Where the Stars of ‘The Bold and the Beautiful’ Are Today

Before her iconic 25-year run as CBS’s The Bold and the Beautiful‘s matriarch Stephanie Forrester, Susan Flannery starred as Laura Horton on NBC’s daytime soap opera Days of Our Lives from 1966 to 1975. She also appeared opposite Paul Newman and Steve McQueen in one of the most famous disaster movies of all time, The Towering Inferno.

She appeared in B&B’s first episode, left in 2012, returned in 2018, and stepped away in 2023 after more than 3,600 episodes. She also directed 31 episodes!

Susan’s powerful portrayal of Stephanie Forrester garnered nine Daytime Emmy Award nominations, three wins, and the top spot on We Love Soaps’ “50 Greatest Soap Opera Actresses.” In real life, Susan has been married to Jack Cooper since 1977, and the couple have an adopted daughter, Blaise.

Now in her mid-eighties, the Milwaukee, Wisconsin native recently directed Venice: The Series and The Fosters. Unstoppable Flannery is a licensed pilot, a gourmet cook, and the owner of two labradors.

Ronn Moss portrayed arrogant player Ridge Forrester, but before he started acting, he was the bassist and lead singer — warbling Bee Gees-like falsetto — in the band Player. The band had several hits, including the global number one “Baby Come Back”. We bet you didn’t know that!

He first appeared as Ridge, the CEO and driving force behind Forrester Creations Empire, in the show’s premiere episode on March 23rd, 1987. Apart from a brief sojourn when Lane Davies played the character in 1992, he played Ridge from 1987 to 2012.

A year after leaving B&B, Ron rejoined his former bandmate Peter Beckett to release another Player album, Too Many Reasons. The following year, he and his band performed their hit single “Baby Come Back” at the 2014 Nurses Ball on ABC daytime soap opera General Hospital.

Ron has appeared on Celebrity Wife Swap, the Flemish soap Familie, and the digital soap opera The Bay. Ronald Montague Moss lives in Italy now, and in 2020, he produced and starred in the comedy film Surprise Trip.

Katherine Kelly Lang made her acting debut in the roller disco film Skatetown, U.S.A., alongside Patrick Swayze and Scott Baio. She first played Brooke Logan in The Bold and the Beautiful in 1987, when she was 26, and went on to appear in almost two-thirds of the show’s 9,000 episodes!

Brooke has married Ridge Forrester eight times and has also been married to Ridge’s father, Ridge’s two half-brothers, her brother-in-law, Whip Jones, Grant Chambers, and more!

Katherine played Brooke in The Young and the Restless in 1999, appeared as herself in the Aussie soap Neighbours in 2016, and returned to Australia for a jungle stay on reality TV show I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here, followed by a Greek soap opera in 2019!

She is now in her 60s and maintains an active lifestyle, enjoying sports and outdoor activities like horse racing. The soap star has three children from two husbands. In May 2018, Katherine became a grandmother when her daughter Zoe had a daughter, Zuma.

Thorsten Kaye was born in Frankfurt, Germany, making him a Frankfurter. Since he emigrated to the USA in 1985, he’s been in nearly every US soap opera. First, he played Patrick Thornhart on One Life to Live from 1995 to 1997.

Then, he played Dr. Ian Thornhart on Port Charles from 2000 to 2003. Next, he played Zach Slater on All My Children from 2004 to 2011. Finally, he took over Ronn Moss’s The Bold and the Beautiful character, Ridge Forrester, from 2012 to 2023.

While Ridge Forrester has been with most of the female cast, Thorsten Kaye is totes monogamous. In 1995, he met his One Life to Live co-star Susan Haskell. The two married on a beach and have two daughters, McKenna and Marlowe.

In 2023, Thortsen became the first German-British actor to win the Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series. When he’s not acting or being a doting father, Thorsten likes music, literature, riding motorbikes, football, hockey, and playing with his dogs and hedgehog!

Donald Feinberg changed his name to Don Diamont, becoming a dazzling daytime diamond. In 1984, he played Carlo Forenza on Days of Our Lives, but he became famous for portraying Brad Carlton on The Young and the Restless between 1985 and 1996.

In 1990, People magazine voted him one of the 50 Most Beautiful People in the World! After Y&R, Don first played Bill Spencer Jr. — aka Dollar Bill Spencer — the half-brother of Karen Spencer and Caroline Forrester on B&B in 2009.

Don’s real life is almost as tumultuous as his soap opera life. He has four sons with his ex-wife, Rachel Braun. Funny enough, like half of B&B’s characters, his ex-wife was a fashion designer! In 2012, he proposed to his long-time girlfriend Cindy Ambuehl — and before you ask, yes… he proposed with a diamont ring!

Don and Cindy tied the knot in France and are the parents of twin boys. But after his sister Bette sadly passed away, they also raised her son, counting him as a seventh child.

