Photo was taken on the set of The Guiding Light

Getting on a soap opera was about the best and steadiest job an actor could have in New York City, but, (and there's always a but, isn't there?) everyone's contract had a clause which let the networks drop your option every thirteen weeks with no penalty to them. This meant that Tom had to hit the ground running and make his character indispensable to the show if he was going to last. It was all about your story line on the soap operas. If your story line was hot, you could figure your contract would be renewed.

 He needn't have worried. He was almost instantly popular with the audience. His love interest, as it is called on the soaps, was an excellent and experienced actress, which was a blessing he didn't always enjoy during his seven-year run on The Guiding Light. The chance to work regularly as an actor with so many other fine actors and talented, creative people was sheer heaven for Tom.

Outside the studio every day, adoring fans waited to get his autograph and have their picture taken with him. Where once he’d been just another out of work actor, desperate for any job, and at the mercy of casting people, now he was a soap star and all sorts of people who wouldn’t have given him the time of day only a few months ago were suddenly taking a very enthusiastic interest in him.

 The first year that Tom was on The Guiding Light the show went from the number six soap opera to number three. Many times, during those first years, Guiding Light won the week in ratings as the number one show. Every week that the show hit the number one spot was cause for celebration and kudos all around. Tom's story line was hot, and he was on the show sometimes three or four days a week, doing as much as sixty pages of dialogue a day. What a gratifying experience it was for him to be so popular and to have his work so appreciated.

 Tom, as Justin Marler, famous heart surgeon, mender of broken hearts, intemperate, irascible, and slightly arrogant, was a resounding success on Guiding Light. He and Sara, the other heart surgeon, his old flame, lit up the screen. Sara was played by the actress Millette Alexander, a terrific actress, concert pianist and the daughter-in-law of Oscar Hammerstein II.

 Everything was coming up roses. Or was it? When I subsequently got the name of one of the women who Tom was allegedly emotionally involved with, I knew that his duplicity began almost immediately after he got on the soap. Sudden fame and success are bound to get anybody a little goofy. But when I first realized that he’d betrayed me as soon as he stepped on the soap opera set, there really weren’t words bad enough to yell out loud at his departed spirit. I’d have staked my life on the heart of Tom O’Rourke, and he initiated a secret involvement with another woman only weeks after he’d proposed to me and been accepted.

 At least in Tom’s mind, his interactions with this woman created a powerful romantic connection between them. She may have just viewed it as a casual show business flirtation. But whatever it was for her, for Tom it was something much deeper and more dangerous.

That kind of thing happens all the time in all businesses. I’d heard it many times from photographers, art directors, and actors. “You’re terrific and I’m going to make you a star.” This always involved some kind of sex. And it’s almost never true. I’d been hit on like that since I was eighteen. Was Tom really so naïve that he fell for it?

 I loved Tom so much that I have to be careful not to make excuses for him. But furious as I was when I figured out when he started his misbehavior, I knew that his situation and life story certainly made him unusually vulnerable at that time. This was the most incredible and best job he’d ever had. The money was great and steady. And there couldn’t have been more than a hundred soap jobs total in New York, even at this time when the soaps were booming.

The pressure on Tom was enormous. He had the external pressure to deliver as a professional and attractive actor, plus an internal pressure to prove to himself that he could survive this job. It must have been absolutely punishing. From starving actor to big star was the biggest change in Tom’s life, ever. Overnight, he went from obscure nobody to an actor who would be watched, recognized, and judged by millions. Not just his face, but his entire personality was going to be exposed to see if he measured up. It was the biggest thing that had ever happened to him, careerwise. The people he worked with on the show must have basked in a very glamourous aura in his eyes. And indeed, many were from very privileged backgrounds of great wealth, well-connected families, and high class colleges.  

Tom had nothing to fall back on, no college degree, no one cared that he’d been in the Army, or been a paratrooper, or gone to Goodman Theater School. He had practically no formal education. If this didn’t work out, God only knows what he’d end up doing. Pumping gas or working in a convenience store, if he was lucky. And he was a sensitive, artistic, talented, very intelligent man who wanted a good life and had worked very hard to get this chance. This was it for him.  

