‘General Hospital’s Finola Hughes Looks Back at Anna’s Romances With Duke, Finn & More

Finola Hughes made her grand General Hospital debut as Anna Devane in April 1985, a meaningful milestone for the fan-favorite actress. “It’s amazing to have had longevity in this business doing something that I love so much,” she told Swooon. “I’m very lucky.”

Forty years — and a stop in All My Children‘s Pine Valley — later, Anna has had a complicated love life. As to who was her best match, Hughes demurred, “I think they’re all suited to Anna at the time that they’re with her, and vice versa. I feel like the character evolves, and she’s with the person that she’s supposed to be with at the time.”

Below, Hughes takes a stroll down relationship memory lane and revisits Anna Devane’s many romances over the years, from Duke to David to Finn and everyone in between. So, who is Anna’s true love? Let us know in the comments below.

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Finola Hughes, Tristan Rogers on 'General Hospital' in 1991
ABC / Everett Collection

Anna Devane & Robert Scorpio

“Well, that was the beginning of it all, and I just learned so much from Tris about how to navigate the whole thing. I had no idea what I was doing when I went on the soap — I’d never done anything like this before. He’s always a lot of fun to work with, and back then, he was not very serious, so that made it more fun for me until it had to be serious. Anna and Scorpio have a great understanding of each other, and they also understand each other’s shortcomings, yet they’re always there to support each other. They still write it like we spend a lot of time together, which is great because we’ve known each other for so long, and I’m really so happy that the writers continue to do honor that history. It’s really cool.”

Finola Hughes, Ian Buchanan as Anna and Duke on 'General Hospital'
Bob D’Amico / ABC / Everett Collection

Anna Devane & Duke Lavery

“Look, I’ve been best friends with him for 40 years, so I can only say good things about Ian [Buchanan]. When he came to the audition, I knew that he had to play Duke Lavery. I just really wanted him to play the role because he was so different. I learned a lot from him, too. He was a very different type of actor, and I think my work started to alter when I started to work with him. You always change a little bit with whoever it is you’re working with. I do, anyway. Duke brought a real sense of mystery and he was also on the wrong side of the law, and Anna, of course, was working in law enforcement. I think that was really cool and an interesting dynamic to play.”

Finola Hughes and Vincent Irizarry as Anna and David on 'All My Children'
ABC / Everett Collection

Anna Devane & David Hayward (on All My Children)

“That was great. I love working with Vincent [Irizarry], and we just flew through that time together. We were very suited for each other, the way we worked. David was a bad guy, but he was a perfect foil for Anna. You couldn’t have put her with anybody else, and I think that was good.”

Finola Hughes, Anthony Geary as Anna and Luke on 'General Hospital'
Paul Skipper / jpistudios.com

Anna Devane & Luke Spencer

“That was so brief, but that was such a hero moment for me because I couldn’t believe my luck that Frank [Valentini, executive producer] put us together for a bit. Tony [Geary] is so emotionally available constantly. His emotional work is so readily available, and so is his comedic work, and within a scene, you’ll probably do both things. He’ll bring something that’s very dramatic, and there’ll be a little sense of humor in there somewhere, which I think is just incredible for an actor. He’s really so talented.”

Rick Springfield and Finola Hughes on 'General Hospital'
Howard Wise / jpistudios.com / Adam Larkey / ABC / Everett Collection

Anna Devane & Noah Drake/Eli Love

“I think I probably texted somebody that day and said, ‘I just kissed Rick Springfield!’ Yeah, I’m not above that. We had no idea what we were doing in all of that, but he’s so lovely. I really looked forward to working with him. We had a lot of fun. They were writing Anna a little wild that during those times, I feel. I think that was [former head writer] Bob Guza writing that stuff, but then we did [GH spinoff] Night Shift, and that was back to Scorpio again, which was kind of awesome.”

Finola Hughes, Michael Easton, Jophielle Love on 'General Hospital'
XJJohnson / jpistudios.com

Anna Devane & Hamilton Finn

“Oh, Michael [Easton]. I loved that relationship so much, I really did. I loved working with Michael. He has this fantastic, abstract ability with humor, and I just really loved playing off that. I think we were allowed to be a lot more humorous than I’ve been in the past as Anna. We ran for two years, but then Anna made a mistake [by telling Valentin, not Finn, that Anna’s twin Alex, not Anna, was Peter August’s mother], and they broke up for something that was her fault. It all blew up at the altar.”

Finola Hughes as Anna Devane and James Patrick Stuart as Valentin Cassadine on 'General Hospital'
ABC / Ricky Middlesworth

Anna Devane & Valentin Cassadine

“I’ve known James [Patrick Stuart] for years. We were in acting class together. We’re just totally suited for each other; we work exactly the same way. I like the dynamic between Anna and Valentin. I think it really works. There’s a richness to it, and it just clicks. I think that you sort of boil that down to chemistry at the end of the day. We just work very well together, plus we’re known to laugh on set, which can be dangerous. But we do get it together.”

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