Rick entered the room with a bunch of exuberant ya’lls.  He’d just made an appearance on the one of the Dallas morning news TV shows.  First off he asked who had never been to a PA before and got a rather large show of hands.   Greg’s friends apparently took him out on the town the night before and he was still trying to recover from their dragging him around from bar to bar.  Rick used to live in Plano and at one point, he asked if they were near Plano and got the answer “Dude, you’re in Plano” to which he responded “where did all this come from?”  He commented on the large size of the beers he was served with “yep, this is Texas, and everything’s bigger in Texas”.  Then he mentioned that he was a light-weight and only had 2 but that was enough to do him in (see Greg’s recaps to see him take apart that story!)   Q&A:   Q:  How did you and Nancy get through the Christmas tree scenes without cracking up yourselves?  The fan also thanked Ric for the laughter   (Ric laughed) Well, about 95% of the stuff that Nancy & I do is actually scripted and not adlibbed.  He also admitted that he put those scenes on his Emmy tape.  With all of the drama going on, like with the current kidnapping story, it can get rather depressing, that’s why it’s good to do other things, like the comedy and other projects.  He mentioned that he has been working everyday since the new year and that his family didn’t know who he was anymore.  He talked a while about the movie project that he’s working on with Corbin Bernsen, Carpool Guy.  For more information on the project, visit http://www.carpoolguy.com/

Q:  Do you play an instrument, sing, dance, etc?  I play the guitar a little, not very well.  I am an actor who dances well, he mentioned training with the salsa, mamba, rumba, cha-cha, etc. and he sings with his ipod.   Q:  If Joel (Rick’s character from Carpool Guy) saw Liz and Alexis on the side of the road, which one would he pick up?  I don’t know, he wouldn’t pick up either of them because Joel doesn’t know them, he’d pick up Tony (Geary, who’s also working on the project).  He went on to compliment Tony and said that Tony left him starstruck.   Q:  Out of the all the soaps that you’ve worked on, who would you like to work with again?  He mentioned Melina Kanakaredes, then went on to say that he didn’t really know, that he likes to find the best in the person he’s with at any given moment.  He would like more scenes with Maurice because the Sonny character is the key to all the issues that are bouncing around in Ric’s head, and he thinks that we’re going to be seeing a lot more of that soon, that a lot more will be resolved.  His contract is up in October.

Q:  Who do you think is the most underused talent on the show?  Robin Christopher has so much to give.  He also mentioned that he was disappointed that he didn’t get to work in a more friendly way with Carly, but that Tamara Braun was a very strong convictions that her character would never be friendly with Ric because of what he did to her.  He also mentioned that he would like the opportunity for Ric to apologize to Carly.  Other people bring up what Ric’s done to beat up on him with it but until recently he’s never talked about it himself.  He mentioned the scene with Becky from last week (karmic justice) was a last minute add-in to the show because they were short scenes so Elizabeth Korte wrote a quick scene for him and Becky to discuss what he did and he was pleased that he got to finally talk about that himself.    Q:  But Ric does hold the “keys to the kingdom” meaning in charge of the PCPD?  Ric will never have control over that, won’t happen.  He talked about the chapel scene with Sonny where he was praying when Michael was ill then laughed when the audience groaned.  “I know, I know, John Gotti was the most devout of catholics bless me father for I have sinned...” then he made shooting sound effects.    Q:  How could Ric, the DA, represent his wife against his brother in a custody trial?  I know, I know, he launched into a story about the judge saying just that then realized he was talking about the Nikolas murder trial, which got a few compliments from the audience on the judge and how great the actor was.  He told us that when he called for a recess during the trial, he adlibbed banging the gavel and then jumped up and left the courtroom, and they were all so surprised they all jumped up with him.  Ric commented that the cast of GH is “collectively the best, bar none”.   Q:  About the spoiler that Faith will tell him that she pushed Liz down the stairs, causing her to miscarry?  Rick said that they were very sad to see Cynthia Preston leave, they adore her but Faith has done so many heinous deeds that she had to go.  He talked about the scene and commented that at one point, the camera freezes on his face after she tells him and he looks like he wants to rip her head off.  Everyone who’s pregnant ends up falling down the stairs, that’s how we found out Alexis was pregnant.  He commented that earlier in his storyline that he felt that Ric needed to go to jail.

