A new role for Judith : mummy !
By Alena Prime, Télé Star, 1994	Home   Cette page en Français

The elegant house, lodged in the hills of Hollywood, resounds of the laughter of a pretty little 4 years old girl. "My daughter, my life !" The cry comes from the heart. Judith McConnell radiates of happiness by taking in her arms the little Gwendolyn. "To be mom is really the most beautiful role of my life." Gwendolyn has just entered to school. "Yes, I cried the first day. Gwen was less sad than me. It reassured me besides. Independence is very significant for a child."

Since the end of the shootings of Santa Barbara, Judith McConnell has all the time to be busy with her little "princess" she could finally adopt in 1990. "I frankly did not have time to annoy me. Gwendolyn has the age of discovering things and I want to be with her  to be able to share everything." And then, there was this new house that Judith wanted so much. "One of my priorities was to make remake the swimming pool. I need my half an hour of swimming per day. Then, I dealt seriously with the garden. It needed very quickly a place where Gwen can run and have fun. I installed a swing and a vat with sand even before having all my movables inside. Since am I here, I do not separate from my tools. I know that it is surprising to imagine Sophia Capwell repairing a tap which flees, but I like to tinker !"

Judith McConnell benefitted besides from the end of Santa Barbara to recover furnitures which formed part of the scenery of the show. "My friends were very astonished to see again in my living-room the crystal gloss of the Capwells !  I even borrowed movables to Nancy Grahn and the TV is the one I won while taking part, in an episode, at a bowling tournament with Jed Allan. It was well necessary that I fill all this bige house." A house where the big family of Santa Barbara reunites sometimes around a pleasant meal in  Judith's kitchen.

"Of course we keep contact ! You can move away from your family but you can't leave it. I am still the mom of the clan ! After all, I am the only Capwell to have preserved my role from the beginning until the end of the show. At the beginning, I was to play the character of Augusta who was given to Louise (Sorel). The producers then called my agent to know if I were interested by the role of Sophia. I came from New York on Tuesday, I signed the contract the same day and began playing three days after, without to have passed an audition. I didn't move from the studios during nine years." Judith will soon find the stages for another adventure. "I'm going to play a psychiatrist who, confined in an asylum for eighteen years, has felt the psychological after-effects of them.   It is a radical change of repertory but it is also one of the challenges with the job of actress. And then I will be glad to leave Sophia. The public identified me with her. She started to stick to me too much, that became suffocating !"