‘I Don’t Really Care What People Think About Me Anymore’: Alley Mills on Emmy Win, Widowhood and ‘GH’ Villain Heather (EXCLUSIVE)
The 'General Hospital' star, 74, shares truth about her Emmy, soap villainy and newfound freedom joining the 'We Do Not Care Club'
Alley Mills loves playing General Hospital’s scheming, madcap and dangerous Heather Webber—not to mention getting goofy as The Bold and the Beautiful’s wacky Pam! This year, however, the two-time Daytime Emmy-winner took home the gold for playing Heather’s uncharacteristically grounded efforts to make sense of the evil she’d done as Port Charles’ Hook Killer.
Here, The Wonder Years alum talks to Woman’s World about playing this iconic soap opera villain, questions Heather’s redemption, and reveals why she wasn’t 100 percent thrilled to win the Daytime Emmy for Guest Performance this year. (Hint: It has to do with her onscreen daughter!)
Mills, who lost her beloved husband Orson Bean in 2020, also reveals how widowhood has helped her join the ‘We Do Not Care Club.’
Plus, with the soap opera star confident Avery Pohl’s Esme Prince is alive and unwell as ever, General Hospital’s back-to-back Daytime Emmy-winning headwriters Chris Van Etten and Elizabeth Korte weigh in on whether or not we could see the presumed dead troublemaker again!
Alley Mills dedicates her second Daytime Emmy to Avery Pohl–‘This is for you, baby!’
The last time we caught up with Alley Mills, she reflected on the challenge of finding redemption for a character like General Hospital’s Heather Webber—and now, she’s celebrating a Daytime Emmy win for Outstanding Guest Performance for having delivered on that challenge.
“Why, it feels great,” she grins. “But I actually wanted my girl, Avery Pohl, to win. This is for you, baby!”
Pohl was nominated for playing her onscreen daughter, Esme Prince, who was hidden from the canvas until she showed up fully formed and just as maniacal as her iconic parents, Heather and John Lindstrom’s Ryan.
After Mills assumed the role Robin Mattson created in 1976, Heather claimed Esme, donned a hook and killed Port Charles locals in the name of avenging her. Then, it was revealed Heather was suffering from metalosis—and while that explanation was deliciously soapy, Mills earned this year’s nod for her grounded performance.
“I was very surprised,” she admits of her win. “It was serious stuff. But the headwriters of General Hospital are the ones that created this amazing character. I just get to play it and I love her. It’s so fun to be a lunatic!”
‘GH’ Emmy-winning headwriter says Alley Mills ‘always surprises me’
While Mills credits the show’s Daytime Emmy-winning headwriters, Chris Van Ettan and Elizabeth Korte are quick to turn the compliment back on her.
“Alley brings so many different levels to her character,” Van Ettan marvels. “She always surprises me, because we did not set out to write a two-dimensional serial killer. We set out to make a fun, interesting woman who had a big heart but was capable of a lot of horrible things. She did all that, and did it in spades. It was just a surprise every time I turned on the TV and saw what she did with it.”
Korte adds that not all actors could have pulled off this redemption tale.
“The acting leads the writing,” she insists. “Alley is such a tremendous actress that she was able to give us a reason why this person actually had good intentions when she did that crazy stuff. And when we gave her a medical reason, she just embraced that and played the humanity of finding out that you’ve done something horrible. She was just terrific.”
Alley Mills on her giant family holiday gatherings–‘It’s like a cornucopia of amazing things!’
While awards, accolades and delicious villainy are all well and good, like many of us, Mills is currently gearing up for a festive holiday season in the real world.
“For both Thanksgiving and Christmas, we have a very big family—like 35 people!—and then orphans come, cousins come, everybody comes,” she cheers. “It’s at my house, and I don’t have a dishwasher. It’s a lot of dishes. That’s the hard part, but the kids do that and I get to drink wine. My husband’s ex-wife is an amazing cook, so she cooks. Everybody brings stuff. It’s like a cornucopia of amazing things!”
Widow Alley Mills says, ‘I don’t give a sh-t what anyone thinks about me anymore!’
One person who will be missing from Mills’ holiday table is her late husband, actor Orson Bean, who was taken by a traffic accident in 2020 at the age of 91.
Though she’s still mourning her love, she admits the devastating loss has given her an unexpected gift.
“I don’t really care what people think about me anymore,” she shares. “I used to, and as an actor, that’s not a good thing. You have to do it because you love it. You have to be kind to people because you really love them. So I don’t give a $%@! what anyone thinks about me anymore. I feel free from that. It’s really interesting, why being a widow would have given me that freedom..
“Heather also helped give me that freedom, because she doesn’t care,” she adds. “She never cared, and there’s so much fun in freedom!”
‘GH’ headwriter on Heather or Esme returning–‘You can’t keep a good bad girl down’
After saying that, Mills realizes that’s not quite true. In addition to her fierce dedication to Esme and a strange kinship with Laura, there are people who keep General Hospital’s Heather on her toes.
“Sonny… when he came in, she was kind of like, ‘Maybe I better be nice to this guy,’” Mills recalls with a chuckle. “Because, you know what? He’s got a gun! So she cares about people with power, but there aren’t many.”
As for whether Port Charles residents are truly safe from redeemed Heather, who left canvas to live with Steven, or presumed drowned Esme, our sources say: Not likely!
“I’ll have to ask the General Hospital writers if my remorse was really serious… or just really good acting on Heather’s part,” Mills cracks to Woman’s World. “And the Seine ain’t that deep! They dredge things out of the Seine all the time. So just like I said to my grandson, ‘I’ll be back.’ And I wouldn’t be surprised if bubbles are coming out of the Seine, and it’s Esme.”
General Hospital co-headwriter Van Etten chimes in to tease: “You can’t keep a good bad girl down. That’s all I’ll say!”
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