Heather Tom played Victoria Newman on B&B creator William J. Bell’s other show, The Young and the Restless, from 1990 to 2003, and Kelly Cramer on One Life to Live and All My Children from 2003 to 2006.

In 2007, she began her run as Brooke and Donna Logan’s younger sister, Katie, and is most famous for her rollercoaster relationship with Dollar Bill Spencer. Heather has earned four Daytime Emmy Awards for B&B and two more for Y&R, tying her for the most wins by a soap actress.

Keeping with the Forrester fashion theme, Heather has also appeared in Ugly Betty. In 2011, she married her long-time partner, James Achor. The following year, they welcomed a son, Zane Alexander.

From 2013 onward, the baby has occasionally appeared on The Bold and the Beautiful as Tom’s on-screen son, Will Spencer. In real life, Heather and her husband aren’t fashion magnates like the Forrester family. But they do run a Los Angeles interior design business, Tight Rope Designs.

Peter John Wagner II is a triple threat. Not because he can act, sing, and dance — but because he’s an actor, singer, and… golfer! For years, he played Frisco Jones on and off in General Hospital, Warren Lockridge in Santa Barbara, and Dr. Peter Burns in Melrose Place.

Then, in 2003, producers brought him onto B&B to shake things up as Nick Marone. Aside from acting, he’s also a musician and has recorded six albums. His 1985 song “All I Need” reached No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100!

In 2006, Jack and his fellow constant won $142,550 on Wheel of Fortune! Then, in 2012, Wagner nearly proved he was a quadruple threat when he appeared on season 14 of Dancing with the Stars. We say nearly as he and his dance partner Anna Trebunskaya finished 11th!

Since then, Jack Wagner has reprised his role as Frisco Jones on General Hospital and plays Bill Avery on When Calls the Heart. Tragically, in 2022, Jack and his ex-wife lost their son Harrison.

Born in 1961, Joanna Johnson first started acting in shows like Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer in the 1980s. On The Bold and the Beautiful, she played Ridge Forrester’s love interest, Caroline Spencer Forrester, from 1987 until her character passed away in 1990.

However, Joanna was so popular with the audience, cast, and crew that B&B producers invited her back to play Caroline’s twin sister, Karen, three times. First, for a three-year stint in the 1990s, a year in 2009, and another three-year stint between 2011 and 2011. But Joanna’s not just a pretty face…

Arizona-born Joanna Johnson studied film at California’s USC Film School. She wrote the 2001 indie film The Shrink Is In, starring Courteney Cox and David Arquette. Since then, she created the ABC sitcom Hope & Faith, starring Kelly Ripa, and produced and directed Emily Owens, MD. She’s also been a showrunner on The Fosters and Good Trouble.

In 2012, she came out as gay, having married LA club promoter Michelle Agnew in 2008. The happy couple have a son and a daughter, both adopted.

After playing Lindsey Wells on The Young and the Restless from 1984 to ’86, Lauren Koslow also appeared with Joanna Johnson on Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer. Then, she won her role as B&B’s Margo MacClaine Lynley and was part of the original cast.

Margo was Eric Forrester’s one-time assistant and had flings with Ridge Forrester and Bill Spencer Sr. She played Margo until 1992, featuring in over 500 episodes. The character moved to Wisconsin with her brother but returned for a couple of episodes in 2002.

Since 1996, Lauren Koslow has graced our early afternoon screens as Kate Roberts in NBC’s Days of Our Lives. Yet somehow, Lauren, who’s now in her 70s, looks just as stunning as she did back in the 1980s! That’s even more surprising when you hear that her life reads like a soap opera script.

She married makeup artist Nicky Schillace in 1987, and they have three children. But in 2021, the veteran actress announced she reunited with her firstborn son Josh, whom she gave away three days after his birth.

Hunky Clayton Wesley Norcross was one of B&B’s original 1987 cast members. However, his run on the soap as Thorne Forrester was short-lived, as he exited the series in 1989 after just 337 episodes — making him a soap opera lightweight!

He said, “I liked Thorne, but I only wanted to play him for a short period of time because I didn’t want to get stereotyped.” The Bold and the Beautiful was huge in Italy in the 1990s, and its success helped him forge an acting career in Rome.

Fast approaching his 70s, Clayton is still just as cool as he was when he played Thorne Forrester. He was last seen on the screen in episodes of Hawaii Five-O, Marvel’s Agent Carter, and the Bangkok-set heist thriller film Last Resort.

Nowadays, he splits his time between Rome and LA and runs his own production company, Wyoming Sunset Productions. He uses the media of TV and cinema to “promote healthy living, sound policies for social reform and lasting crime solutions.” In essence, he’s a silver-haired Batman!

