Raven Bowens Opens up About Joining the Cast of DAYS

It may have taken a few extra months, but Raven Bowens finally landed the role of Chanel on DAYS OF OUR LIVES! The young actress actually auditioned back when the soap was casting around for the new character but wound up not getting the part. “A couple of weeks later, I booked [another show], so I was in New York and I was doing that show and then DAYS called and they offered me the role,” she revealed to Soap Opera Digest. “It was pretty crazy.”

Bowens still had a couple of days left shooting her other project before she jetted back to Los Angeles to take over the role of Chanel Dupree from previous portrayer Precious Way. “I had to change my hair, get everything together because it was a recast so they needed certain matchups and things like that,” the actress confided. “I literally hopped on a plane, was learning lines on the plane, and had one day of being in L.A. before I started filming on DAYS. My first day, I think I did something like 29 scenes. It was wild. Wild!”

During the few months that Chanel was already on screen, the character had changed slightly from the way she’d originally been conceived. So the soap made sure that Bowens would be comfortable playing a sexually fluid character. “I didn’t understand what the big deal was,” she admitted. “To me, it’s acting and it’s real people’s stories and that’s what I’m in the business to do. I’ve never played a character that was sexually fluid, but I love that they’re doing it on daytime. It can be a little bit taboo to certain people in that regard, but I love it.”

Calling working with Jackée Harry (Paulina) “a dream” and that Lucas Adams (Tripp) and Lindsay Arnold (Allie) took her under their wing and showed her the ropes, Bowens is settling into Salem and enjoying putting her own stamp on Chanel. “I think the longer I’ve been on, the more colors I’ve been able to show,” she said of her alter ego. “The writing is phenomenal and it gives me a lot to work with and does allow me to show all the different sides of her.”

Stay tuned to DAYS to watch Bowens make the role her own and what Chanel does next!