On soaps/dramas, who were the worst replacements? I don't mean characterwise, but actorwise.

I haven't seen her act, but I can not stand Victoria Winters #2 from Dark Shadows aka Betsy Durkin. She is just scary looking. Thank the lord she was only in ten episodes before she was replaced by Carolyn Groves for three episodes.

Great topic. I never knew Dark Shadows replaced actors. What other actors were replaced on Dark Shadows?

On Passions they replaced the first actress who played Kay with Gina Marie May. SHE WAS HORRIBLE! She just didn't know how to play Kay Bennett at all. I can't think of any one else. This is the only one that irritated me so much.

On All My Children, there used to be a main character named Tara. She was first played quite well by Karen Lynn Gorney (who was in Saturday Night Fever). She was then replaced several times over the years with mixed results. Her character was discontinued for a long while and then brought back again in the early 90s and played again by Karen Lynn Gorney. And she was awful.

And speaking of All My Children, I really cant accept the current Opal. I know people like her, but I just loved Dorothy Lyman.

Originally posted by Silver Daze
Great topic. I never knew Dark Shadows replaced actors. What other actors were replaced on Dark Shadows?


They replaced people for various reasons. Alexandra Moltke (Vicki) became pregnent and left the show, so she was replaced with Betsy Durkin (ewwwww) for a month. Carolyn Groves then played Vicki for one week before she got written off. Willie Loomis was originally played by James Hall, but after two weeks he was replaced with John Karlen who ended up staying until the end of the show. In the early episodes of the show, Sam Evans was played by Mark Allen for five weeks, and then replaced with David Ford. Matthew Morgan from the early ones was originally played by an older actor (who's name I can't remember right now), but then replaced with Thayer David. Mitchell Ryan played the character of Burke Devlin from the start of the show until summer 1967, but he arrived on the set drunk so he was fired. He was replaced by Anthony George for a few months, then replaced. Nancy Barrett was with the show it's entire run, but for one episode where her character Carolyn was played by her understudy, Diana Walker because (I think) Nancy was sick that day. The Diana episode airs next Friday.