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Soap Opera Digest
September 5, 2006
Performer of the Week
Hillary B. Smith
(Nora, ONE LIFE TO LIVE)
It was a sure bet that we were
going to prefer whatever story OLTL gave Smith to do over the months they had
her languishing in a coma. Unfortunately, that story turned out to be another
couple of months of post-op stroke, isolating the character for much of the time
from the rest of the action in Llanview. But Smith was able to take those lemons
and make lemonade.
Nora has always been a strong,
tough lady. Since the hard-nosed attorney first stormed into Llanview 14 years
ago, she’s never been shy about speaking her mind, and Smith’s portrayal has
proven the actress to be quite the scene stealer. But the stroke changed things
by forcing a more subdued Nora, to say the least. Instead of grandstanding in
court before the entire town, Nora suddenly found herself bedridden, struggling
with the most mundane tasks (speaking, walking) and having to accept that she
needed help. It provided us with a number of sweet scenes between her and R.J.,
whose affection for Nora bubbled to the surface when she needed him most,
especially considering that Nora’s best friend, Evangeline, was busy dealing
with blindness, a neck injury and a jealous love triangle. It also resulted in
adorable scenes between Nora and Matthew, who made his mother proud by showing
the maturity to call the newly unemployed Paige to be his mother’s nurse when
stubborn Nora fired the last one.
Smith made the most of every
one of those quiet scenes. She showed how Nora went from frustrated to
determined, and then hinted that the witty, tough woman we have known and loved
for more than a decade was on her way back.
“I can get out of bed myself,
I can walk, you know?” she told Matthew. “I’m not running any 10K’s, but I’m
doing pretty good.”
With a sagging face, slurred
speech and weak voice, Smith carefully gave us a glimpse of Nora’s enduring
strength, and if anyone failed to jump in her corner at the outset of this
ordeal, surely they were rooting for her by the end. |
