Helen Wagner Passes Fifty Years on “As the World Turns”

Helen Wagner has achieved an impressive milestone: Half a century playing the same television character.

While actors young enough to be her grandchildren come and go on television, soap opera veteran Helen Wagner has earned a place in the Guinness World Records by playing one role for 50 years.

The 87-year-old actress says the secret to her longevity as matriarch Nancy Hughes on the CBS daytime drama “As the World Turns” is simple. “They kept offering me a contract, so I kept doing it. And they kept writing things for me, so I kept saying them,” Wagner recounted in a recent interview. “I didn’t think about leaving or not leaving.”

Years after James Arness of “Gunsmoke” and Kelsey Grammer of “Frasier” retired from their respective record-tying 20-year roles in prime time, Wagner still reigns supreme as the longest-running character on any TV show played by a single actor. She has portrayed the kindly but plain-spoken Nancy Hughes since “As the World Turns” debuted on April 2, 1956, and even uttered the show’s very first line of dialogue (spoken to her TV husband): “Good morning dear, what would you like for breakfast?”

As the sole original cast member on the series, Wagner and her alter ego have witnessed more than their share of tragedy and star-crossed romance, sibling rivalries, marital infidelity and treachery. Nancy has grieved the deaths of her beloved TV daughter and first husband, remarried and endured the gradual fading of her second spouse due to Alzheimer’s disease.