Sometimes you just can't go home again, as OLTL's Bob Woods (Bo) discovered during a recent trip to the place where he spent much of his childhood. "I grew up in Bell Gardens, Calif. It was an interesting place; it's even more interesting now," he says referring to the changes that time has brought to the area. "It was rough then, but it's much rougher now. My family lived in these apartment buildings there, and I went back because I wanted to see the place where I was born. So I'm driving around at 3:00 in the morning in a really bad neighborhood, looking for the building. Later, when I told people where I was driving around, they were like, 'You've got to be out of your mind.' It was very strange. My elementary school was gone, the apartments had been converted into garages and all the other buildings had bars on the windows. So it was kind of weird."
While he was growing up, Woods' family was shrouded in sadness due to the tragic death of his older brother, Ronnie, who was hit by a car when Woods was just 10 months old. "Looking back, I can understand the impact losing a young child had on my mother, especially tragically like that," says Woods.
Unfortunately, the actor understands all too well, since he and his wife, actress Loyita Chapel, also suffered the loss of their son Tanner's twin brother, Dylan, shortly after birth. "I didn't ask my mom a lot of questions. There was always this eerie presence around the house, with photographs and reminders of Ronnie's birthday and stuff like that," recalls Woods. "It slowly subsided over the years, but I didn't appreciate it when I was younger They were still in a mourning period when I was growing up, and the sadness impacted me even though I didn't realize it while it was happening.
"In retrospect I can see it very clearly," Woods continues. "Now I can justify the things my mom would do that used to annoy me, like telling me, 'Be careful, be careful,' all the time. As a kid, you get tired of hearing that - I know Tanner, my son, does, too, when I'm that way with him. I always tell him to expect the unexpected and to be careful, not to launch into something without looking around and watching his back."
Woods shares a great deal in common with his son, including the fact that they each lost a brother before even getting to know him. "Tanner's the same way I was," Woods observes. "He has all these questions about his twin brother. You want to answer those questions, but the answers conjure up memories. It's a sad part of life."
Woods does his best to answer his son while at the same time being careful never to recreate the air of sadness that enveloped his own childhood home. "Loyita and I just tell him that both of them (Tanner and Dylan) were very sick little boys because they were born premature," Woods explains. "However, Tanner was able to get heathier while things just got worse for Dylan. We've also let him know that Dylan is safe and buried with my mom, dad, brother and grandmother in Texas. It's hard because after the way I grew up, I don't want to dwell on it quite as much with him as it was with me. I just want to touch on it now - then as he gets older, he'll understand it more, and we'll discuss it more."
The fact that Woods' mom was somewhat overprotective of him after that kept him from lettering in any sports in high school. "I did well in gym, because I was coordinated, but I never played any sports," the actor recalls. "I wasn't at all what you would call a stand-out athlete. I was sick as a kid - I had a heart murmur and rheumatic fever as a child - and the doctors all told my mom that if I rested up then, I should grow into a healthy adult. In fact, I even spent the first grade at home, being home-schooled away from the other kids."
It was around this time that the young Woods began to test the waters of acting. "It was something I kind of wanted to do in high school," he admits. "But I just never had time to get involved in any plays because I was busy with student government and stuff like that. Then I got a chance to emcee one of the assemblies, and that was just fun - it was like a chance to be Johnny Carson or something. Later, I got to put on a skit for the student body, and I had the greatest time. You know, getting laughs. I thought it was just such a cool thing, and it stuck with me."
As a senior in high school, Woods met his future wife, Loyita Chapel. However, the fact that the two attended different schools and were several years apart kept them from dating seriously right away. "When I was a senior, she was still in junior high, so she was like this little kid the first time I saw her," Woods says. "She was this really cute little girl to me, but when you're 17 and she's a few years younger, that's a huge difference in age," he says with a laugh. "I mean, guys wrote songs about that stuff back in the '60s - things like, 'Come back when you grow up, girl.' It's funny, when I listen to any of the oldies stations and hear songs like that, I always think about that period of time."
