A Look Back at Susan Lucci Winning Her First Daytime Emmy in 1999

Real life tends to fly by just like it does on soap operas. It was 25 years ago this week that Susan Lucci won the Daytime Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series. Soap Hub is taking a look back at her victory, for playing the iconic role of Erica Kane on All My Children, which came a quarter of a century ago.

Hey, 19

Lucci was an original cast member of AMC and played the part until the show came to an end on ABC in 2011. Her first Daytime Emmy nomination came in 1978. That year, the award went to Laurie Heineman, who played Sharlene on Another World.

It took another 18 nominations until Lucci’s name was called as the winner. In 1999, she was awarded the Daytime Emmy over fellow nominees Jeanne Cooper (Katherine, Young and the Restless), Elizabeth Hubbard (Lucinda, As the World Turns), Melody Thomas Scott (Nikki, Y&R), and Kim Zimmer (Reva, Guiding Light).

Attendees inside The Theater, Madison Square Garden in New York City, where the awards were held, gave Lucci a heart-felt standing ovation. The camera cut to daytime familiar faces including Rosie O’Donnell, Oprah Winfrey, David Canary (Adam/Stuart, AMC), Kelly Ripa (Hayley, AMC), and Marj Dusay (Vanessa, AMC), but the focus, naturally, was on Lucci.

“Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you so very much,” a grateful Lucci began. She elicited perhaps an unintentional laugh when she added, “I truly never believed that that this would happen.

Thank You!

“First of all, I want to thank each and every one of you in this room,” the actress continued. “This is a room full of such talented, hard-working people and the fact that you have thought that my work was worthy of notice 19 times is something that I will treasure. Always.

“I thank God for the many, many blessings in my life,” Lucci said. “For parents who always encouraged me to dream my dreams and who have been sitting in every audience of my lifetime, including tonight, for my great teachers Wynn Handman, the late Harold Clurman, Ron Weyand, and Inez Norman Spiers, who were so good at teaching and who helped me grow.

“Agnes Nixon [AMC creator], you change the face of the medium we work in,” Lucci added. “I am so grateful to have been placed in your hands. Thank you so much for creating the part of Erica Kane and for allowing me to be part of your writing full of such humanity and passion and vision.”

Not So Fast

Lucci informed the audience that she had much more to say but that she got word that producers wanted her to wrap it up. The audience protested so Lucci continued, and, at one point, the producers played music as if they were scoring a beautiful, scripted TV moment.

Susan Lucci continued by thanking former AMC casting director Joan D’Incecco for “seeing me more than just an ethnic type and saw that I could play Erica Kane and for bringing me to Agnes’s attention, to the incredible acting company at All My Children with whom I have the privilege to play these scenes every day. You inspire me if I’m halfway good, it’s because I’m afraid I won’t be as good as you.”

Chocolate Cakes, Balloons, and Poems

Next, Lucci turned to the most important people in her life — her family. “To Liza [Huber, Gwen, Passions] and Andreas [Huber]. I wasn’t meant to get this award before tonight because if I had, I wouldn’t have that collection of poems and letters and drawings and balloons and chocolate cakes you made me all this time to make me feel better.

“My husband Helmut Huber who has been with me every step of the way,” said Lucci, hastening to add, “and to the fans! I was only supposed to be on every other Tuesday…but thanks to you, I’m here and I promise I will try my best never to let you down.”

Lucci concluded her acceptance speech with a promise to the fans. “I’m going back to that studio on Monday and I’m going to play Erica Kane for all she’s worth!”

And she did — until the show’s untimely cancellation in 2011. Last year, Susan Lucci returned to the Daytime Emmys, this time in Los Angeles, where she accepted the Lifetime Achievement Award for her contributions to Daytime.

Do you remember this iconic moment from 1999? Let us know in the comments section below.