General Hospital: James Patrick Stuart Calls Valentin ‘Strangely Obsessed’ With Carly
When Carly (Laura Wright) began hiding fugitive Valentin in her attic on General Hospital, the improbable allies found unexpected common ground beyond their mutual desire to take down Jack Brennan (Chris McKenna), and their chemistry soon became impossible for the characters to ignore. Of course, once the pair slept together, things got exponentially more complicated — and while they agreed on the Tuesday, March 17 episode not to continue their physical relationship on the grounds that it would distract them from their mission to get revenge on Jack, it seems unlikely that they’ll be able to resist temptation. During a recent episode of the That’s Awesome podcast, James Patrick Stuart opened up to co-hosts Steve Burton (Jason) and Bradford Anderson (Spinelli) about his latest Port Charles pairing.
Anything But Love
“It’s one of those things where, ‘Who would have thought?’” Stuart marveled of the unlikely match-up between Carly and Valentin. On the subject of the duo’s first love scene, the actor offered high praise to how new leading lady Wright worked to make the encounter memorable for fans. “I love how much thought she puts into it and how ultimately everything just sort of gets reduced to what’s really essential,” he said. “If you go back and look at it, you realize it’s like, ‘Wow, you guys really got a lot of emotion going. You got a lot of people thinking about stuff.’ And not much was happening. It was just two people kissing each other. And I give her all the credit because I think the temptation is to just show everything and to do everything. She was like, ‘I think that we can be a little more thoughtful than that.’”
Valentin has, of course, been madly in love before, with both Nina (Cynthia Watros) and Anna (Finola Hughes), though Stuart maintains that his character is too dysfunctional for healthy emotional attachment. “I mean, he doesn’t have the ability to really love somebody — not in the legitimate way,” he mused. “But he certainly gets fascinated. And I think that Carly… she surprises the hell out of him by being something that he actually kind of related to more than he thought he was going to. And that’s kind of where we’re at now, is that he would probably be more inclined to just cut and run if he wasn’t strangely obsessed with the woman downstairs!”
Stay on Target
For now, Valentin and Carly are going to try to keep their hands off each other and their focus on their plan to punish Brennan. “The angle is to get Jack Brennan off his high horse and in prison and saddle him with everything,” Stuart explained. “I think the Cullum [Andrew Hawkes] and Sidwell [Carlo Rota] stuff” — which is to say, Sidwell’s secret partner being a bigwig at the WSB — “has now created a new opportunity that is actually bigger than the one [Valentin] thought there was. But certainly, in the meantime, what he’s trying to do is figure out what the heck it means that he’s now sleeping with the woman who’s been hiding him. So that’s kind of the immediate situation, but he’s also trying to get his name cleared so that he doesn’t have to be in hiding the rest of his life.”
Meanwhile, Jack has no idea that Carly is wise to him enlisting her daughter, Josslyn (Eden McCoy), for a dangerous gig as a WSB agent, much less that she has both partnered with Valentin against him and has taken him to bed! Stuart grinned that he was looking forward to Jack learning that Valentin is the new man in Carly’s life, calling it “part of the fun.” He added, “There’s going to be a ‘come to Jesus’ moment where [Jack] realizes what’s been happening, and what’s that going to be? Who’s going to say what to whom?”
Are you liking Carly and Valentin, or would you like to see Jack win back her trust? Let us know in the comments below!
