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Melissa Reeves and several fan favorites return to “Days of Our Lives” to say farewell to a legend.
With the passing of soap legend and Days of Our Lives veteran, Frances Reid on February 3, Days of Our Lives executives have reached out to former DAYS cast members to return for to the series as the show pays tribute to the actress and the beloved Alice Horton.
According to reports from Soap Opera Digest there have been several fan favorites scheduled to return to pay tribute to the legendary actress. Those returning to Salem include: Jaime Lyn Bauer (Laura Horton), Christie Clark (Carrie Brady), Roark Critchlow (Mike Horton), Maree Cheatham (Marie Horton), Bryan R. Dattilo (Lucas Horton), Mary Beth Evans (Kayla Johnson), Patsy Pease (Kimberly Brady), Melissa Reeves (Jennifer) and Lisa Trusel (Melissa Anderson). A few of these alum are quite possibly hanging around for more than one episode.
Days Executive Producer, Ken Corday spoke exclusively with Soap Opera Digest in February, shortly after Reid’s death, about what the show planned on to memorialize the soap legend.
“The way we’re going to deal with her death on screen is we’re not going to one day walk downstairs, as it was with Mickey, and say, ‘Oh, Grandma’s dead’ and then have a day or two where everyone comes to the show and we have a funeral and you cut to Marie for one line and Doug and Julie for one line and it really becomes ‘lip service’ to such a great character. So, what we’ve decided to do is we will play her as being ill and the end is coming and one by one, characters who loved her dearly or are related to her, from the past, will come to the show and ‘visit’ with her. You can start to imagine the list. I don’t know what we’re going to do with Bill Horton, because the last person who played him was not Ed Mallory, it was Chris Stone, who is gone, too, so that will be a little tricky. We’re working that out. And unfortunately, because we’re so far ahead into writing the show, it won’t air really until the end of May sweeps. But I believe it’s far better to do it that way then to just have a day or two of she’s gone, here’s the funeral and on we go. It’s too important and there are too many individual relationships that needed to be remembered and have flashbacks as opposed to a flashback show. I think it’s an honest and sensitive way to deal with something like this. It will give the audience time to prepare, even though many of our fans know this has happened.”
Corday along with several Days cast members expressed their thoughts and sympathies at the time of Reid’s passing. “This is a very sad day, indeed; not only for me personally, but for the Days of Our Lives family and the entire Hollywood community,” said Executive Producer Ken Corday. “From day one until she taped her last scene, Frances epitomized the past, present and future of the show. Frances was truly one of a kind. Her class cannot be matched and her shoes cannot be filled… We will miss her all the rest of our days.”
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