James Franco is many things -- movie star, fashion model, Ivy Leaguer, Queer cinema academic. And now he's something else: A soap opera actor. Not just any soap, mind you, but General Hospital. The AP reports he'll play "a mystery person" who arrives at Port Charles in an arc that lasts approximately two months, beginning November 20th. Says EP Jill Farren Phelps: "It's an honor that an actor of Franco's caliber would choose to spend some of his valuable time in Port Charles." Is he Lucy Coe's illegitimate son? Bobby Spencer's new boytoy? The man who broke up Luke and Laura? We just don't know. Because we haven't watched General Hospital since the '80s. (And also -- it's a mystery! It says it right there in his character description!)
Now we know of plenty movie stars who got their starts on daytime dramas -- Brad Pitt, Courteney Cox, Sarah Michelle Gellar and Jonah Hill, to name a few (OK not Jonah Hill) -- but we're struggling to come up with established movie stars at the peak of their game who downgraded to soaps. But when did that stop us before? In honor of Franco's interesting career turn -- perhaps for his final thesis in The Sudsy Gaze: A Feminist Survey of Daytime Drama in Post-Iraq War America -- we thought we'd celebrate some of the most memorable superstar (using the term loosely) guest appearances on soaps.
1. Elizabeth Taylor on General Hospital (1981)
Before she was obsessed with tweeting her support for Kathy Ireland on Dancing with the Stars, she was equally obsessed with General Hospital -- to the point where she herself was the mystery arrival at Port Charles, playing the widow of evil genius Mikos Cassadine. Unfortunately, she couldn't pronounce her former husband's name, as you'll see from this potty-mouthed blooper reel. Dame Liz!
2. Snoop Dogg on One Life to Live (2008)
Not only did Snoop get crunked-up-in-this-bitch for his One Liffle to Lizzle cameo, he also recorded his own version of the theme song! He loves OLTL!
3. Lily Allen on Neighbours (2009)
British pop star stopped by Ramsay Street on the long-running Australian soap recently, of which she is a longtime fan. She played herself.
4. Jeremy Piven on Big Brother (2009)
It's not a daytime drama in the traditional sense, but there's something inherently soapy about the machiavellian power plays and whole-lotta-sitting-around-talking-about-nothing in every episode of Big Brother. That is, until Jeremy Piven shows up, to lecture the cast about his favorite causes -- his doomed summer comedy and toro poisoning.
5. Crystal Gayle on Another World (1987)
The singer with the ankle-length hair did a week-long guest stint on Another World, where she played a friend of Felicia Gallant followed by the serial-killing Sin Stalker.