our comment sections. Our comments section is a place where readers can engage in healthy, productive, lively, and respectful discussions. Offensive language, hate speech, personal attacks, and/or defamatory statements are not permitted. Advertising or spam is also prohibited.