John Oliver certainly knows how to make an entrance.
In the final moments Thursday of ABC’s long-running soap opera “General Hospital,” set in Port Charles, New York, the HBO host donned a dark suit and jet black hair and descended from a helicopter surrounded by armed security guards to investigate the aftermath of a gunfight. He whips out his Glock and shoots a wounded gunman writhing on the ground, then rushes to the front of Jocelyn Jacks (played by Eden McCoy).
“Everything will be fine,” he tells her. “I’m here to help.”
As viewers of the show already know, Jocelyn is Carly Spencer’s beleaguered daughter, who has been working as an agent for the World Securities Bureau (WSB), the spy agency that maintains order, since her boyfriend’s murder.
“General Hospital,” which airs weekdays on ABC and then streams on Hulu, is now in its 64th year and has the dual distinction of being America’s longest-running scripted drama and the program that has won the most Emmy Awards for daytime drama (18). Oliver’s episodes will air on ABC on July 2nd, 3rd, and 6th, but his character’s true identity is being kept secret.
Daytime Emmy Award-winning actress Laura Wright, who has played Carly Spencer (née Corinthos) on General Hospital since 2005, will play opposite Oliver’s mysterious character in an upcoming episode, and told Variety that the two went to a ball together.
“I had no idea what was going to happen,” she says of Oliver’s appearance on the series. “A lot of times people like to make fun of what we do, but I don’t really like that. Our work is just as important as anyone else’s work, and we don’t think of it as another kind of acting. So, I respected his excellence but stayed true to our work, and I was so impressed with how he showed up and how he expressed it. It was incredible.”
Ms. Wright says she was surprised when Oliver told her he had never taken acting classes before because he makes certain choices in scenes that a trained actor would make.
“I don’t know if he was nervous or not,” Wright insists. “His lines were perfect. We were in the middle of a very intense storyline that had been building for months, so it’s really funny that he stepped in right away and didn’t miss a beat. You’d think he was on the show!”
In addition to appearing in two more episodes of General Hospital, Oliver will also be filming three episodes of another drama, Days of Our Lives, which will air in August. He said he was inspired by ESPN pundit Stephen A. Smith’s 10-year run as Brick, a well-behaved security consultant on “General Hospital.”
“‘General Hospital’ was everything I wanted,” Oliver said. “I am truly honored to be able to leave a small stain on the history of this illustrious show.”
