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Marlena Evans is a fictional character on the American soap opera Days of Our Lives, a long-running serial about working life in the fictional town of Salem. She has been played by actress Deidre Hall since 1976, but the character was absent from the show from 1987 to August 1991 and again from January 2009 to September 2011. Marlena was created by scriptwriter Pat Falken Smith and executive producer Betty Corday, and has become one of Days of our Lives' most well-known characters. Hall made her debut on the soap on June 21, 1976, currently making her the second longest running actress on the serial, surpassed only by Suzanne Rogers (Maggie Horton).
Throughout the course of her existence on the program, she has experienced what some consider to be the most outrageous circumstances of any character in soap opera history. These would include being possessed by the devil two times (in 1994 and 2021); a plummet from a 30-story-window (which she survived); being used as a surrogate for genetically engineered babies, Rex and Cassie, during a four-year coma, where she was presumed dead after being involved in a plane crash; being mind-controlled to believe she was a serial killer; being targeted by several serial killers; and becoming pregnant late in life and suffering a miscarriage, which caused her to have hysterical amnesia. She has also been kidnapped numerous times over the past 45 years. She is a doctor, wife, mother, twin, grandmother and great-grandmother.
Marlena has been a staple in the US press during her time on Days of Our Lives, a representative of the symbiosis between American's soaps and tabloid soap magazines. Widely read tabloids, such as Soap Opera Digest and Soap Opera Weekly, would routinely publish forthcoming developments in Marlena's storylines. Marlena was well received by critics, and is notable for her popular pairing with John Black. The character is well-known even outside of the show's viewer-base. In 2010, Sheri Anderson (a former head writer for Days) began writing books about off-screen characters from the soap. John and Marlena were included in one called A Secret in Salem.
In 2009, after struggling in the ratings for years, Days of Our Lives received a two-year pickup. However, the soap's budget was decreased by 40%. To make do with the new financial restrictions, executive producer Ken Corday was forced to fire Deidre Hall and Drake Hogestyn. Marlena's on screen love interest, Drake Hogestyn, had been fired in early 2007 as a way to clear money in the budget. However, he was brought back in 2008 for storyline purposes and to please fans.Stephanie Sloane, "Play It Again," Soap Opera Digest, January 8, 2008; Janet Di Lauro, "A Closer Look – John," Soap Opera Weekly, January 22, 2008; Carolyn Hinsey, "Carolyn's Corner," Soap Opera Weekly, February 5, 2008; Paulette Cohn, "Why I Came Back To Days," TV Soap, February 20, 2008; "Missing In Action," Soap Opera Digest, March 3, 2008; and "Buzz," Soap Opera Weekly, March 18, 2008. The couple were quickly reunited after Drake returned; and then they traveled to Switzerland to treat John's physical disability. Fans were furious with the way the writers wrote John and Marlena out. In an interview with Nelson Branco, Deidre said, "Yes. There was enormous upheaval. I wasn't following a lot of the brouhaha but I was told fans and critics were upset. But it is what it is. Yes, it feels good to hear that fans miss Marlena. People are deeply attached to her."
After a brief two years off the canvas, Hall reprised her role as Marlena beginning in September 2011. Marlena's return was one of the many changes brought about by the soap in order to please old viewers and as an attempt to draw in some new ones. Her return was brought about in extreme changes on the soap, with characters coming and going. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Hall dished on her return saying: "It's dramatic, romantic and involves the entire town. They brought in two new head writers who really believe in things that our core audience believes in. They like romance. They don't like people buried alive, they don't like who's your daddy. For a couple like Marlena and John – who endured bouts of paralysis, amnesia, false deaths and mind control – that should come as a huge relief." It was also confirmed in July 2011 that Drake Hogestyn, who portrays Marlena's on-screen love interest John, will also return to the soap in September as well. Executive producer Ken Corday issued this statement, saying: "We are thrilled that Deidre and Drake are rejoining the show. I know their return will excite loyal fans and intrigue new viewers. We are gearing up for some amazing cast surprises and guest stars visiting Salem in the fall, launching a grand event airing on September 26."
