Adam Huss talks to us about filling in as Nikolas Cassadine on General Hospital, his family and more! Learn more here---->>
Adam Huss recently
stepped in to play Nikolas Cassadine on General Hospital while
Marcus Coloma was out sick with Covid. His performance delighted fans of the
dark Cassadine Prince and reminded long-time viewers of Nikolas’ father,
Stavros Cassadine, who was last played by Robert Kelker-Kelly. Adam very
graciously sat down to talk to us after a long day of shooting on the set of
his new project. Keep reading to find out what we learned in this entirely
delightful conversation!
The thing that stood out
the most about the Long Island native was his humbleness, candor, and true love
of acting. The joy he finds in his work radiates off of him when he talks about
it. He was very excited to hear that his temporary run as Nikolas was
well-received by the fans. About the role of Nikolas Cassadine, he told us, “I
really am super grateful because I love what I do and to get to do that for
four episodes, I felt so lucky and blessed.”
Adam is from a very
close-knit family. He is the middle child of 3 sons and has 6 nieces as part of
the family that he clearly adores. “They're just awesome. I really love them
and they're very supportive and very excited about all this stuff.” He’s also
been happily married for over 3 years and the couple shares an adorable pup,
Sawyer.
His love of acting
started in his living room and local theater where he became immersed in TV
shows and movies as a child and connected with the characters on a deep level.
He would reenact his favorite scenes in his backyard, telling us, “They were my
friends in my mind, my imagination. I was a loner, and I was a middle kid and
those were my people. I always had an affinity for anything that was to do with
television and movies.”
His love of all things
TV and movies developed into a desire to act himself and he nurtured that in
college, “When I went to college, I thought, I need a craft, I need to study, I
can't just do this. You could be born with instinctual stuff, and I think
people are. But I also wanted to hone that craft.”
He studied under Gene
Lesser who really pushed and inspired Adam toward his dream of acting, “The guy
was not kind, he was harsh, he was hard, but he was real. He was authentic. He
knew his shit and I wanted that.”
After college, he
visited his friend, writer Colleen McGuinness (About A Boy, 30
Rock) in LA and took acting workshops while he was there. His fellow actors
encouraged him to make the move to LA, so he took the leap. “I don't know how I
did it because I'm so close to my family, but I just knew I had to do it. I was
green as hell, and I was always nervous and trying to find my way. And just
over the years I started working on myself as well as my acting craft and
loving myself and owning who I am and not being ashamed of things I was ashamed
of. I really got into therapy too, which I'm a big advocate of.”
Things he learned from
Lesser helped him on that journey, “Gene Lesser would say to us, ‘if you have
problems, if you have issues, I don't want to see them on stage. Work through
that shit. Own who you are, know who you are. If you feel fat, either be
comfortable feeling fat or lose the weight. I don't want to see that on stage.
I don't want to see Adam’s shit on stage. I want you to learn about that stuff
and then use it as the character.’ That really resonated with me, so I sought
out therapy at 24 and I started really soul-searching. That really helped me
know who I was.”
His acting journey led
him to a role on the hit show Power. “It was everything I wanted;
it was surreal. I had to leave and go to New York. I was in a relationship, a
serious one, and I had to leave that relationship, leave my dog, who I love
with all my heart. I had to just go to New York for six months and shoot the
first season with no money and all of a sudden it was all happening. I was
sitting with 50 Cent and all these cast members, and we were eating dinner at
these expensive steak restaurants and every single thing that I learned to get
there, I will say, I gave away.”
“I just wanted to be
liked. I wanted to be kept on the show. And it taught me so much. I gave so
much of myself away. Everyone was finding their feet. It was a lot of people's
first show and so there was just a lot of chaos. A lot of people were just lost
a bit. And I lost myself too, trying to stay grounded, trying to stay on the
show.”
After 3 seasons his
fears were realized, and he explained to us, “Long story short, I was written
off. It was my worst fear come true. Everyone thinks you get this one big
opportunity and then everything changes in your life. And it didn't. It changed
for a little while and then I was out of work. It didn't change my career how I
thought it would. And I learned a lot again. I learned I had to go right back
into that self-reflection and learn how to shore up my foundation and not lose
myself like that again. So, I really don't have regrets because I think it
needed to happen for me to be who I am today.”
