Rita Stapleton
Encyclopedia
Rita Stapleton Bauer was a fictional character
on the CBS soap Guiding Light
. The character was played by Lenore Kasdorf
, and was created by Bridget and Jerome Dobson
, shortly after they became Guiding Light's head writers in 1975. Rita was written out in 1981, when Kasdorf announced she was leaving the show. (She had been so popular in the role, producers decided against recasting.)
(Mart Hulswit), and the two began dating. The two became closer, particularly after Ed helped Rita's elderly mother Viola (Kate Wilkinson
) recover from a stroke, and he soon asked Rita to marry him. However, unbeknownst to him, Rita shared a past with his nemesis Roger Thorpe
(Michael Zaslow
) (who Ed had just found out was the biological father of the child thought to be his, Christina
).
Unfortunately for Rita, her past with Roger would come out while she was on trial for the murder of a wealthy, elderly Texas oil man, Cyrus Granger, for whom she had worked as a private duty nurse, prior to coming to Springfield (she also became a suspect in the death of Granger's son Malcolm, who followed Rita to Springfield, and then died under mysterious circumstances, after being admitted to Cedars). Roger had also worked for Cyrus Granger and he and Rita had had a brief fling. Though she was hesitant to provide an alibi, it eventually came out that Rita couldn't have committed the crime, for she was with Roger at the time. While Rita was acquitted, Ed, upset and angry to learn of her past with Roger, broke things off with her. Rita briefly dated Dr. Peter Chapman, though he turned out to be more interested in Ed's ex-wife Holly Norris Bauer
(Maureen Garrett
).
Eventually, Ed got over his anger and he and Rita reconnected. He grew closer to Rita, during a period where she had to contend with an apparent stalker, who pushed Rita down a flight of stairs, tampered with her brakes and attempted to set her apartment on fire (trapping Rita's then blind sister Eve (Janet Grey
) in the burning apartment). Ultimately, the stalker was revealed to be Georgene Granger (Delphi Harrington), Cyrus Granger's deranged daughter-in-law, who held Rita and Eve at gunpoint in their apartment building laundry room, during which time she confessed that it was in fact she who had murdered Cyrus (She was trying to prevent her father-in-law from changing his will to include Rita, unaware that he had in fact already done so), and that she was also indirectly responsible for the death of her husband Malcolm (she snuck into his room at Cedars and began berating him over her incorrect presumption that he and Rita had had an affair, causing him to have a fatal heart attack). By this time, Ed, along with Eve's fiance Ben McFerren (Stephen Yates
) and Springfield Police Chief Larry Wyatt had pieced together that Georgene was the stalker, and were tipped off that she was holding Rita and Eve at gunpoint. Ed and Ben showed up at the laundry room just in time to rescue Rita and Eve, overhearing Georgene's confession. With Georgene arrested, Ed and Rita became engaged. However, before they were married, Roger appeared at Rita's apartment, angry over how providing an alibi for her during her murder trial had cost him his own marriage. Becoming increasingly enraged, he raped Rita. Afraid that no one would believe her, Rita remained silent. She and Ed married in November 1978. A few months later, Roger also raped Holly and Rita became overcome with guilt at having not come forward herself. Holly did press charges, and when it looked like Roger would be acquitted, Rita finally revealed that Roger had raped her too. However, at the same time this was happening, Holly was pointing a gun at Roger and, in a moment of post-traumatic stress, shot him. She was convicted of the murder (despite the extenuating circumstances) and Ed came to resent Rita for not telling him about the rape, causing a strain in their marriage.
Alienated from Ed and under pressure to be an active stepmother to Christina (which necessitated her leaving nursing, a job she loved), Rita began a reckless fling with an old boyfriend, Dr. Greg Fairbanks, who had just relocated to Springfield (and who also began seeing Rita's younger sister Eve (Janet Grey
), though neither sister knew Fairbanks was dating the other). When Rita found herself pregnant, she was unable to determine whether Ed or Greg was the father. Though she briefly considered terminating the pregnancy, after a discussion with her mother Viola, she decided to keep the baby. Toward the end of her pregnancy, Rita, decided to undergo paternity testing on her fetus in order to try to determine whether Ed or Greg was the father (which, in 1980, prior to DNA testing, consisted of comparing the baby's blood types with the potential fathers'). Before she could get the results, however, Rita spotted a clown at a charity carnival to benefit Cedars as Roger Thorpe (who was presumed to be dead, after having been shot by Holly). After thwarting Roger's attempt to abduct Christina, Roger chased after Rita, cornering her in a hall of mirrors
(all the while Donna Summer
and Barbra Streisand
's disco hit "No More Tears (Enough is Enough)
" playing, in a sequence that would win Guiding Light its first "Best Daytime Drama" Emmy). Roger abducted Rita and brought her to a remote cabin. Eventually Ed and his brother, attorney Mike Bauer tracked Roger and Rita down. Roger fled. Rita went into premature labor and accidentally kicked over a kerosene lamp that was set on a dresser near the cot she was tied to. Ed and Mike were able to save Rita, but she lost her baby (who it had since been revealed was Ed's). For months, Rita recuperated at home with her mother in West Virginia.
