The ‘General Hospital’ Production Hiatus Will Continue Longer Than Hoped, Acknowledges Star William deVry
It sounds as if the cast and crew of General Hospital aren’t going to get back to work as quickly as they had been hoping. Due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic and social distancing efforts, the sets went dark more than a month ago. Now, actor William deVry (Julian) signaled via Twitter that the hiatus isn’t over yet.
In mid-March, it was announced that taping would be put on hold due to coronavirus concerns. At the time, it was noted that the initial plan would be to shut filming down for a month.
In a recent interview with Smashing Interviews, Maurice Benard (Sonny) noted that the cast was told to be ready to report back to the set on April 30. So far, there have not been any official announcements changing that date. However, deVry said in a couple of tweets that April 30 seemingly isn’t going to happen.
When asked by a General Hospital fan if they were going to report back to work on April 30, deVry tweeted back a simple response indicating they definitely would not.
“I hope we can get everyone back to work soon. I will let @valentinifrank update you guys. I wish I had the magic wand,” deVry wrote.
Julian and Britt seem awfully chatty over there, at the bar. Where will their night take them?
A sexy, new #GH starts RIGHT NOW on ABC! @WilliamdeVry1 pic.twitter.com/jGKL4lWlzV— General Hospital (@GeneralHospital) March 13, 2020
Later, deVry added another post on Twitter adding some context to his earlier response.
“I said April 30th is def not happening as we are city lock down until May 15th. Not so much a GH update. I also said to check with @valentinifrank for accurate info,” deVry wrote.
At this point, it isn’t known for certain when California will lift the social distancing restrictions and let people head back to their workplaces. As long as there is an ongoing stay-at-home order in California, the General Hospital cast will remain on hiatus.
Unfortunately, that likely means that daily reruns are on the horizon for viewers. The network recently started airing encore episodes on Fridays in an effort to stretch out the new shows they have pre-taped. As that plan went into place, it was noted that ABC would have to start airing all reruns after May 22 if filming had not resumed.
The show has started to incorporate a lot of flashbacks into these new episodes, a strategy that is surely being done to further stretch out the new content they have remaining. Unfortunately, if taping isn’t resuming on April 30 as had previously been anticipated, ABC soon will be out of fresh content.
It doesn’t appear that General Hospital executive producer Frank Valentini has shared any updates on this taping schedule via his Twitter page as of yet. For now, it seems that fans will have to hang tight and hope for the best in terms of getting everybody back to work soon.
