The Young & the Restless Comings & Goings: DAYS Star Lauren Koslow Temporarily Steps In as Jill
The Young and the Restless is bringing in a familiar daytime face for a brief turn in one of its most iconic roles. Days of Our Lives star Lauren Koslow (Kate) will temporarily fill in as Jill Abbott while longtime star Jess Walton is unavailable for filming.
Limited Time Only
According to TV Insider, which broke the news, Walton’s absence at Y&R is due to scheduling conflicts. The actress, who made her debut as Jill in 1987, resides in Oregon and has been commuting to the show’s studio in Los Angeles as storyline dictates since she moved out of Los Angeles in 2011. She has been on recurring status with the show since 2012.
Koslow will appear for five episodes, with her first show airing on Thursday, June 25.
You Can Go Home Again
This will mark the second character Koslow has taken on at Y&R. The actress began her career in daytime television as sultry blackmailer Lindsey Wells, who she played from 1984-86. Koslow recounted the story of landing the role to Soap Opera Digest in 2023, saying, “I was pretty fresh out here from college. I was working at a production company, auditioning for plays, and I got into acting class. It turned out that Ed Scott, who was then a producer at Y&R, was taking the class [to] learn more about actors and the whole acting process. So he got to see me in scenes. [When] I got a call to come in to audition, I thought, ‘What?’ I literally didn’t even think it was real.”
Koslow noted that she was “extremely lucky to get that chance” and that when she booked the job, “I was absolutely over the moon. It was a fabulous thing that had happened to me to launch my career.”
As Lindsey, Koslow’s storyline was enmeshed with the tale of Jack Abbott (then-Terry Lester) and the secret affair he’d had with his stepmother, Jill, who at the time was played by Brenda Dickson. Koslow recalled in her 2023 interview, “The storyline was Jack gaslighting the Lindsey Wells character to get back blackmail photos that she had of him and Jill. Later, I was told that when they started that storyline, they didn’t know who that blackmailer was going to be. They decided it was going to be a woman and that was how they wrote this story.”
The actress’s time as Lindsey was also significant on a personal level. Since 1987, she has been married to makeup artist Nick Schillace, who she met when he was part of Y&R’s makeup team. She recalled to Digest in 1996, “I thought Nicky was a little intimidating, so I used to just slip into the nearest makeup seat. One day he said to me, ‘You need to get into my chair.’ Friendship blossomed into love and then into marriage.” The duo has two children, Zachariah and Millikate.
Worlds Collide
After Koslow wrapped her original run as Lindsey, she was tapped to join the original cast of Y&R’s sister show, The Bold and the Beautiful, where she spent five years in the role of fashion designer Margo Lynley. Then, in 1996, DAYS selected her to take over the part of Kate Roberts, which Deborah Adair had originated from 1993-95.
Remarkably, Adair came to DAYS after playing Jill on Y&R from 1980-83, during which time the character first married John Abbott (Jerry Douglas), becoming Jack’s stepmother and setting up the scandalous story of Jill and Jack’s one-night stand that fueled Lindsey’s blackmail!
Team Spirit
In a joint statement to TV Insider, Y&R Executive Producer Sally McDonald and Head Writer Josh Griffith said they were “extremely grateful” to Koslow for coming aboard and thanked the team at DAYS for the “collaborative spirit” they showed in allowing the actress to return to Genoa City. They also stressed that Walton, who will mark her 40th anniversary on the show next June, “is an enduring cornerstone of Y&R” and that they “forward to welcoming her back to Genoa City as her schedule permits.”
As for Koslow’s work on DAYS, a rep for the show assured TV Insider that her stint on Y&R “does not affect her status with the show in any way.”
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.