In early summer 1980, Rita returned to Springfield and reconciled with Ed. The couple tried to patch their marriage up, but the resentment and hurt was difficult for them to overcome. Ed remained emotionally distant and Rita began to have a torrid affair with Alan Spaulding
(Christopher Bernau
), who was at the time married to her niece Hope Bauer. When the affair was revealed a few months later by blackmailer Andy Norris, Rita left Springfield for good. The last glimpse of her was as she sat in in an airplane, taking off for parts unknown, wondering if she would ever come back to Springfield. It was suggested at the time of her departure that she might be pregnant, but this was never resolved (nor was it resolved whether the baby would have been Alan's or Ed's).
After her departure, Ed and Alan both tried to locate Rita, independently of one another, though her whereabouts were never determined. (She was said to be headed to San Francisco, but Alan's private investigator was unable to find her there.) Eve informed Ed that she believed Rita had left San Francisco a few months after arriving there, because she feared she was being followed, and that she'd then lost contact with her sister; neither Eve nor Rita's mother Viola had any further knowledge of Rita's whereabouts. Eventually Ed was granted a divorce from Rita on the grounds of abandonment. The character was last referred to on Guiding Light in the late 1980s, during a conversation between Ed and Alan.
Fictional character
A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...
on the CBS soap Guiding Light
Guiding Light
Guiding Light is an American daytime television drama that is credited by the Guinness Book of World Records as the longest running drama in television and radio history, running from 1937 until 2009...
. The character was played by Lenore Kasdorf
Lenore Kasdorf
Lenore Kasdorf is an American actress.-Biography:Kasdorf was born in New York City to an army colonel father. She is best known for her role as the alluring and promiscuous nurse Rita Stapleton Bauer, whom she played from 1975 to 1981 in the soap opera Guiding Light, and for her performance as Mrs...
, and was created by Bridget and Jerome Dobson
Bridget and Jerome Dobson
Bridget and Jerome Dobson were writers for American soap operas best known as creators of the NBC soap opera Santa Barbara .Bridget Dobson is the daughter of General Hospital creators Frank and Doris Hursley. Bridget and Jerome married in 1961...
, shortly after they became Guiding Light's head writers in 1975. Rita was written out in 1981, when Kasdorf announced she was leaving the show. (She had been so popular in the role, producers decided against recasting.)
Character's background
Rita was born and raised in Bluefield, West Virginia, the oldest of two daughters. She grew to adulthood under very modest circumstances. When she first arrived in Springfield to take a job as a nurse at Cedars Hospital, Rita began dating Dr. Tim Ryan (Jordan Clarke). However, she soon became interested in Chief of Surgery Ed BauerEd Bauer
William Edward "Ed" Bauer Jr. is a fictional character on CBS's daytime drama Guiding Light. While having been portrayed by five different actors, Ed has been portrayed by a number of actors, including Robert Gentry, Mart Hulswit and Peter Simon....
(Mart Hulswit), and the two began dating. The two became closer, particularly after Ed helped Rita's elderly mother Viola (Kate Wilkinson
Kate Wilkinson
Kate Wilkinson was an American stage, film and television actress, best known for her roles as Viola Stapleton in the CBS soap opera Guiding Light, a role she played from 1976 to 1981, and Clara Hudson on the NBC soap opera Another World, which she played from 1987 to 1989.In addition to...
) recover from a stroke, and he soon asked Rita to marry him. However, unbeknownst to him, Rita shared a past with his nemesis Roger Thorpe
Roger and Holly
Roger Thorpe and Holly Norris are fictional characters and a supercouple from the American CBS daytime drama Guiding Light.-Actors:...
