Lesli
Kay thinks Meredith Brooks' anthem Bitch is the perfect description of
her alter ego, As the World Turns' Molly Conlan, soon to be McKinnon.JUST LIKE MOLLY, ATWT's LESLI KAY HAS TRIUMPHED AND FOUND HAPPINESS
Lesli
Kay thinks Meredith Brooks' anthem Bitch is the perfect description of
her alter ego, As the World Turns' Molly Conlan, soon to be McKinnon.
"I always think of that son," confesses the actress, humming the lyrics.. "I'm a bitch, I'm a lover, I'm a child, I'm a mother, I'm a sinner, I'm a saint..." That's Molly. That should be her theme song when she walks onto the show. She's still a total child sometimes, yet she's a wonderful mother to Abigail and the twins."
Add "wife" to those sobriquets this week as Molly exchanges vows with Jake. "Molly's never had a man who loved her unconditionally, and finally, this is the man," smiles Kay. "Every other man has had conditions, and Jake is the one who seems to understand her. She can't do any wrong in his book."
Marriage can be the kiss of death for daytime couples, but Kay doesn't think that will happen with Jake and Molly. "There's an incredible amount of fun in the relationship without it being too saccharine-sweet all the time," she offers. "I think that marriage, if anything, is just gonna make them stronger. Have you ever seen a better guy than Jake? When he says those things to Molly, how can you not just melt? Tom's (Eplin) really great at looking right into my eyes and just making me melt. So it's not really difficult to do our scenes, because we have a great working relationship."
Kay's lively pairing with Eplin has made them one of ATWT's most popular couples. "Tom and I play the moments. Sometimes we'll throw in a kiss or a look or a touch, and that's what makes what we have really special. We always are in tune. If one of us is having a bad day, the other one picks up the slack, and vice versa."
Kay is also a successful career woman raising a family, and she's just as happy in her personal life as Molly is. She and former ATWT co-star Keith Coulouris (Keith, One Life to Live) have a son, Jackson, who is 19 months old. "We're a multi-soap family," she laughs.
"Being a mom is the best thing in the world," she continues. "My life has changed so drastically in the past two years, and so much for the better. Being Jackson's mom has made me the best person I can be. There's no way that you can be a bad person and be the mother of a child like that. He's a dreamboat, and I just feel like I've been blessed."
What about a brother or sister for Jackson? "That's a discussion you have to have with Keith," says Kay with a chuckle. "I definitely do (want to have more kids). He's just fine with one. He's like, 'Our lives are still somewhat normal. We can go do stuff, but if we have two we're never gonna leave the house.'"
Earlier this year, Kay brought home something very special: the Outstanding Supporting Actress Daytime Emmy. "I felt like I was in a dream sequence," she beams. "I could be homeless on the street, but I'll still have my Emmy. But it doesn't mean that I have a job forever. It doesn't mean a lot except that I can look at that and know that I did something well. That's probably the top moment in my life. The other moment would have been having Jackson, except that it was a very painful moment. Clearly the best thing came out of the moment of having Jackson, but the best actual, physical moment was probably winning the Emmy."
| Kay credits her Emmy to the evolution of her
character. "If Molly was still the laughingstock, I don't think I would have
won, to be honest with you," she admits. "With those types of characters, no
matter how good the actor is - with the exception of Cynthia Watros
(ex-Annie Dutton, Guiding Light), who did a brilliant job and pulled
off an Emmy - it's hard to win the respect of people when you're constantly
the joker and never the sympathetic heroine. What's great about Molly now is
she is a combination of both." Kay experienced another victory recently in court after a long legal battle with ex-husband Mark Sterling, who argued that Kay's celebrity status entitled him to half of her enhanced earnings capacity. "My feeling about that whole thing is that that was a part of my life, it's gone, it's over," she states simply, "Nobody wins in a situation like that. It was an unnecessary thing. I certainly never wanted to go to court, and it's a shame that he made it end up there. My life is happy, and I think he should go try to make his life happy. Just cut your losses and move on." Kay was pleased with Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Marylin Diamond's ruling that Kay "has not achieved that level of enduring celebrity that assures her a high income for an indefinite number of years." "The bottom line is, the judge is right," Kay asserts. "We're all just real people with real jobs, trying to make a living. I'm not on Friends, I'm not on ER. It's a fickle business, and I think while you're lucky enough to be making some money, you should try to save for your child's future. The only winners in a situation like this are the lawyers. It's a shame. I wasn't talking to anyone (in the press) about it because, to me, it's just not anybody's business. My feeling is it was a day in the papers and it's gone. The only reason it was a big deal at all is because it now sets a "cause celeb" precedent - not because I'm so newsworthy." Kay stresses that Sterling's argument that he was entitled to her earnings simply wasn't true. "He never supported me and he never helped me in my career," she explains. "Whether I go on to make millions of dollars or nothing, he never proved to be worthy of any of it." Looking forward and not back, the optimistic Kay chooses to concentrate on her many blessings. "I've got a beautiful mate, I've got a beautiful baby, I've got a beautiful gold trophy," she gushes. "It's been the best year of my life!" |
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