Lisa Yamada couldn’t believe her luck at the 2025 Daytime Emmys. For her role as Luna Nozawa on The Bold and the Beautiful, she won an award in the Outstanding Emerging Talent category. Yamada took to social media to express her immense gratitude.
Key Takeaways
- Lisa Yamada made her debut as Luna Nozawa in September 2023.
- Her character had a surprising plot twist, in which she became a murderous psycho.
- The plot twist allowed Yamada to portray a range of emotions in her 2024 storyline.
- She won a Daytime Emmy award on Friday night.
Winning Her First Daytime Emmy
Luna was first introduced as an intern at Forrester Creations, who had her eye on RJ (Joshua Hoffman). She then ended up in a love triangle between RJ and Zende (Delon De Metz). Aside from that drama, she wanted to know who her biological father was.
This created tension between Poppy (Romy Park) and Li (Naomi Matsuda), the latter of whom didn’t want her involved with the Forresters. In her 2024 storyline, she went from innocent and unassuming to a villainous and delusional psycho.
Tom Starr (Howard Clint) claimed that he was Luna’s father. But she wanted Bill (Don Diamont) to be her father. As a result, she killed Tom.
Following Tom’s death, Hollis (Hollis Chambers) tried to dig into the mystery, so Luna killed him as well. Then, she tried seducing Bill and held Steffy (Jacqueline MacInnes Wood) hostage in a cage, where she revealed her true colors.
Yamada kept B&B viewers hooked on this wild rollercoaster ride of highs and lows. She had us convinced she was a killer, and a result, fans hated Luna and her misdeeds. Yamada brought home an award on Emmy night in the Emerging Talent category.
She also made history at the Daytime Emmy Awards by winning it during its inaugural year. “Thank you so much for this recognition, acting has been my dream since I gained consciousness, and my dreams are coming true right now,” Yamada tearfully said during her acceptance speech.
She thanked her boss, Brad Bell before adding, “Luna has been the honor of my life.” The actress also thanked Don Diamont, Christian Weissmann, and her parents. You can watch the rest of Yamada’s speech below.
Expressing So Much Gratitude
Yamada isn’t done thanking the important people in her life. She posted her acceptance speech on Instagram, adding, “There aren’t enough words to express my gratitude to everyone who’s helped me get here.”
Once again, Yamada thanked her family and her fellow nominees. She also revealed that she has “two immigrant parents who helped me navigate an industry that was so foreign to them.” They helped her all throughout her acting journey, which included auditions and acting classes.
“So to be the first performer of Asian descent to win a Daytime Emmy for acting in a network soap opera… I’m so deeply humbled,” Yamada noted. In the caption, she admitted that acting on a soap isn’t all that glamorous. “But I’d tell the little Lisa, the one who cried herself to sleep dreaming of a moment ilke this: We did it, girl,” she added.