(Michael Zaslow
Michael Zaslow
Michael Joel Zaslow was an American actor. He was best known for his role as villain Roger Thorpe on CBS's Guiding Light, a role he played from 1971 to 1980 and from 1989 to 1997.-Life and career:...
) (who Ed had just found out was the biological father of the child thought to be his, Christina
Blake Marler
Christina Blake Marler is a fictional character on CBS's daytime drama Guiding Light. She was portrayed by Elizabeth Keifer from August 19, 1992 to September 18, 2009...
).
Unfortunately for Rita, her past with Roger would come out while she was on trial for the murder of a wealthy, elderly Texas oil man, Cyrus Granger, for whom she had worked as a private duty nurse, prior to coming to Springfield (she also became a suspect in the death of Granger's son Malcolm, who followed Rita to Springfield, and then died under mysterious circumstances, after being admitted to Cedars). Roger had also worked for Cyrus Granger and he and Rita had had a brief fling. Though she was hesitant to provide an alibi, it eventually came out that Rita couldn't have committed the crime, for she was with Roger at the time. While Rita was acquitted, Ed, upset and angry to learn of her past with Roger, broke things off with her. Rita briefly dated Dr. Peter Chapman, though he turned out to be more interested in Ed's ex-wife Holly Norris Bauer
Roger and Holly
Roger Thorpe and Holly Norris are fictional characters and a supercouple from the American CBS daytime drama Guiding Light.-Actors:...
(Maureen Garrett
Maureen Garrett
Maureen Garrett is an American actress.Garrett played the role of Holly Norris Bauer Thorpe Lindsey Reade on Guiding Light, a role she inherited from Lynn Deerfield in 1976...
).
Eventually, Ed got over his anger and he and Rita reconnected. He grew closer to Rita, during a period where she had to contend with an apparent stalker, who pushed Rita down a flight of stairs, tampered with her brakes and attempted to set her apartment on fire (trapping Rita's then blind sister Eve (Janet Grey
Janet Grey
Janet Grey is an actress who is remembered for having played Eve Stapleton McFarren on the CBS soap opera Guiding Light from 1976 to 1982...
) in the burning apartment). Ultimately, the stalker was revealed to be Georgene Granger (Delphi Harrington), Cyrus Granger's deranged daughter-in-law, who held Rita and Eve at gunpoint in their apartment building laundry room, during which time she confessed that it was in fact she who had murdered Cyrus (She was trying to prevent her father-in-law from changing his will to include Rita, unaware that he had in fact already done so), and that she was also indirectly responsible for the death of her husband Malcolm (she snuck into his room at Cedars and began berating him over her incorrect presumption that he and Rita had had an affair, causing him to have a fatal heart attack). By this time, Ed, along with Eve's fiance Ben McFerren (Stephen Yates
Stephen Yates
Stephen Colin Yates is a former English cricketer. Yates was a right-handed batsman. He was born in Manchester, Lancashire.Yates made his debut for Cheshire in the 1983 Minor Counties Championship against Shropshire...
) and Springfield Police Chief Larry Wyatt had pieced together that Georgene was the stalker, and were tipped off that she was holding Rita and Eve at gunpoint. Ed and Ben showed up at the laundry room just in time to rescue Rita and Eve, overhearing Georgene's confession. With Georgene arrested, Ed and Rita became engaged. However, before they were married, Roger appeared at Rita's apartment, angry over how providing an alibi for her during her murder trial had cost him his own marriage. Becoming increasingly enraged, he raped Rita. Afraid that no one would believe her, Rita remained silent. She and Ed married in November 1978. A few months later, Roger also raped Holly and Rita became overcome with guilt at having not come forward herself. Holly did press charges, and when it looked like Roger would be acquitted, Rita finally revealed that Roger had raped her too. However, at the same time this was happening, Holly was pointing a gun at Roger and, in a moment of post-traumatic stress, shot him. She was convicted of the murder (despite the extenuating circumstances) and Ed came to resent Rita for not telling him about the rape, causing a strain in their marriage.
Alienated from Ed and under pressure to be an active stepmother to Christina (which necessitated her leaving nursing, a job she loved), Rita began a reckless fling with an old boyfriend, Dr. Greg Fairbanks, who had just relocated to Springfield (and who also began seeing Rita's younger sister Eve (Janet Grey
Janet Grey
Janet Grey is an actress who is remembered for having played Eve Stapleton McFarren on the CBS soap opera Guiding Light from 1976 to 1982...
