Broadway Star, TV Hearthrob, & Multiple Emmy Winner, Kevin Spirtas' Return As Dr Craig Wesley on Days Of Our Lives Has Secured Him A 2023 Daytime Emmy Nomination for Outstanding Guest Performance in a Daytime Drama

From Broadway's "Finian’s Rainbow" and "Priscilla … Queen of the Desert," not to mention the standby for Hugh Jackman in "The Boy from Oz," to Daytime TV hearthrob on both "One Life to Live" and "Days of Our Lives," Kevin Spirtas has become one of Hollywood's most watched talents with his 2019 Emmy win for Best Actor in a Digital Drama and 10 Indie Series Award Nominations and eight Daytime Emmy Pre-noms as Actor/Producer and Co-Creator for AFTER FOREVER (www.AfterForevertheSeries.com) .

DAYS OF OUR LIVES In 2022, Kevin Spirtas reprised the fan favorite role of Dr Craig Wesley on Days of Our Lives that has earned him a 2023 OUTSTANDING GUEST PERFORMANCE Daytime Emmy Award nomination.  Spirtas debuted in the role in 1997 and played the role on and off until 2009. He then reprised the role for the spin-off, Days of Our Lives' Last Blast Reunion in 2019.  The one thing that Daytime Drama stars will always have on movie stars is that they can always drop back into their hit show and continue a character’s story. Most popular television shows do eventually end, and most movie series also hit a brick wall at some point. But with a daytime legendary dramas like “Days of Our Lives,” recurring stars like Kevin Spirtas can return at just about any time — and make a splash immediately.

After appearing on the show on and off from 1997-2009, Spirtas’ Dr. Wesley returned, and made a huge confession to his wife on the series ... that he was gay. Hardcore fans and even casual fans quickly took to social media to vent their frustration with the surprise plot thread.

Kevin’s Response: "I’ve never considered it.  I don’t lead from the character being gay and I’ve never led from it.  I’m Kevin.  I’m someone’s son. I’m someone’s uncle. I’m someone’s partner. I’m someone’s non-partner. I’m someone’s friend.  It’s a slice of who I am.  I am an actor. I am a performer.  I think the interesting thing now is that you no longer have the time or energy to put up with the bullshit or constantly prove yourself.  But I don’t lead with that.  In “Loaded,” my character just happens to be a gay role, a gay man I’m portraying.  Dr. Craig Wesley happened to be a straight man … Until the writer’s decided he wasn’t."

AFTER FOREVER has become the first LGBTQ themed drama to win 5 Daytime Emmy Awards (Including Outstanding Digital Drama, Best Director and Best Actor for Mr Spirtas). Audiences have embraced the series characters, Brian (Kevin Spirtas) and Jason (Mitchell Anderson). A couple who had it all. Their love and their marriage were both supposed to last forever. But when Jason unexpectedly dies, "forever" is cut short, and Brian must learn to negotiate not only his grief, but the world as a, now, single gay man in his early 50's.

Season 2 of AFTER FOREVER, the multiple Emmy Award-winning, short-form Digital Drama Series, has launched on Prime Video, attracting an enormous and incredibly diverse audience of fans of all ages, sexes, sexual identities and genders, who are extremely vocal on social media and in letters sent directly to the show about how much they love the characters and story, and in many cases, how the series has helped them move through their own grief or better understand the grief that a friend or loved one is going through.

Season 1 of After Forever gathered rave reviews for telling the rarely seen story of vibrant, active, diverse “grown-up” gay men ... a group who, like women, tend to disappear from television and film once they are no longer 20 or 30-something, not returning until they are elderly and non-sexual. It also received kudos for its unflinching honesty in dealing with loss, while still maintaining a sense of humor and of hope for the future, and its ability to touch a wide audience.

LEGACY AWARD - On June 8th, 2023, Spirtas will receive the LEGACY AWARD from the Hollywood Museum, during opening of their annual “REAL TO REEL EXHIBIT” and tribute ceremony. Previous recipients have included Michael Feinstein, Geri Jewell, Lily Tomlin and Jane Wagner, as well as LGBT supportive individuals such as Julie Newmar and Fran Drescher

BIO IN BRIEF: KEVIN SPIRTAS is most recognized around the world as Dr. Craig Wesley from NBC’s Daytime Drama: Days of Our Lives, and the cult classic film sequels: Friday the 13th – Part VII: The New Blood, and Wes Craven’s: The Hills Have Eyes – Part II. Before departing the soap in 2000, Spirtas played his DAYS character opposite Matt LeBlanc’s Dr. Drake Ramory on FRIENDS: The One That Could Have Been-Part 1. In 2016, Spirtas went on to win the Indie Series Award for Best Actor in a drama, (of which he also earned an Emmy nomination) for his role as Dominic Delacorte on the digital drama series: Winterthorne. Some of Spirtas’ Broadway credits include: A Chorus Line, Meet Me In St. Louis, and Hairspray, and The Boy From Oz (Stand-by for Hugh Jackman). 

In 2008 the 30-year acting veteran produced the NY Shakespeare Festival reading-presentation of Don Cummings’: A Good Smoke, starring Academy Award winning actress, Meryl Streep, and directed by Tony Award winning director, Pam McKinnon. Shortly thereafter in 2009, Spirtas made his debut as a Broadway producer on the critically acclaimed revival of Finian’s Rainbow, and in 2012 he co-produced the hit Broadway musical: Priscilla…Queen of the Desert. 

In 2014, after running into Days Of Our Lives alum, the late Michael Slade in a New York gym, the two set out to create the critically acclaimed, 6 x Emmy Award Winning Digital Drama Series: After Forever, In 2019 After Forever – Season 1 made history by becoming the most Emmy-awarded LGBTQ-themed drama series on any platform. Spirtas received an Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Digital Drama, along with 3 additional Emmys that he shares with Slade for Outstanding Digital Drama Series 2019 and Outstanding Writing Team for a Digital Drama 2019 and 2020.

In 2022, after a twenty year absence, Spirtas made a historic return to the soap opera, Days Of Our Lives, where his long time ‘straight’ character, ‘Dr. Craig Wesley,’ came out of the closet as gay, late in life. “It was a truly groundbreaking; full circle moment. Not only for the soap opera… but for Spirtas as well.” 

Official Website: http://www.kevinspirtas.com

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