 But none of that explains why he so quickly emotionally disengaged from our relationship. From his first day on the soap, not only did he do very well and make new friends, but there was a young woman there. He met many people while he was working on the soap and told me about them. Many of them became good friends of ours. She was just one of them. I recall he told me he’d found her crying in the hallway and had comforted her because he felt bad for her. That’s what I heard. Awww. Yeah right.

Back then, I didn’t suspect the two of them of being up to anything, but I should have. After Tom’s posthumous confession from beyond the grave, she was a woman on my suspicious list who I could see he’d been in contact with for decades, supposedly over job issues. Her name as someone he was emotionally involved with was confirmed for me later when I consulted the famous psychic Pam Coronado. Once I knew she’d been his secret passion for many years, lots of incidents that had seemed innocuous turned out to have been anything but.

 The woman who Tom was pursuing was young, new on the job, and working in some lowly staff position, but she came from a privileged background and had great expectations of moving up to positions of power in the soap opera industry. She had attended exclusive drama schools and walked into jobs at top notch theater companies due to her connections. I’m sure she impressed the hell out of Tom. How thrilled he must have been that she turned to him for comfort, advice and perhaps something more. Though it was common knowledge that he was engaged to the woman he was living with, she must have, at the very least, accepted his attentions. But that may have been just who she was.

It’s difficult not to feel that she took advantage of Tom’s neophyte status. She had a lifetime of experience in how the industry worked, unlike Tom, who was a relative newcomer, a guy who’d come up the hard way and whose whole future was riding on this job. But, how much experience does it take to recognize trouble when you run into it? Let’s be realistic. It takes two to tango, and he was tangoing, too.

 When he mentioned her, it sounded as though he thought he was being kind to a person who was having a hard time at her job. I didn’t really think anything of it. Tom was always kind to people, men and women. I met men all day long on my jobs, too. I had no reason to be suspicious of this woman. You can’t go through life being suspicious of everyone your husband works with.

She certainly seemed to encourage his interest. We were invited to her home quite a few times over the years. She rarely said two words to me. Perhaps she enticed him with her insider tips about ways she could show him to achieve easy career success. Whatever she offered, he fell for it, hook, line, and sinker.

How far their relationship went, I don’t know. But many things happened afterward that can only be explained if they were constantly in contact for years. She certainly meant me no good as she toyed with my husband’s affections. But Tom went merrily along with the clandestine association, never mentioning a word about his secret association. But why would he even give her a second look when he was already engaged, had a great job, and was a success? What was his problem?

 After Tom’s confession from beyond, I eventually got over the incredible hurt and pain of his unfaithful behavior, I took a cooler look at the situation from a more objective point of view. So here we have Tom, a struggling actor for many years, who now has a great job, and is engaged to the woman he loves, a woman who adores him, who has proved her love by helping him and sticking with him through some tough times, whose greatest joy in life is satisfying his every wish and desire, and, oh by the way, she’s a successful, high fashion model who’s considered pretty hot stuff and a graduate of an Ivy League college. Without being accused of bragging, I think most people would call that being a lucky guy. So, what does Tom do the minute he gets his great job? He gets himself secretly involved with another woman at his job. Looking at the facts, this goes far beyond stupid. People with single digit IQ’s would know better.

 It’s absurd to ask what was he thinking. No one who does something that irrational is thinking. So, yes, there was more to this messy situation than meets the eye. Something else was going on. But what on earth could it be?

 There are many things about Tom’s behavior with regards to this woman that don’t make sense. If he’d fallen in love with her, he could easily have made himself available and broken up with me. He was making plenty of money, and she was rich and connected in show biz. We weren’t married yet, so there was no question of alimony. Besides, I was making a very good living and could have supported myself, so he didn’t even need to feel guilty. If you’re both so hot for each other, why not go for it?

Of course, show biz is famous for its cheating spouses; it’s practically a requirement, so he certainly would have been doing just what everyone else at his job was doing. To make matters worse, soap operas would have no plots if it weren’t for cheating spouses. And what goes on in the dressing rooms is even worse. He was surrounded by cheating and cheaters. But what was wrong with our love affair all of a sudden?

Tom’s desperate romantic fantasy about this woman actually shows a kind of emotional naivete. He didn’t need her to get ahead. He had real talent. He was sexy, witty, skilled at finding and playing both the drama and comedy in a scene. But as I was to learn much later, there were deeper and much darker reasons which even he didn’t fully understand, but which plagued him all his life and sent him to an untimely grave.