The Erika Slezak Fan Club, maintained by its president, Walter Miller, unveiled a brand new website design on Wednesday featuring more photographs, career highlights, fan club memories and a treasure trove of content from “One Life to Live,” particularly material connected to Slezak’s character, Victoria Lord Buchanan.
Elsewhere, the fan club confirmed that Slezak will be playing a new character on “General Hospital” when she begins taping episodes in September, which are slated to air in the fall.
As previously reported, the six-time Emmy award-winning actress announced in June that she had signed a short-term contract with the daytime drama series. At the time, Slezak did not know which character she would be playing or when her scenes would air. Still, she was excited to be working again with former “One Life to Live” executive producer Frank Valentini, who, since 2012, has overseen the day-to-day operations of “General Hospital” as that show’s executive producer.
“I am thrilled to confirm that my dear friend and former ‘One Life to Live’ colleague, Erika Slezak, will appear on @GeneralHospital this Fall. Stay tuned as we prepare to introduce another daytime legend to Port Charles,” said Valentini in a message posted to X (formerly Twitter) shortly after Slezak’s initial casting was announced.
Earlier this month, Daytime Confidential was the first to report that Slezak would be portraying a brand new character when she arrives in Port Charles. According to a “rumor report” from the outlet, the character will be revealed to be the long-lost sister of Dr. Monica Quartermaine (played until 2023 by the late Leslie Charleson).
Should Slezak join the cast as a relative of Monica’s, it would mark the first time since the character’s introduction in 1976 (then played by Patsy Rahn) that the soap opera would establish a sibling for her, considering Monica was known to have been an orphan raised by Gail Baldwin (played by the late Susan Brown) with no direct family ties introduced beyond her cousin Lorena Sharpe Barrington (Shelley Taylor Morgan).
In the years since “One Life to Live” went off the air in January 2012, Slezak went on to reprise her role from the show for the short-lived 2013 online revival that was produced by Prospect Park Networks, which at the time had landed the exclusive licensing rights to the show’s characters. The company went on to sue ABC, accusing the network of looking to create a “mega soap” scheme following the network’s use of key “One Life to Live” characters on “General Hospital.”
Prospect Park Networks had been seeking more than $95 million in damages. By December 2012, the lawsuit had been dismissed, with the rights to both the “One Life to Live” brand and characters returning to ABC, along with the rights to the “All My Children” brand and characters.
Playing Viki on “One Life to Live” for more than 40 years, Slezak won six Emmy Awards, each in the category of Outstanding Lead Actress in a Daytime Drama Series, earning the most wins of any individual actress.
By 2018, Slezak would make her first appearance after the dual cancellations of “One Life to Live,” playing the role of Helen in an episode of “The Resident.” She followed that up with an appearance in the May 3, 2019 episode of “Blue Bloods, playing the role of Donna Duvall. She again reprised the role in the January 6, 2023 episode
In 2021, Slezak made her Hallmark Channel original movie debut, appearing alongside soap alums Lyndsy Fonseca (“The Young and the Restless”) and Chandler Massey (“Days of our Lives”) in “Next Stop, Christmas.” Lea Thompson (“Back to the Future”) and Christopher Lloyd (“Back to the Future”) also starred in the holiday movie.
