Soap Hub Performer of the Week for B&B: Jacqueline MacInnes Wood

Steffy Forrester Finnegan is nothing if not persistent. The Bold and the Beautiful heroine wants her parents back together and will not rest until that happens. For her performance as a determined daughter, Soap Hub bestows Performer of the Week honors on Jacqueline MacInnes Wood, who plays Steffy.

Jacqueline MacInnes Wood – Performer of the Week

It’d be easy to dismiss Steffy’s desire to see her parents — Ridge Forrester (Thorsten Kaye) and Taylor Hayes (Krista Allen) — as the wishful thinking of a grown woman who needs to let this go. But Wood infuses Steffy with such upbeat passion that Taylor — and the audience — can’t help but see her point of view. When Taylor tried to say she had plenty on her life to keep her busy, Steffy shot back, “Nothing compares to the electricity you felt in Monaco after you and dad kissed. Boom.”

Steffy has playful fun when pointing out to her mother that she needs to be with the man she loves. Wood infused her character with more logic when talking to her father about the benefits of reuniting with Taylor. Ridge pointed out that Brooke is his wife prompting Steffy to deftly point out that Brooke has cheated on Ridge with “your dad, and your brother, and like a dozen other[s]…”

Ridge asked his daughter to back off her attack on Brooke so Steffy took a different approach, pointing out Taylor’s strengths. She likened her love for Finn to the love she knows Ridge has for Taylor. Wood had Steffy deliver to Ridge a perfect blend of reason and passion as she tried to convince her dad that Taylor is the right woman for him.

Steffy likely keeps in the forefront of her mind that Ridge and Taylor would still be together if they’d not been torn apart by fate not once but twice. First, Ridge thought Taylor had died in a plane crash. Miraculously, she survived only her return to Ridge has delayed due to Prince Omar of Morocco’s fascination with the good doctor. Years later, Ridge and Taylor’s happy life with their children was disrupted after Omar kidnapped Taylor from the hospital and everyone thought that she’d died.

Steffy is trying to right some wrongs. She’s not looking to move back in with a reunited Ridge and Taylor; she genuinely believes that her father and mother will be happier together. “Stop wasting your time on Brooke,” Steffy urged her dad. “Have a life you deserve…have it with mom.”

Jacqueline MacInnes Wood knows that Steffy can push the envelope with her dad. He’s going to listen to her more than he would anyone else in his life because she’s his daughter and he loves her deeply. Conversely, there’s no love lost between Steffy and nemesis Hope Logan Spencer (Annika Noelle). Sure, Steffy’s happily wed to Dr. John ‘Finn’ Finnegan (Tanner Novlan) but there’s always a hint of lingering resentment between Hope and Steffy over the fact that Hope is Mrs. Liam Spencer and Steffy is not.

Hope came upon Steffy dishing with her brother Thomas Forrester (Matthew Atkinson) and asked that she stopped trashing her mother. Thomas tried to diffuse the situation but Steffy wasn’t backing down. She brought up her late grandmother Stephanie and what she thought of Brooke for years before the two women made peace. “Your mother hasn’t changed,” Steffy stated to Hope, who tried to defend her mother. “No matter how devoted and committed my father has been, your mom always falls for another man. It’s just the truth.”

Jacqueline MacInnes Wood does her character’s namesake proud. She arms herself with the storyline facts, chooses a stance (Brooke, bad; Taylor, good!), and argues her case, challenging her co-stars to rise to the occasion in the process. Steffy runs a great fashion house but if the character ever decides to become a lawyer, we think she’d win over her share of juries!

The Bold and the Beautiful (BB) airs weekdays on CBS. Check your local listings for airtimes. For more about what’s coming up in Los Angeles, check out all the latest that’s been posted on B&B spoilers, and for an in-depth look at the show’s history, click here.

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