Michael E. Knight & Cady McLain Share The Magic of AMC’s Tad And Dixie

General Hospital star Michael E. Knight recently reunited with All My Children co-star Cady McClain. Fans of the show’s supercouple, Tad and Dixie, or “TnD,” loved seeing this duo together again and what they shared about that magical time was wonderful.

Michael E. Knight & Cady McClain: When Magic Happens

Knight and McClain joined a recent Zoom event for Coastal Entertainment. It wasn’t long before the backstage stories were flowing, and the biggest question was when they realized their pairing was going to be something special.

Dixie Cooney arrived in Pine Valley in 1988 as a girl from the wrong side of the tracks. She soon fell under the spell of Adam Chandler (David Canary), the arch-enemy of her Uncle Palmer (James Mitchell). He wanted a baby more than anything and used Dixie to get it. Adam’s wife, Brooke (Julia Barr), hired Tad Martin to find out who the father of Dixie’s baby was.

When Tad laid eyes on Dixie at Myrtle’s Dress Shop, he uttered these memorable words, “Heaven help me, I’ve just forgotten every woman I have ever met.” And the rest is history. When the All My Children writers decided to team up Tad Martin and Dixie Cooney, no one knew for sure if the two had staying power, but it was clear the two actors had chemistry. In the Zoom event, McClain and Knight (Martin, GH) shared when they knew Tad and Dixie would be “magical.”

McClain recalled the exact moment when she knew. “I remember the scene that we did with the yarn and the first kiss. I was knitting, and you were going to have to kiss me,” she referred to Knight, setting it up. “I think you were rolling the yarn into a ball, and I was knitting and we were on a sofa. We had to do that first kind of very tender kiss. And I remember after that — like just the vibe and the whole studio and the camera people were like, ‘Oh yeah, this is, this is it.’” 

Knight, who took home three Daytime Emmys for his role, added, “What most people don’t remember is this happened by accident. I think I was supposed to be your talk-to person. I don’t know to this day if they would plan on getting us together,” he said. He summarized and laid out the backstory. “I remember Adam was married to Brooke, and he was trying to have a baby with you. But we had a scene together at Myrtle’s Boutique.

“I heard that I was supposed to be a talk to you, and you were a kid from the wrong side of the tracks, and everybody was giving you crap because, you know, people were talking in a small town because they thought you were moving in on Adam,” he explained. Knight reminded fans that Tad was a cad at that time. “I had been sort of the bad boy…we were just sort of going to compare notes.”

The actor explained when he felt their chemistry kick into high gear. “After that one scene, people were like, ‘Oh, we got something going on there.’ But I knew we arrived when we were on the run, and we were in something like a Shantytown or something, and we did the Tad and Dixie Love Test,” he described the scene. “There was a series of three questions. It was like, do you dream about me and stuff? And a friend of mine, somebody called me and said, ‘That was really good magic.’”

McClain agreed. “That was magic. I’ve seen that scene. That was a good scene.” She thought they had something else going in their favor and shared it with fans. “One of the things that Mike and I were just sort of reminiscing about recently was what made us sort of click. So much of it was, I think, a certain kind of training.”

The actress, who has taken home three Daytime Emmys for three different roles, revealed the kind of training that refined their performance. “We were both actors with like a certain kind of theater training and a lot of focus on the scene and the material and what we were going to do and wanting that scene to really work. We were working on the writing together and polishing it together.” 

The coupling of Tad and Dixie is considered one of the most timeless, classic romances in daytime, and fans still can’t get enough of it. Both actors were happy to share their experiences and thanked the fans for joining them on Zoom.

“You know that you were always with us. You were always a part of us and always a part of our collective experience,” Knight shared with fans. “You know, without you guys, we’re stuck selling the Tad and Dixie stock. It would be a disaster.”

McClain echoed his sentiments, “Thank you for being so awesome and, you know, bringing these awesome questions and coming today.”