Carrie Mitchum is another B&B actress who appeared in the very first episode. She played Donna Logan, the middle Logan sister, from 1987 until 1991 and randomly popped up as Donna for another decade. However, since 2006, the character has been portrayed by Jennifer Gareis. Here’s her Donna with Rocco looking very 1980s!

Did you know that Carrie comes from an acclaimed acting family? Her grandfather was Hollywood legend Robert Mitchum, who appeared in such classics as the original Cape Fear and The Night of the Hunter.

After leaving B&B, Carrie married Superman-jawed Starship Troopers actor Casper Van Dien. They had a daughter together, Grace Van Dien, but they split shortly after her birth. Those acting genes carried on through the family DNA. Carrie’s daughter Grace recently played troubled cheerleader Chrissy in Season 4 of Netflix’s hit series Stranger Things.

However, Grace recently said, “My mom is a horrible person. But she’s also an amazing chef… supposedly.” Carrie is now a gourmet chef in Santa Barbara — the town, not the soap opera.

In 1987, Canadian actor Bryan Genesse originally auditioned for the role of Storm Logan, which Ethan Wayne won. But the producers liked Bryan’s funny audition so much that they created the part of Rocco Carner for him. He played martial arts fanatic Rocco from 1987 to 1989.

That’s because Bryan himself was a black belt in Taekwondo. He went on to utilize his ninja skills opposite the late Carl Weathers in Street Justice. In 1994, he married actress Brooke Theiss, and they have two sons.

Nowadays, 60-year-old Bryan still practices martial arts and sells real estate in California. In a 2022 episode of The Bold and the Beautiful Podcast, he said, “It was a pivotal part of my life and my career.” 35 years after he left the show, Bryan still keeps in touch with his B&B co-stars.

He said, “Katherine [Kelly Lang] was great. We actually dated a little bit … I’m still friends with her and Ron [Moss] … I’m good friends with Carrie Mitchum still.” Well, at least someone likes her!

Carrie Mitchum isn’t the only B&B actor born into Hollywood acting royalty. Ethan Wayne is John Wayne’s son. The Duke and Robert Mitchum even appeared together in the 1966 Western El Dorado.

Named after his father (whose real name was Marion Morrison!), John Ethan Morrison followed in his famous dad’s footsteps, appearing alongside his pops and even meeting Carrie Mitchum on the set of Big Jake (1972). In 1987, Ethan landed the role of Storm Logan, whose name is so cool he should be a cowboy!

Despite playing Storm Logan for 16 years, between 1987 and 2003, Ethan only appeared in 41 B&B episodes. Over the years, Ethan appeared in several TV shows, like Knight Rider, but his Hollywood star status slowly faded.

Nowadays, he manages John Wayne Enterprises and is the director of the John Wayne Cancer Foundation. That said, he did appear as himself on a 2013 episode of Pawn Stars as an expert on… you guessed it — John Wayne memorabilia. He also travels with his chocolate labrador, Finn.

Aaron D. Spears portrayed Justin Barber from 2009 to 2022. Much of Aaron’s time on the show focused on Justin’s strained relationship with his son, Marcus, and his equally stressful relationship with Marcus’s mother, Donna Logan. Justin and Donna eventually worked things out long enough to tie the knot. Here he is with B&B co-star Tisha Campbell.

You may also recognize Aaron D. Spears for playing Commissioner Raines Raines on Days Of Our Lives and Mark Bradley on Being Mary Jane.

Aaron’s acting resume reads like a Who’s Who of TV shows. He made his screen debut as Officer Washington in Sunset Beach in 1997. Since then, he’s appeared in The X-Files, Everybody Loves Raymond, General Hospital, Castle, Greenleaf, This Is Us, and The Rookie, usually playing a cop.

In 2020, he joined the cast of The Black Hamptons, playing another cop named Sergeant Lane. In his personal life, Aaron’s married to equally gorgeous actress Estela Lopez-Spears. When he’s not looking after their son and four daughters, he composes music.

Hunter Tylo played B&B’s globally renowned UCLA Medical Center psychiatrist, Dr. Taylor Hayes, from 1990 to 2002. Then, Hunter got a part in Melrose Place, so Dr. Taylor Hayes was bumped off. However, when she became pregnant, producer Aaron Spelling fired her before she filmed an episode, so Hunter sued him and won $4.8 million!

Then, in a storyline only daytime soap operas could get away with, Taylor returned as a ghost and later returned to the land of the living! After a long and fraught relationship with the producers, Hunter finally left the show in 2019.

Dr. Taylor Hayes did return to lend her psychiatric skills to everyone who needed them at Steffy Forrester & Co., but nowadays, she’s played by younger actress Krista Allen. In real life, the Texan native’s life is a soap opera writer’s dream; she’s been married three times and has four children.