), though neither sister knew Fairbanks was dating the other). When Rita found herself pregnant, she was unable to determine whether Ed or Greg was the father. Though she briefly considered terminating the pregnancy, after a discussion with her mother Viola, she decided to keep the baby. Toward the end of her pregnancy, Rita, decided to undergo paternity testing on her fetus in order to try to determine whether Ed or Greg was the father (which, in 1980, prior to DNA testing, consisted of comparing the baby's blood types with the potential fathers'). Before she could get the results, however, Rita spotted a clown at a charity carnival to benefit Cedars as Roger Thorpe (who was presumed to be dead, after having been shot by Holly). After thwarting Roger's attempt to abduct Christina, Roger chased after Rita, cornering her in a hall of mirrors
House of mirrors
A house of mirrors or hall of mirrors is a traditional attraction at funfairs and amusement parks. The basic concept behind a house of mirrors is to be a maze-like puzzle. In addition to the maze, participants are also given mirrors as obstacles, and glass panes to parts of the maze they cannot...
(all the while Donna Summer
Donna Summer
LaDonna Adrian Gaines , known by her stage name, Donna Summer, is an American singer/songwriter who gained prominence during the disco era of the 1970s. She has a mezzo-soprano vocal range. Summer is a five-time Grammy winner and was the first artist to have three consecutive double albums reach...
and Barbra Streisand
Barbra Streisand
Barbra Joan Streisand is an American singer, actress, film producer and director. She has won two Academy Awards, eight Grammy Awards, four Emmy Awards, a Special Tony Award, an American Film Institute award, a Peabody Award, and is one of the few entertainers who have won an Oscar, Emmy, Grammy,...
's disco hit "No More Tears (Enough is Enough)
No More Tears (Enough is Enough)
"No More Tears " is a duet from 1979 by Donna Summer and Barbra Streisand. While Summer was famous for her disco material and Streisand for her more easy listening and soundtrack work , this song fused both sounds with a slow beginning which then develops into a disco song...
" playing, in a sequence that would win Guiding Light its first "Best Daytime Drama" Emmy). Roger abducted Rita and brought her to a remote cabin. Eventually Ed and his brother, attorney Mike Bauer tracked Roger and Rita down. Roger fled. Rita went into premature labor and accidentally kicked over a kerosene lamp that was set on a dresser near the cot she was tied to. Ed and Mike were able to save Rita, but she lost her baby (who it had since been revealed was Ed's). For months, Rita recuperated at home with her mother in West Virginia.
In early summer 1980, Rita returned to Springfield and reconciled with Ed. The couple tried to patch their marriage up, but the resentment and hurt was difficult for them to overcome. Ed remained emotionally distant and Rita began to have a torrid affair with Alan Spaulding
Alan Spaulding
Alan Spaulding is a fictional character on the CBS soap opera Guiding Light. He was played by Chris Bernau from the time of the character's introduction on November 7, 1977 until June 1988, when Bernau left the role due to health problems ; Daniel Pilon stepped into the role from 1988 until Alan...
(Christopher Bernau
Christopher Bernau
Christopher Bernau was an American actor.-Life and career:Bernau trained in the drama department at the University of California before getting his big break, appearing in the New York Shakespeare Festival's production of Antony and Cleopatra in 1962...
), who was at the time married to her niece Hope Bauer. When the affair was revealed a few months later by blackmailer Andy Norris, Rita left Springfield for good. The last glimpse of her was as she sat in in an airplane, taking off for parts unknown, wondering if she would ever come back to Springfield. It was suggested at the time of her departure that she might be pregnant, but this was never resolved (nor was it resolved whether the baby would have been Alan's or Ed's).
After her departure, Ed and Alan both tried to locate Rita, independently of one another, though her whereabouts were never determined. (She was said to be headed to San Francisco, but Alan's private investigator was unable to find her there.) Eve informed Ed that she believed Rita had left San Francisco a few months after arriving there, because she feared she was being followed, and that she'd then lost contact with her sister; neither Eve nor Rita's mother Viola had any further knowledge of Rita's whereabouts. Eventually Ed was granted a divorce from Rita on the grounds of abandonment. The character was last referred to on Guiding Light in the late 1980s, during a conversation between Ed and Alan.