His life coach and
therapist of 25 years, Maryann Russo, helped him with this, “She said to me,
‘you gotta stay out of expectation and stay in aspiration.’ And so now that's
what I focus on. Every day I'm grateful to have what I got coming to me. I
trust that there's an HP up there and that things are meant to be. And if it's
not mine, it's not mine. If it is, it is.”
This lesson helped him
with his career, especially in temporary roles, like playing Nikolas. “Even
with this show, I have to think of it that way. If this role comes back around,
or some other role than it was meant to be. And it's hard because it's
stability, it’s really satisfying gratifying work and you have to let go of
that and say ‘I might not have a job next week. And that's just the way it
is’.”
Adam shared with us how stepping
into the role was for him, “This came along, and I felt really ready, I felt
like okay, this is a big deal. I'm stepping in. I got 65 pages to learn in 36
hours. I want to own this. I don't want to steal anyone's job, but I want to
step in and do exactly what you said I did.”
“We're rehearsing and
all of a sudden, we're switching. We're doing three episodes in this one day.
And then different directors coming after three scenes and then a different
director. And when the nerves started creeping up, I said, ‘you've done this,
you know, yourself' and all the work I’ve done, that even I doubt sometimes,
was taking over.”
He got to work with all
three of Nikolas’ leading ladies and he had nothing but praise for them. He had
this to say about working with Avery Pohl who plays Esme Prince, “She's
spectacular. She reminds me of the way Marcia Cross played Kimberly on Melrose
Place, really crazy, but that grounded, crazy. And that's scary. It was
fun, fun, fun to play off of her.”
“She is a consummate professional
as well. She was so pleasant, so kind, made me feel so good and welcome. It
just put me right at ease. Love her and on set, amazing as well.”
Working with Rebecca
Herbst, who plays Elizabeth Webber, was its own amazing experience for him. “I grew
up watching her and seeing her in those magazines. So, to be with her was a
little intimidating. And she walks up and she's a little more reserved, she
does her thing. She has her routine. I respect that you're doing that for 25
years, you know, what your routine is. I didn't want to get too much in her
space, but she wound up just being so generous and kind with me. I just felt
such a warmth toward her. I really felt like we had chemistry in our scenes. I felt Nikolas’ draw to her. I know he’s not supposed to be into her, but I could really feel their past. I felt that warmth from Rebecca as well.”
He had worked with Maura
West, who plays Ava Jerome when he filled in as Nikolas in 2021 and enjoyed it
just as much this time, “I worked with Maura last time and she was lovely. I
have such a soft spot for her.”
He and Maura
collaborated on a small change in the script direction this last go-round. At
the end of the scene they shared, Ava is leaving Wyndemere and Nik is right
behind her. They are very close, but her back is to him as they talk. He told
us, “What the director wanted to play was a little different. And she said,
‘no, I think it's better if I don't look at you’ and I said, ‘I love that, I
feel that’ and she's said, ‘me too. I love it, let's do that’. So, the
director's saying, ‘we have the camera, you have to move’. And she said, ‘no,
we decided we're doing this’ and he said ‘ok, cool’.” Anyone who has seen that
scene knows they made the right choice!
After Adam filled us in
about his time on General Hospital, he also shared with us his
passions for things that aren’t acting, “I'm producing too. I am producing a
lot. I have a company called Molecule Productions. I wrote a feature film
before the pandemic, but really launched into it over the pandemic, because
what else was I gonna do? And I didn't want to sit idle. So, I wrote a
coming-of-age high school movie very John Hughes-Esq, but this generation, the
generation Z, and it's being developed by Hunter Arnold (Kinky Boots, Dear
Evan Hansen) and we’re aiming to shoot in the fall.”
“I am a voracious
reader, really, I am. I love it. I listen to books when I'm working out. I read
books on my Kindle at night before bed. I love comic books. I still collect TV
and film action figures. I also love the outdoors. I really do love nature. It
speaks to my soul. I love camping. I love hikes. I love getting away and
traveling.”
We loved talking to Adam Huss and getting to know the man who stepped into such a daunting role and made it look so easy. We would love to see him back on General Hospital! Maybe a recast AJ Quartermaine or Zander Smith…let us know your thoughts on who you would like to see him portray and follow Adam on his personal Instagram to find out where you can see him next.
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