In 1998, one of her daughters had retinoblastoma. In 2008, one of her sons drowned in the family pool. In 2009, she married Gersson Archila, but the marriage was annulled in 2018 because he’d been hiding a criminal past.

Legendary producer Jack Warner discovered John McCook performing in West Side Story on Broadway. John signed for Universal Studios before spending two years in the US Army. One of his earliest roles was in the sitcom Mister Roberts in 1964, before appearing in CHiPs and The Love Boat.

John found fame as Lance Prentiss on the television soap opera The Young and the Restless from 1975 to 1980. Then, in 1987, he was cast as one of The Bold and the Beautiful‘s four main characters, Eric Forrester. Here he is on the far right, celebrating B&B’s 10th birthday.

Fast-forward almost four decades, and John has appeared as Eric Forrester in nearly half of B&B’s episodes. All that dedication finally paid off in 2022 when he won the Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series at the age of 78!

In real life, John has been married twice and has four children. One of his daughters followed him into acting, and you may have seen Molly McCook playing Mandy Baxter on Last Man Standing.

Before joining The Bold and the Beautiful cast in 1987, Stephen Shortridge was already famous for playing southern student Beau De LaBarre in the 1970s sitcom Welcome Back, Kotter. He also appeared in every ’70s and ’80s show you can think of, from Charlie’s Angels and The Fall Guy to Airwolf.

During B&B’s first season, he played Brooke Logan’s police sergeant boyfriend, Dave Reed. Brooke broke his heart when she broke off their engagement and ran off with Ridge Forrester. Stephen was so devastated he gave up acting altogether in 1989.

Stephen gave up acting to become an artist. On his website, he explains, “I had been acting for several years, and although I had been successful, it was never where my heart was. Art was my first love and always was.” He and his wife, Cathy Shortridge, owned a fine art gallery in Idaho called The Painter’s Chair. Sadly, Cathay passed away in 2017.

Stephen has many strings to his bow. He’s also an author, having written books on art, faith, and spirituality. In 2011, he published Deepest Thanks, Deeper Apologies.

Some people get all the luck. As well as being super handsome, Darin Lee Brooks was born and grew up in Hawaii! He played Max Brady on Days of Our Lives from 2005 to 2010, then after a brief stint on Blue Mountain State, he joined B&B as Wyatt Spencer in 2013.

Wyatt turned out to be media mogul Bill Spencer, Jr. and Quinn Fuller’s long-lost son. Darin’s portrayal of Wyatt earned him a Daytime Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series in 2021.

In 2016, he married his girlfriend of six years, actress Kelly Kruger. They welcomed their first child to the world in 2019. Together, they run a charity organization called Aid Still Required. In 2021, Darin hopped over to Genoa City, Wisconsin, to play Wyatt Spencer for two crossover episodes on The Young and Restless.

Three years later, in January 2024, he left the role of Wyatt to pursue other acting jobs… or maybe to start a band as he plays the guitar, bass guitar, and drums. That should keep his wife awake!

Jacob Wayne Young has had long stints on not one, not two, but three beloved soap operas. He first played Eric Forrester and Brooke Logan’s son Rick Forrester on The Bold and the Beautiful from 1997 to 1999. Then Jacob got a job as General Hospital’s Lucky Spencer from 2000 to 2003.

Next, he played JR Chandler in the soap opera All My Children between 2003 and 2011. Finally, he returned to B&B as Rick Forrester from 2011 to 2018.

Between his soap roles, the Washington State-born, Colorado-bred actor also found the time to release an album. Unfortunately, it came out on September 11th, 2001. He also appeared in ABC’s Hope & Faith and played Lumiere in the Broadway production of Beauty and the Beast.

In his personal life, Jacob married model Christen Steward in 2007, and the couple has three children. Most recently, you may have seen him in Beacon Hill, High School Musical: The Musical: The Series and The Walking Dead. Here’s Jacob wearing a kilt. Now, that’s bold!

Another more recent B&B addition was stunning Aussie actress Ashleigh Brewer. When she played Kate Ramsay in the long-running Australian soap opera Neighbours from 2009 until 2014, she shared an apartment in Melbourne with her Neighbours co-star Margot Robbie!

When the Brisbane native arrived in the USA, she had great chemistry in her audition with Wyatt Spencer (Darin Brooks), so the producers created Ivy Forrester for her. The character was originally going to be American, then English, but they finally settled on Australian!

Ashleigh played Ivy Forrester for four years before hightailing it back to Australia. From 2018 to 2019, she played Chelsea Campbell in Oz’s second-most favorite soap opera, Home and Away. So, what’s Ashleigh been up to since then?

Well, she had a blink-and-you-miss-it role as Totally Hair Barbie in a little movie you have heard of called Barbie. That’s what friends in high places can get you! In January 2024, she announced her engagement to filmmaker and studio executive Mark Bauch. Ain’t she beautiful?