| Name |
Helen Wagner |
| Height |
|
| Naionality |
American |
| Date of Birth |
3-September-1918 |
| Place of Birth |
Lubbock, Texas, U.S. |
| Famous for |
Acting |
Helen Wagner was an American actress. Born in Lubbock, Texas, she is best known for her long-running role as Nancy Hughes McClosky on the soap opera As the World Turns. Wagner also played the role of Trudy Bauer during the initial TV years of Guiding Light in the early 1950s. She also appeared on the early soap Valiant Lady, as well as on 1950s primetime programs including The World of Mr. Sweeney, Mister Peepers, Inner Sanctum, and the Philco-Goodyear Playhouse. Wagner died on May 1, 2010, at the age of 91. The cause of her death was cancer.
Wagner played the soap opera's matriarch, Nancy Hughes, from its debut on April 2, 1956, until her death. She is acknowledged by the Guinness Book of Records for having the longest run in a single role on television. In fact, Wagner spoke the show's very first line, "good morning, dear," and would go on to witness its many broadcast transformations. As The World Turns premiered as a 30-minute program and was the first soap opera, along with The Edge of Night, to do so. Up until that time, all soaps ran for only 15-minutes. Advertisers were skeptical at first, finding it hard to believe that the average housewife had the attention span to tune to one soap opera for a half hour. The show would hit ratings gold within three years. After a number of years of broadcasting live and in black-and-white, it would eventually go on to air on tape and in color and expand to a full hour.
On November 22, 1963, Wagner inadvertently became part of broadcast history. About ten minutes into that day's episode of As the World Turns, a scene featuring Wagner's character was interrupted by Walter Cronkite's first news bulletin that President John F. Kennedy had been shot in Dallas, Texas (this bulletin was audio only, as the studio camera was not ready until 20 minutes later). Wagner later remembered that she and actor Santos Ortega, who played Grandpa Hughes, continued with the scene as it was broadcast live, unaware of the unfolding national tragedy until they were told about it during a commercial break.
