Dominic Zamprogna on His Daytime Emmy Nomination and Dante’s Heartbreaking ‘GH’ Year (EXCLUSIVE)
Plus, he gets candid about the ‘double-edged sword’ of Kelly Monaco’s exit as Sam McCall
With Daytime Emmy week upon us, lead actor nominee Dominic Zamprogna reflects on telling powerful storylines like his General Hospital character Dante Falconeri proposing to and then losing Kelly Monaco’s Sam McCall—which gave him the meaty material that put him in contention for Lead Performance in a Daytime Drama this year and also reset his soap opera’s canvas.
The General Hospital leading man—who’s going up against The Young and the Restless’ Peter Bergman and Days of Our Lives Eric Martsolf, Greg Rikaart and Paul Telfer at the awards show on Friday—also dishes on Dante’s epic year of change.
Plus, Zamprogna gets candid about life as a girl dad.
Dominic Zamprogna on the fallout from Sam McCall’s death
Over the last year on General Hospital, Dante has proposed to and lost Sam within 24 hours, seen first love Lulu wake up swinging, moved into the Quartermaine manse, learned Gio’s his son and most recently, welcomed back from the dead his former partner Nathan and Rocco’s scheming “surrogate” Britt.
“This guy’s been through more in the last 12 months than he’s been through in 12 years,” marvels Dominic Zamprogna, who first joined the show back in 2009. “There have been so many devastating moments. It’s been a terrifying place for him to be. But I love it! It keeps me busy and focused.”
The flood of juicy story started with Sam’s decision to donate part of her liver to Lulu, which led to Dante’s sweet hospital bedside proposal… followed by her shocking death.
“There’s big moments that I’ve been a part of on the show—like when Sonny shot Dante,” Zamprogna says. “You know you’re going to get some good material. And after it’s over, you look back on them and you’re like, ‘Wow, this was a pretty cool thing to be a part of.’
“Not that Sam’s death was cool!” he quickly adds. “That’s the double-edged sword, I guess. I didn’t know Kelly Monaco that well when we started working together, but we quickly became pretty tight and enjoyed working together. I also really liked the foundation of Dante and Sam. There was trust and love and family.
“But Sam was such a huge character that I knew the fallout of that story was going to be pretty grand, so I just wanted to deliver.”
Is Dante ready to love again—especially with Lulu?
With Dante’s proposal and eulogy part of the material that helped him land this year’s Daytime Emmy nomination, Zamprogna certainly did that.
As his character now approaches the one-year anniversary of Sam’s death, the widower is finding a new balance in life, not to mention with resurrected Lulu—with whom he recently exchanged a very meaningful glance at the mention of “true love” during Monica’s funeral!
“I imagine the end game could be them together… but I don’t think we’re there yet,” Zamprogna maintains. “There’s too much crap coming down the pike, still. This girl is also walking around with part of his dead fiancé inside of her—that’s going to take some reconciling!”
Dominic Zamprogna reveals he’s fighting the chemistry with Alexa Havins’ Lulu
Whatever’s to come for Dante and Lulu, Zamprogna admits he’s currently fighting the chemistry with Lulu-recast Alexa Havins.
“We joke, because she constantly reaches out for my hand in scenes or goes for affection, and I’m like, ‘No, no, no! I’m not into you like that, right now,’” he chuckles. “But it’s hard not to play that with her. Recently, we shot a scene and I felt like Dante wanted to connect with her. It was like this out of body thing. It’s an interesting feeling.
“And talk about nuanced,” he gushes of Havins. “Day one, I did a scene with Alexa, and I was like, ‘Oh wow!’ It took me out of the scene, because I realized how good she was.”
Dante, Brook Lynn & Gio: can co-parenting spark a reunion?
Meanwhile, as mad as Dante was when he learned Brook Lynn had secretly birthed and given up his baby when they were teenagers, their relationship has been shifting as they’ve struggled to connect with their newfound son, Gio.
“Amanda Setton and I are very conscious of certain moments that happen, and sometimes, we lean into them, because I think that’s only natural,” Zamprogna says. “These two were together at one point and now, they have a reason to coexist, team up, and need each other. So before you know it, they could be having a different feeling.
“Chase is also becoming very protective of Willow, right now,” he points out. “And I can’t help but think that maybe he would be a bit threatened by the Gio connection.”
Who shot Drew? Theories fans (and Dante) can’t ignore
These days, Dante is caught up in the investigation of who shot Drew. While Willow and Nina’s alibis have put them in the PCPD’s crosshairs, General Hospital viewers can’t stop talking about how Michael’s been acting since he returned from burn care in Germany.
“We call him ‘Dark Michael’ on set, because he’s literally dark,” Zamprogna cracks, referring to the physical differences between recast Rory Gibson and blue-eyed Chad Duell. “I had scenes with him where I mentioned, ‘You’ve changed since you came back from your accident.’ It was very funny.
“But I don’t know if Michael’s the one who shot Drew,” he hedges. “He’s the obvious choice, but the way Katey MacMullen plays it, there just seems to be something so broken about Willow… I could be wrong. I have no idea.”
‘Girl dad’ energy: how his daughters fuel the toughest scenes
Whether Dante’s facing disaster or celebration, Zamprogna is grateful for his three daughters with wife Linda Leslie, Anbilliene, 14, Eliana, 12, and Adeline Pauline, 10.
“People say actors gotta have a thick skin to handle all the rejection, but you just pretend to have a thick skin,” he says. “You have to have a thin skin so that things can get to you, and when you’ve got daughters, man, it’s like everything gets to you—their pain, their joy.
“So when I have to do an emotional scene, I don’t think about negative things,” he continues. “I think about their faces at the Taylor Swift concert, those pictures on the phone reminding of ‘10 years ago,’ and the joy that is innately them before all these societal pressures are added and create this heaviness on them—which breaks your heart, too.”
With his eldest 15, he confesses to having some fears for his girls, but so far, Dad is keeping his cool.
“I was saying to Jane Elliot the other day, ‘You get what you can handle,’ and she said something like, ‘No, you get what allows you to be the best that you can be,’” Zamprogna shares. “I’ve learned so much from being their dad. I’m so proud of them. It makes me want to cry talking about it.”
Daytime Emmys 2025: Zamprogna’s category, rivals & how to watch
After Dante’s rough year, General Hospital star Zamprogna’s thrilled to be going to the Daytime Emmys this Friday—when he’ll go up against soap opera stars Peter Bergman, Greg Rikaart, Paul Telfer, and Eric Martsolf for Lead Performance.
“I gotta say, I would like to win,” Zamprogna admits. “But nominated is really cool!”
He’s also thrilled that Jane Elliot will be inducted into The National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) Golden Circle—which honors her over 50 years as Tracy Quartermaine on General Hospital.
“Jane’s royalty in every sense of the word,” Zamprogna gushes to Woman’s World. “She’s the epitome of class and talent and beauty and grace. And she’s got it all. There’s a picture in the green room of her, probably 35 or 40 years ago—she had it then and she’s still got it now. I’m honored to work with her and to consider her a friend… I hope she considers me one!”
While the celebrations won’t be televised this year, soap fans can stream it on watch.theemmys.tv and through The Emmys app starting at 7:00 p.m. ET / 4:00 p.m. PT—or attend in person, with tickets on sale through Ticketmaster.
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