Marcy Walker

Marcy Walker (born November 26, 1961) is an American soap opera actress. She was born in Paducah, Kentucky.

In 1981, she got her first soap job as Liza Colby Chandler Chandler Chandler on All My Children. After a successful three-year run (and two Outstanding Supporting Actress Daytime Emmy nominations, in 1983 and 1984), she decided to leave the show for other opportunities.

Late in 1984, she created yet another popular soap role in the form of Eden Capwell on Santa Barbara. Her character, partnered with A Martinez's character, Cruz, became one of the show's flagship supercouples. She was nominated for Outstanding Lead Actress Daytime Emmy awards in 1987 and 1988, with an Emmy win in 1989. She left the serial in 1991.

In 1993, she started playing the tailor-made role of Tangie Hill on Guiding Light. Fans and the soap press alike found Walker's character too much of an "inadequate replacement" for Beth Ehlers's character, Harley Cooper (Ehlers had left the show mere months before Walker was signed on). The character didn't catch on and she left in 1995 to make a comeback as Liza on All My Children. She was nominated for another Outstanding Lead Actress Daytime Emmy award in 2001.

Many factors led to her exit from from All My Children in 2004. Amelia Heinle, who played her on-screen sister Mia Saunders in 2001, decided to leave the show in early 2004 wanted to pursue other options because of her character's lack of storyline. Her on screen mother Jennifer Bassey had been bumped to recurring status in order to save the show some money. A soap opera actor going on recurring status usually has the effect of reducing their character to minimal apearances. [ However there are notable exceptions to this rule. Cady McClain's entire run on As The World Turns has been recurring and she still won a Daytime Emmy Award in 2004 ] With no real family connections in town the writers tried to have the character become a surogate mother to Adam Chander's son JR but when Jonathan Bennett left the role his replacement Andrew Riddings was so rejected by fans that the character was written out. Making one last shot at reinvigorating the character headwriter Megan McTavish rehashed her storylines from the 1980's having Liza attempting to seduce Tad Martin. Fan complained that they couldn't swallow the usually headstrong and independent character reduced to a scheming schoolgirl. In addition to the lack of storyline All My Children's budget ( as with most soap operas ) have been dwindeling due to poor neilson ratings and all American soap operas have been trimming their casts. It was announced that Walker's contract would not be renewed when it expired in 2004. She taped the last of the episodes in her contract in the summer of 2004. Her farewell episode (with an appearance from her character's mother, who is also seldom seen as of late) aired on September 28.

Liza's exit occurred amid rumor that Walker would return to the show on recurring status. This rumor was fueled by the fact that her exit was very open-ended. She was not killed off like some notable fan favorites like Jesse Hubbard (Darnell Williams) or Gillian Lavery (Esta Terblanche) but rather assumed a new identity and took her daughter to live out of reach of her controlling ex-husband Adam Chandler (David Canary)

According to Soap Opera Digest magazine she was at first hesitant to go on recurring status due to the reasons mentioned prior in this article but later warmed to the idea. Liza made a phone call apearance in December 2004 and apeared again in January 2005 when her character assisted Babe Chandler (Alexa Havins) and Jamie Martin (Justin Bruening) in their attempt to flee from Adam's wraith.

Walker has not been seen on-screen since these episodes aired. Headwriter Megan McTavish has spoken to the soap media and publically thanked Walker for working without a contract but has also hinted that she does not intend for Liza to return to the show any time soon.

She has been married five times, most notably to actor Billy Warlock. Rumors indicate that Walker divorced him when she walked in on him in bed with another man, but the rumors have never had a solid basis in reality. In a 1998 interview with Soap Opera Digest she explained the breakup in her own words : " "He thought I was somehow higher than him and I could never live it down. I couldn't jump off the pedestal. He was unhappy about everything and I couldn't be happy about anything. I think that Billy is fantastic and, in his heart, he's one of the nicest people that you'll ever meet. It's just that he hasn't been acknowledged a lot in his life and he needs -- and deserves -- a lot of everything. I was just not the person who was able to give it to him. Unfortunately, if you really love someone, you let them know when they're bad as well as when they're good. He needed as much positive reinforcement as he could get and never wanted to hear the negative. I learned that too late, I often played the devil's advocate, thinking I was helping by being honest". [1] (http://members.aol.com/WAILUA/Marcy_WALKER.HTM)

External links

• Marcy Walker entry in IMDB (http://imdb.com/name/nm0908001/)