Q:  Would you like to see Ric’s father come to PC?  He hopes so, would like additional issues for the character of Ric so that you’re not seeing the same fights over and over.  He commented that there were a lot of scenes that he played with the idea that Trevor’s voice was reverberating in his head, poisoning him against other versions of what might have happened.  He mentioned a scene with Alexis in the Cellar where they were discussing their childhoods and she brought up the idea that maybe his father was wrong about what had happened.  Maybe they can tackle the father story in his next contract?    Q:  Wouldn’t that make a good point with the new baby on the way?  Yes.   He commented on how Carly has forgiven Lorenzo for what he did but not Ric.  He commented on how character-driven stories are not so much anymore.  He talked about watching the reels for the Emmy judging panel and how he was drawn into some of the stories.   He talked about how originally he was supposed to be Lily’s brother who had come to town to avenge her death on Sonny, but one day Chuck glanced at one of the screens and thought he had seen Mo but it turned out to be Rick, so after having seen Rick’s character on Y&R they devised a plan to make him Sonny’s brother instead.   Q:  about the NYE episode with the “Titanic lady” – It was a lot of listening and that’s how you relate to people by thinking about something in your past that is similar to their experience.

Q:  Comedy or Drama?  The comedic stuff is fun because it’s a challenge.  Rick talked about the director that they’ve had on the show since the very beginning (I believe he said Joe Behr) and that he has done this so long that he has everything down to a system.  You just come in and he’s knows exactly where each camera’s going and when.  Rick snapped his fingers for effect, “camera 1 3 2 3 ”  but when Nancy and I get going we talk faster than the cameras are moving and it’s like “whoah, cut, cut, cut again!”  LOL.    The dramatic stuff is great because it allows you to see how far you can go.  He used the scene where Ric thinks about smothering Liz with a pillow for an example.  To get the mood on, he lit some candles in his dressing room and played Peter Gabriel’s “Passion”, then imagined himself spinning out of control before coming out to do the scene.   Q:  How do you leave that kind of emotion at work after doing a scene like that?  The drive home is his detox time.  He talked about the movie Carpool Guy a little bit more.  He mentioned that he has always been a talker that he even talked when his mother placed him in the corner.   Q:  Do you watch yourself on the show?  Yes, he does, he likes to critique himself and probably shouldn’t and often asks his wife what she thinks if he wonders if he was being over the top.  She probably loves him being on GH because of his lack of sex scenes.  Yea, she’s probably like “come home to Mommy.”

Rick then went around the room signing autographs and posing for pictures.  I was able to ask him a couple of questions while he was at our table.  I asked him about the Ric/Alexis scene that was cut during the church at Nikolas and Emily’s wedding, the one with the media pic in the church in front of the candles (on the label of edit #9).  Rick said that he was unaware that the scene had been cut.  He told me that it was a scene where he was reassuring Alexis that everything was going to be alright with the custody trial.  That when two non-religious people come together in a place like that, being a church, that they can have very interesting reactions to things, similar to the “miracles” chapel scene.  The table got into a discussion on all of Nikolas’s sex scenes and how he’s the only one that gets them and Rick laughed that Tyler’s got those abs worked out so he can just rip off his shirt on command.  He also commented that part of the scene where he was on the verge of smothering Liz was cut down, that he had done the scene where Ric slowly walks up to the drawer where the linens were kept and pulled it out and looked down at the pillow before slowly drawing it out and walking slowly across the room before pausing halfway, which is where the actual scene that aired started.  He said that it was felt that it showed too much premeditation on Ric’s part and that it would have been too much to show the scene in its entirety.   Don’t hate me because I’m lucky!  LOL.  I won 2 items at Rick’s event in the raffle, a beautiful heart shaped ceramic Christmas ornament which I had Rick sign when he came by my table and a Christmas CD with various soap stars singing the songs including Rick & Cynthia.