Interview with Soap Opera Digest: "Wright Now" She moved cross-country to become PASSIONS third Kay, but when Deanna Wright finally hit Harmony, she found a surprising number of familiar faces. "I knew alot of people here from back in Miami," the native Floridian explains. "The first thing I ever did, acting-wise, was a showcase with Eva Tamargo Lemus [ Pilar ]. And my first-ever audition was for MIAMI SANDS, which starred Galen Gering's [ Luis ] wife, Jenna. Through that, I ended up meeting Galen and James [ Hyde, Sam ]. And now, we're all here in L.A.," she muses. "Isn't that weird? Some would call it fate." At the very least, that's what her agent called it. "We were watching TV in her apartment in Miami, and she was looking through the [ casting ] breakdowns, and suddenly, she said, "Deanna, I found your role.' And I'm like, 'Uh-huh,' " Wright recalls, laughing. "And she said 'No, I'm really serious.' And the thing is, she didn't even know what the role was at that point, but she's like, 'It's for PASSIONS, so it's got to be yours. There's just too much Karma, what with Eva and Galen and James already there. It's just too much karma.' " Understandably, Wright was a little skeptical. "I totally didn't believe her," she chuckles. "I was like 'Whatever.' "And she continued to feel that way, even after her first audition tape wowed the show's casting gods and they invited her to make another. "I was going through a really rough period of my life," says the actress, who was dismayed by her seemingly slow crawl towards success in Hollywood. "I had come out here for a pilot season and pretty much fallen on my face. I really thought that because I had taken [ acting ] classes and done one pilot before [ the never-aired MANCHESTER PREP ] ... it never occured to me that you can be out here for 10 years and never book anything at all."So I never took that into consideration before," she continues. "All I took into consideration was that I was going to make it, and I didn't. That was hard for me to deal with; I kind of went back to Florida with my tail tucked between my legs." Wright began to regroup by taking premed classes at Central Florida Community College and waiting tables at Chili's. She continued to go through the motions on the acting circuit, but her heart wasn't in it. "So that's why, when I had to do the second tape for PASSIONS, I wasn't optimistic at all. I really only did it to appease my agent; she had to argue with me to get me to do it. But I'm really glad she did. I guess that's what agents are for." Upon receiving the second tape, PASSIONS flew Wright out to L.A. ("You get coach, but it's still a plane ticket") for a proper screen test. Following orders, she arrived at NBC at 6 in the morning and went straight to Stage 5. "I saw the red light, but I didn't pay attention to it. I didn't know what it meant, to be honest," she says, referring to the studio's taping-in-progress signal. "So I walked in, and nobody stopped what they were doing, but they all kind of looked at me like, 'What are you doing here?' And I thought, 'Oh, God, they're taping. My cell phone's gonna ring.' I was so scared that I was going to make an even bigger fool out of myself than I already had." She avoided disaster ("Thank goodness, I shut the door quietly"), did a scene with Molly Stanton [ Charity ], was thanked for coming, and then returned to Florida. Two weeks later, the show wanted her back in California so they could see how she looked standing next to Jesse Metcalfe [ Miguel ]. There was only one problem: She was told on a Thursday that PASSIONS wanted to fly her out on the following Sunday, audition her on Monday ... and if she got the job, she would have to start taping on Wednsday. "So I went to Chili's to explain all of this, and my manager goes, 'Let me get this straight: You're turning in your four-day notice, basically,' " Wright sudders. "And I said, 'No, I'm not doing that; I just wanted to let you know what my situation was.' And she said, 'Well, Deanna, this is the second time you've gone off, and I don't think it's very professional.' Of course, I was thinking, 'Acting is my career. Waitressing at Chili's is not. I think I'm making a very professional decision.' But I totally understand her point of view, as well. I left them high and dry; they need their servers." With the matter settled, Wright packed a week's worth of clothes and flew out West for the second screen test. "I got the job, obviously," she says, "and my whole life was turned upside-down in 24 hours. I started working right away, and there were just a lot of changes that I'm still getting used to." Like, say, a new name. "When I first joined the show, I wasn't Deanna anymore. I was 'The New Kay'," she grins, alluding to predecessors Taylor Anne Mountz and Gina Marie May. "It was a big joke. I actually went out and got a key chain that says, 'The New Kay' because for the longest time, that's how people would introduce me." That said, she's not complaining - not by a long shot. "I love every minute of everything that I do here," The New Kay enthuses. "Sometimes I think, 'This is crazy' because I'll be driving down the street, and it'll hit me all of the sudden: I live in California, and I have a job as an actor, and I'm on national television. I have fan mail, and people want my autograph, and there are millions and millions of people in the world who would kill to be doing what I'm doing. It's pretty unrealistic, if you think about it. It's crazy. I'm deliriously happy, but it's crazy." Identity Crisis: "I can relate to Kay to a certain extent," says Wright, "But you know who I can really relate to? Simone. I've been in Simone's place many a time," she laughs. "When I was in seventh grade, I would just sit there and watch my best friend scheme and lie to her parents about where she was and what she was doing and why she wasn't at home and why she was at my house, and why her boyfriend, Bobby, was at my house, too. I would warn her and warn her that it wasn't going to work, but she always got away with it, so I was just in awe of her." Alas, the whole house of cards eventually collapsed. "Her parents found out one day, and that was that. But now, when I'm playing Kay, I get alot of motivation from this girl I knew in Seventh grade." From Soap Opera Digest Magazine! |
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