Life After Carly
In a way, saying goodbye to GENERAL HOSPITAL’s Carly Corinthos broke Sarah Brown’s heart as much as leaving a long-term boyfriend would. “I broke up with the love of my life of five years,” the three-time Emmy winner tells Soaps In Depth referring to her former alter ego. “I needed at least two months to sit and let it go. You can’t start a new relationship when you’re still in love with an old flame. I had to be at peace with letting go of that character, that job, that whole experience, so I could walk into a new place.”
When at last her healing was complete, the actress was ready to open herself up to different roles. In no time, she had been cast as ambitious journalist Emma Shepard opposite Adrian Pasdar on MYSTERIOUS WAYS, the PAX networks X-FILES/TOUCHED BY AN ANGEL hybrid. As her October 16 debut nears, she looks back at the home that she left, and ahead at the road she is traveling.
“Carly was following me around!”
Before getting signed for the three-and-possibly-more-episodes MYSTERIOUS WAYS story arc, Brown first had to put to rest the memories of Carly that dogged her everywhere. “You can’t do a character for five years and shake her that easily,” she observes. “I brought Carly into a lot of auditions when she wasn’t right. She was following me around–the way she walks, talks, moves, her attitude…
“I stopped auditioning for two months because I needed to focus,” she continues. “It wasn’t going to help me if I was still carrying this character around. Now, I’m free of that, and that’s really a big, big thing.”
She’s very impulsive…”
On MYSTERIOUS WAYS, which chronicles the efforts of Declan Dunn (played by Pasdar) to prove that miracles truly happen, Brown adds chaos and romance to the mix. “Emma is a journalist who is constantly looking for that story that will give her that big break and get her a position as a hard news anchor,” she elaborates. “She’s very impulsive, which sometimes gets in the way.”
Emma meets Declan when he interrupts her during an on-air interview, and their attraction builds from their. “This is a fabulous gig,” enthuses the single mother of one daughter, Jordan, 3. “It’s a family show that kids can watch with their parents and then talk about, which really appeals to me.”
“It’s not enough for me to just be really good!”
The timing of MYSTERIOUS WAYS couldn’t have been better for Brown, either. The break she took did more than help her put Carly to bed, it enabled her to regain a clear picture of what she truly wants. “I searched myself to remember what’s really important about acting and to get my focus and drive back,” she says. “When you’re working all the time, and you have a job, it’s very different than trying to get a job. Trying to get a job, you have to be that much better. To audition is such a different process than actually being able to do a role. I’d like to get myself to a place where I’ve done enough work that people know that I can act.”
That said, directing is still in Brown’s foreseeable future; in fact, within 10 years, she hopes to help a major motion picture. “Although I will do my own short films, professionally, you have to have a laser focus on what it is that you want,” she asserts. “To try to be a jack of all trades at this point in my career, when I haven’t established myself on firm ground as an actress in the outside world of primetime and film, is premature. I have so much to learn about acting and about being great at it. It’s not enough for me to just be really good. I want to be great.”
“The show must go on!”
While Brown pursues her goals, GH is forging forward with her old character’s relationship with husband Sonny–but with a new Carly, Tamara Braun, in her place. Nonetheless, Brown remains a trouper. “At the end of the day, the show must go on,” she says. “And that’s what’s really important, that the show continues grow and thrive, and the fans are happy and excited.”
Although her confidence level is high, Brown firmly believes that her immediate success is due in large part to luck–and also to her wonderfully supportive admirers. “I knew that I was really going to have to hone my craft when I left daytime, and be better than I’ve ever been,” she shares.
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