General Hospital And A Daytime First: Transgender Character Played By A Transgender Actress

General Hospital (GH) fans were stunned on Friday when Elizabeth went on and on about her male bestie Terry, a boy from her childhood she even shared her first kiss with. They were further stunned–and so was Liz–when she opened the door to a beautiful woman who announced that she was Terry.

Well, Liz may have been shocked, but it didn’t mean she was any less thrilled to see this blast from her past, and she embraced the friend in front of her.

This friend is played by actress Cassandra James, a transgender woman who began her medical transition from being physically male to female in 2016. According to IMDB, she came out to her family the year before and is an outspoken advocate of transgender rights.

The actress was born and raised in Canada and studied acting in college. Finally, in 2017, she made the move to LA to make it as a Hollywood actress and GH is her first major role.

She is also a daytime pioneer. While All My Children featured a transgender character more than a decade ago, the character was not played by a transgender actress. Playing Terry makes James the first transgender performer to play a transgender character on soaps.

James was thrilled with the warm and welcome reception she got from GH fans on Friday and expressed her happiness with a tweet.

Admittedly, the soap experienced some backlash two years ago when Kristina Corinthos came out as a lesbian, but that might have been because it didn’t make sense for the characters, who fell in love with her much older professor.

Whether the soap receives any backlash for this story remains to be seen, but Soap Hub is anxious to see how it plays out and is glad to see soaps taking this topical and very human step.

General Hospital (GH) airs weekdays on ABC. Check your local listings for airtimes.