February 1997
Stephen Nichols and I recently attended the fundraiser for the Aliso Academy for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing. Since our deaf storyline as “Patch” and Kayla on Days of our Lives many years ago, we’ve been active in charity events for the hearing impaired. This fundraiser aimed to benefit a new school my sister and I set up to help educate youngsters with this disability. Joining us was Karen Hensel (soon to be seen as Y&R’s Doris), whose character is confined to a wheelchair. Karen knows all about working with disabilities and gave a moving speech about Doris’ independence and self-esteem.
Karen and I go back a long way. We worked and studied together at South Coast Repertory Theatre in Orange County. We chatted about the old days at the fundraiser. When we met, I was 19 and had just finished at the Young People’s Conservatory. I was cast in the play Hotel Paradiso alongside Karen, Patti Johns and Jeffrey Tambor. Patti’s fiancé was a medical student from Chicago, and he brought along a friend to see the play, Michael Shwartz. We all went out to lunch afterwards.
The electricity between Mary Beth and Michael was palpable, you could see it bounce around the room,” Karen says. “They were across the table from each other and you knew it was love!”
Karen and I remain good friends. Michael and I, of course, got married! Karen still runs the actors’ training company at SCR. In fact, she was invited to the fundraiser by my brother’s wife, Pilar, who was one of her students.
According to Karen, we’re all deeply connected. “I’m in the play Six Degrees of Separation. The premise is that everyone in the world is connected to a sixth degree, that is, it would take only six phone calls to anyone to reach anyone else in the world- we’re all that close.”
She’s been on Murder She Wrote, as have Stephen and I. She also did an episode of ER (whose composer also works on GH and is my good friend). She did a play in Australia called “Our Country’s Good”, and here we are in TV SOAP!
She says: “My daughter was born in Melbourne and my sister, Kathryn Lowe, lives in Brisbane. She’s active in the Arts Council and she introduced me to Tom Kenneally, Cellblock H’s Val Lehman, and David Galump, the famous Aboriginal artist and didgeridoo player. You know, I probably know more about Australian culture than American culture!”
Karen recalls working in the theatre with lots of soap actors. “I think that when you go through the theatre with someone you forge a real strong and lasting friendship. You become loyal because theatre is rough work, with little pay – it’s almost like boot camp!”
Karen has worked with Jim Reynolds (Days Abe Carver), John DeLancie (Days’ Eugene), Patti Johns (she was that weird nanny on Days) – and me. “I always figured I’d be on Days at some point,” she says. “But how I ended up on Y&R I don’t know!”
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