Wes Ramsey will reprise the role of Days of Our Lives‘ Owen Kent on February 27, 16 years after his last appearance on the soap.
For Ramsey, who also resurfaced last month on General Hospital as Peter August, neither return was on his radar, making the double comeback more surreal. “This is another glorious example of something coming up that is very unexpected,” he says. “Being asked to reprise a role that I played 16 years ago is something I’ve never done before. That’s the kind of thing that can happen in daytime, and it was absolutely a wonderful experience.”
Ramsey reveals that when he taped his Days scenes last summer, he didn’t know another blast from the past was around the corner. “When I filmed there 10 months ago, I obviously had no idea that I would be asked to revisit a role that would happen to air weeks in advance of that reveal,” he explains. “It’s a great gift to be called back to do something you once did before because it means somewhere along the way, someone making creative decisions liked what you were doing enough to want to bring you back. It’s a compliment and something I don’t take for granted.”
Stepping back onto the Burbank lot stirred vivid memories of his first Salem run. “We’re talking about a really different time,” Ramsey points out. “It was 2009, and I remember being in the hallway [and] Ali Sweeney [Sami Brady] had a group of people standing around, and she was trying to show all of them on a smartphone what this new thing was called a tweet. Twitter was brand new.”
Beyond the nostalgia, he also appreciated reconnecting with his costars. “To sit in that makeup room and laugh with Eric Martsolf [Brady Black] again all these years later, talk about going back in time,” Ramsey marvels. “I believe there was a screen test back then, and Galen [Gering, Rafe Hernandez] and Eric and I were all there for it, and they both started their roles at that time on the show, and I was brought in to create Owen a few months after that. So, for me to jump back in the saddle with them was wonderful, and I loved giving those guys big hugs and getting to reconnect with them. They’re such great guys and great actors, and it was a lot of fun being over there and seeing a lot of old friends again there as well.”
Portraying the complicated Owen after such a long break came with its own challenges, which gave Ramsey some new creative opportunities. “I thought, ‘How on earth is this going to go?’” he shares. “That was a different experience in terms of revisiting it because when you’re talking about 16 years, it’s enough of a lifetime that you have to ask yourself, ‘How can my character be coming back into this world after so long?’ and, ‘How can I help facilitate pushing their story forward in a way that makes sense?’”
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Once he received the script, however, the path became clear. “Then it just became a question of, how far can we go? How much fun can we have? How much is too much? Owen is a man who desperately wants to love and be loved and is lonely,” he notes.
Working with his new scene partners, Abigail Klein (Stephanie Johnson) and Robert Scott Wilson (Alexander Kiriakis) was a highlight for the actor. “Abigail and I got along really well, and she’s wonderful, a real pro,” he praises. “We really let ourselves go there and had a ball. Robert Scott Wilson and I got to work together, too, and he’s a great guy and a wonderful actor. He and I really got to step up to the plate together and had so much fun.”
That there are similarities between Owen and Peter August isn’t lost on the actor.
“I do see some similarities in the fact that when they show up, distressing things seem to happen, and some people seem to be very traumatized,” Ramsey says. “I just find that one of the best gifts any actor can be given is to find a way to create drama in the world of daytime television. I have loved playing both of them very much.”
Corday Productions/Days of our Lives
And while both roles lean into darkness, Ramsey embraces it. “I know what I’m capable of doing as a leading man and as a romantic lead,” he explains. “And I know a lot of actors that desperately want to sink their teeth into some of these great gifts that I’ve been given to play, some of these characters that are further out on the risk curve and deeper off the edge of darkness. I love every second of it and I always have. I’m always game for it. As an actor, I think it’s some of the most fun work we can ever be asked to do.”
As for whether Owen might return again, Rasmey isn’t closing the door. “I do hope there’s room for some of this to perhaps be revisited somewhere down the road,” he concludes.
Days of our Lives, Weekdays, Peacock
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