Y&R’s Bryton James Says Farewell to Mishael Morgan
After almost a decade of working on THE YOUNG & THE RESTLESS — first as Hilary and then as her twin, Amanda — Mishael Morgan exited the soap on November 15. The Emmy winner announced in late September that she would be taking “a step back” from the soap, further clarifying the following month that she yearned to do other projects and focus on her family.
In the storyline, after learning that her boyfriend had slept with Abby, Amanda left Genoa City — and Devon — to move to Virginia to take care of her mother. In an interview with Soaps.com, Devon’s portrayer, Bryton James, shared that he was just as impacted by Morgan’s departure as his alter ego was by Amanda’s. “More than anything, I’ve lost not just a scene partner but a friend,” he confessed. “You know, we’ve known each other for, gosh, almost 10 years now.”
Going to work will have a decidedly different feel without Morgan there, the actor added. “It’s gonna be sad not to be around her and her energy on set,” James declared. “When you work with someone for that long, there’s a comfort that you have. You feel safe in any kind of scene, and anything that you have to take on, you do it together. So I’ll always miss that.”
Morgan first joined the cast of Y&R in 2013 as Hilary Curtis. The legal eagle was killed off in 2017 when Morgan opted to leave the show, but the actress made a surprise return as Hilary’s twin, Amanda Sinclair, in a shocking cliffhanger episode that aired on September 19, 2019. Following her historic Daytime Emmy win in June of this year, Morgan revealed her plans to drop down to recurring status with the soap in the early part of fall. “A lot of people have noticed that my name is not on the main credits anymore and I wanted everybody to know that it was my decision,” she said in a video message shared in an Instagram Story. “I decided, actually back in December, that I wanted to take a bit of a step back from the show.”
In the months since announcing her exit, Morgan has stated several times that she wouldn’t be turning her back on Y&R forever — and James is hopeful that the door is still open for his former leading lady to come back at some point. “I think we’ll see her here and there.”
