Star Tracks: Brynn Thayer

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Star Tracks: Life After Soaps
Brynn Thayer: No Objections
Soap Opera Weekly, April 13, 1993

Having just begun its seventh season this past January, the courtroom drama Matlock, starring Andy Griffith as lawyer Benjamin Matlock, has undergone some major changes, including a new timeslot (Thursdays, 8-9 p.m. EST) and a new network (ABC). It has also added Brynn Thayer (ex-Jenny Renaldi, One Life To Live, 1978-86) to its cast as Leanne McIntyre, another lawyer who happens to be Matlock's daughter.

The character of Leanne was introduced in last season's final episode. Thayer, however, had appeared in an episode of the show a few months prior to that. "I did a guest role as a murderess who was out to get Ben," she says. "She tried to make him fall in love with her. They (the producers) liked the chemistry between Andy and myself, so they asked me to come back."

Thayer sees some humor in the casting: As a woman out to seduce Matlock, she had such good chemistry with Griffith that she was asked back to play his daughter. Both, however, are roles with which Thayer
can identify, minus the homicidal inclinations. She describes Griffith as
"a very sexy man" as well as "the father we all want to have. A lot of people tell me that Andy looks like their father. Then you meet their fathers and they look nothing like Andy. But they see in Andy all the things they love about their own fathers."

Thayer is a longtime fan of Griffith's. "I still watch 'The Andy Griffith Show'," she says. "It comes on every day at about 5:30 in the afternoon. He's such a great actor. He makes it all look so easy. On 'Matlock', he's in every scene. Even if he's not onscreen, his presence is there."

One of the ongoing appeals of the show that Thayer sees, beyond Griffith himself, is Matlock's commitment to justice and the way he goes about it. "He doesn't use violence," she points out. "He gets at the truth by asking the right questions. He's a brilliant lawyer. I think people really like watching him in action."

While primetime is flooded right now with an array of female lawyers ("Reasonable Doubt's" Marlee Matlin; the women on "L.A. Law"), Thayer feels that the fact that she's Matlock's daughter makes her stand out. "He's the best there is," she says of Matlock's courtroom skills. "That is something she always has to contend with.

"There is some competition, some tension between them," she adds. "The tension comes from the fact that they are so much alike. The two of them don't see it, but everybody else around them does. They're both obstinate. They're driven. They're workaholics."

Unlike the majority of primetime series, "Matlock" is filmed not in Los Angeles but in Wilmington, North Carolina, near where Griffith lives. Thayer could not be happier about the location. "I'm on the beach. The weather's great. It's gorgeous here."

"I've always gotten these great locations," she continues. Several years ago, for "One Life To Live" she and co-star Michael Zaslow (ex-David Renaldi; currently Roger on Guiding Light) shot some scenes in Vienna. Filming the short-lived TV-series "Island Son" with Richard Chamberlain afforded her the opportunity to live in Hawaii. "It was such a special, mystical place. That's been Richard's home for quite a while. He knew a great deal about the island, the culture and the history, and he was more than willing to share that information with any of us. He was able to show me and others places on the island other than where you would go as a tourist, burial grounds and waterfalls, glorious places. It was hard to leave."

"Island Son" was Thayer's second shot at a primetime series. The year before (the 1988-89 season) she starred on the high school drama "TV 101". "Somebody the other day referred to it as a pre-'Beverly Hills, 90210'. Maybe we were too ahead of our time," she says, noting the show's short lifespan.

The series cast Thayer as a schoolteacher, a job she held in real-life before she landed the role of Jenny on OLTL. "I was an elementary school teacher," she says. "I taught fifth grade." Thayer went from teaching to acting with no formal training. OLTL was in fact, her first acting job. She was not, however, totally unprepared for the experience, since she had been watching the show for years. So, she knew what was going on not only with the role of Jenny, which she was taking over from Katherine Glass, but with all of Llanview. "I learned so much about acting just watching the soaps," she says.

Her OLTL co-stars, she adds, were more than willing to give her all the help they could. "I remember Judith (Light, ex-Karen Wolek), Robin (Strasser, who recently returned as Dorian) and Steve (Fletcher, ex-Brad Vernon, now Hank on AW) staying late nights to go through scenes with me. They were just so generous with their time." The actress now counts them among her closest friends along with her former husband Gerald Anthony (ex-Marco, OLTL) and Zaslow. "Michael and his wife and their two daughters came and visited me in Wilmington for a week," she says.

Thayer had not only remained friends with many of her former castmates, she has stayed a loyal fan of OLTL and the entire ABC lineup. "I got into the habit of watching all the ABC shows while I was doing OLTL," she says. "Now I always have them on in my trailer, from 'Loving' all the way through 'General Hospital'." While she believes that OLTL got off track a bit in recent years, she says, "I do like what they're doing with the show now."*

--Gerald J. Waggett