The couple's first date didn't come about until Woods was in college and Chapel was a sophomore in high school. "She needed an escort to this Valentine's Day dance, and she asked me," Woods recalls. "I was already in college and we were friends, so it was no big deal - but it was a date. Still, in my mind college freshmen didn't date high school sophomores. So after that night, we'd have dinner once a year or something, and whenever we ran into one another, we'd always say, 'I'll call you, I'll call you.' "
The actor spent two years in college before deciding to enlist in the military for the Vietnam War. "It was the time of the draft, so you always had that possibility hanging over your head," Woods explains. "Plus, I was in a fraternity and going nowhere fast anyway. I never missed a party, but I missed a lot of classes, so I figured I'd better enlist before my grade point average got me drafted. Besides, as a kid I just always figured that at some point in your life you went into the service - it was always called 'the service' back then. It just seemed like everyone's father was involved in World War II somehow."
As he grew older, Woods was noticing less and less of a difference in his and Chapel's ages. Unfortunately, geography was now playing a pivital role in their would-be relationship. "When she got into college at Long Beach State, where I went, she ran into a friend of mine there and asked where I was. But by then I was gone; I was at Ft. Bragg," the actor recalls. "Right after that, she dropped out to tour professionally with Disney on Parade as a dancer, and I was sent to Vietnam."
By that time, Woods was seeing Chapel in a different light, and he turned to his mom for a little investigating. "I called home and said, 'Why don't you see if you can get a hold of Mrs. Chapel (Loyita's mom) and find out where Loyita is, because I'd like to write to her.' So my mom got in touch with her mom, and before I knew it, Loyita had written to me," he says with a proud laugh. "We wrote back and forth constantly. Then, when I was on leave, her tour was in L.A., so we were able to spend just about all of our time together."
Following Woods' stint in the military and his reintroduction to college life, the couple married and both embarked on careers in the entertainment business. Before he knew it Woods' career was taking off with roles on such hits as "The Waltons" and "The Bob Newhart Show." Things were going well for the young couple, who were managing to support themselves as actors - which both realized was no easy feat. Then, in 1979, Woods was offered the role of Bo Buchanan on OLTL, a part he has been playing on and off ever since.
Relocating to New York and joining the show was not such an easy decision for Woods. "I'd been like a lot of young actors and kind of pooh-poohed daytime. Because when you haven't done anything professionally, you're holding out to do movies and your own series and stuff like that," he says.
However, Woods soon opted to take the job and found himself thrust into the world of daytime television. "It was a shock," he says, referring to the notoriety he got as a result of his soap role. "One time, early on, Colleen Zenk (Barbara, ATWT) and I were going to do a mall appearance, and when we got there, we couldn't believe the size of the screaming crowd. I asked a security guard who else was appearing that day, and he said, 'Just you two.' That blew me away. Here I was, thinking, ''I'm just going to do this soap opera,' never having any idea how much my life was about to change. Once it did, it was difficult to keep it all in perspective."
Unfortunately, the new job and the frenzy surrounding it contributed to the breakup of Woods' marriage. The next several years were a time of learning for the actor, who quickly discovered that the raves he was getting for his work on OLTL weren't enough. After working things out with Chapel in 1985, the couple remarried in a simple, private ceremony, and a year later they decided to try their luck on the West Coast again. "California was home for us at that time," explains Woods. "We had a home there, and my mom was out there sick. So it just seemed like we should be back there."
The next couple of years were not easy on the newly remarried couple, who quickly faced the loss of Woods' mother in addition to the miscarriage of a much anticipated pregnancy. A brief stint on DAYS and a severe bout of homesickness for New York were soon followed by a return to the East Coast - and, for Woods, a 1988 return to the role of Bo Buchanan, which suits his costars just fine. "Bob Woods is such a pleasure to work with," says the actor's onscreen wife Hillary B. Smith (Nora). "And quite honestly, he is one of the most handsome men on daytime."
Nathan Purdee (Hank) adds, "I love my wife, but I'd vacation with Bob any day of the year and leave her at home! He's a lot of fun, and we have a great time. We sort of regress and become like kids when we're together. He's one of the funniest guys I've ever met."
That's strong praise from two of Woods' biggest fans and chief partners in mischief on the OLTL set, which serves as the actor's home away from home when he's not spending the time he treasures with his family. A second chance at love and a second chance at the role he originated on OLTL has Woods counting his blessings. Life is good these days - a fact that doesn't escape him for a moment.- ART SMITH
