Portrait

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Child : Channing Capwell Junior

Dena Dietrich :
May 22 1985 (# 210) to January 02 1986 (# 364)

Sweet and loving woman, of a real understanding, Katie Wallace, during her brief appearance in Santa Barbara, seems to accept and endure all the revelations of her only son, Brick, with the greatest resilience. It is also without resentment and rancor that she finds Glenn, her husband, more than twenty years after their separation, perhaps ready to start with him a completely different relationship, more friendly than in love. Katie seems to live every event of life as a circus representation : once the performance is over, she appears to be no more affected than that. The only shadow in Katie's personality is in the past : her road once crossed Minx Lockridge's in the 1960s...

In full chase with Jack Lee's men, Brick finds refuge in his childhood circus. If he comes to hide there, it is also to talk about his new fiancée to his mother, who welcomes this news with joy. Katie, visibly touched by her son's feelings, is understanding and very happy for him, congratulating him on his choice. When she meets Amy, it is with true tenderness that she opens her arms to her, although she is pregnant with another man. She will easily grant her son her blessing for his wedding later on and will advise him, based on her experience with Glenn, to make his marriage work. Helped by Marisa Perkins, she manages to silence Brick's fears, on the eve of the big day.

Despite her deep kindness, Katie has to face, in reality, the anger and jealousy of Augusta Lockridge. First of all because Augusta is at the origin of the car accident that almost killed Brick and that forces him to receive a kidney transplant. Confident, Katie offers to search for Glenn, Brick's father, so that he can be tested as a donor. Then because she must, during a fortuitous meeting with Lionel, almost argue that she and Lionel do not know each other and that they were never lovers ! Katie's maternal instinct explodes in front of them, and she says she is ready to fight them to protect her son.

Katie is satisfied with this role of mother a little at a distance that she knew to build with Brick. She attends his wedding, meets again with Glenn and imagines herself as Johnny's grandmother, enjoying him every holidays. This split life projection collapses when Brick teaches her the truth : he is not her son, Channing Capwell Junior is her son. Katie accepts without explosion of anger, of pain, this new reality and swears to Brick that he is and will remain her little boy. If Katie goes to Channing Junior's grave, it is to better turn the page and finish with this representation so that she can move on to something else...

Dishonoured woman, remote mother... Katie is a woman who, at the end of her road, has lived with an artist's soul, from representation to representation, and who reconstructs herself with fragments of life : a husband more friend than lover, a son of heart that she loves deeply, a son of blood that she cannot imagine. Just like Glenn, Katie leaves Santa Barbara with the feeling of a bad representation...

It is a shame that Katie's character left town so quickly. The writers could have given her a lot more extent. The viewer was in right to expect fine oppositions with Minx Lockridge; Katie seeking revenge on her and Minx seeking to gain the trust and love of her grandson. Katie could have found in Sophia a strong ally and maintain a real tension between Augusta and Lionel, reinforcing the main storyline around the baby exchange...

Portrait written for this site by Lilian

Read also : Amy Perkins and Brick Wallace's wedding . Exchanged at birth and the revealed secret of a birth