The story begins when the villainous Stefano DiMera gives Marlena mind-altering drugs whilst she is asleep, and with her hypnotised, whisks her away into his fantasy world of romance. The mental, emotional and spiritual abuse of this leaves her open to demonic possession. Marlena completely switches personalities, and she becomes possessed by the devil. John Black, who was a priest at the time, is forced to perform an emergency exorcism. In 2010, Ken Corday discussed the storyline in an anniversary retrospective:
After dwindling ratings again, the show made its craziest decision. All the victims are brought back alive on the tropical island of Melaswen (New Salem spelled backwards). The fired actors (James Reynolds, Suzanne Rogers, Matthew Ashford, Alexis Thorpe, Josh Taylor, Peggy McCay, Frances Reid, Thaao Penghlis and Deidre Hall) all returned to their original roles. There was also another twist, the killer wasn't Marlena. Stefano DiMera's nephew, Andre DiMera (posing as Tony DiMera) had kidnapped them and made Marlena think she was killing off her friends and family. The storyline was incredibly controversial, and garnered the soap a lot of press.
In 1981, Marlena begins spending a lot of time with Kellam Chandler. After Marlena refuses Kellam's advances toward her, he rapes her. Kellam is killed by his son Todd hours later and at the trial that followed, Marlena testifies that Kellam had raped her that night, helping Todd's case. Later that year, Marlena is given her own radio show. Marlena begins to receive threatening phone calls and letters to her and her radio show. While being stalked by the Salem Strangler, Marlena meets Detective Roman Brady, who becomes her bodyguard and then her beau. The Salem Strangler kills Samantha when he mistakes her for Marlena. Soon afterward, the Salem Strangler attacks Marlena, but is killed by Roman.
Marlena and Roman eventually become engaged, but Roman's estranged wife Anna DiMera soon arrives in Salem with their young daughter, Carrie Brady. Anna causes trouble for Roman, but eventually grants him a divorce. Roman receives custody of Carrie, and he and Marlena are married in February 1983. The following year, shortly after she gives birth to twins Sami Brady and Eric Brady, Roman is shot by Stefano DiMera, and is presumed dead by everyone. Marlena, who once thought that she had fatally shot Stefano, is kidnapped several times over the years.
In 1986, Marlena takes in John Black as her patient; he has amnesia and she is determined to help him recover his past. John and Marlena spend a lot of time together, and the pair fall in love. However, John seems to know a lot about Stefano, leading Marlena to suspect he is Stefano. Later, Marlena finds a plastic surgeon's file containing before and after shots of both Roman and John. Marlena becomes convinced that John is Roman, and, over time, John took on the role of Roman. Marlena is later trying to talk down a suicidal jumper when she falls from a window ledge. Marlena lays in a coma, near death for a month. When she finally recovers, she and Roman renewed their vows on August 22, 1986. In his years with the ISA, Roman worked with a man named Orpheus. Roman accidentally killed Orpheus' wife while on assignment. To get back at Roman, Orpheus kidnaps Marlena and fakes her death. Roman shoots and kills Orpheus, but before he could rescue Marlena, she is presumed to have been killed in a plane crash.
In 1992, a jealous, crazed Stella Lombard is convinced that Marlena wants to steal her husband, Roger, and holds Marlena captive in an abandoned warehouse. John saves Marlena before the warehouse is demolished, bringing the two closer and finding it hard to deny their attraction. They eventually start having an affair, which leads to the birth of their daughter, Belle Black. When Belle's paternity becomes known, Roman divorces Marlena and leaves town. In 1994 as Stefano tries to make Marlena his queen of the night she becomes possessed by a demon and John being a priest at the time calls on God and Marlena is freed. By then, however, John is involved with Kristen DiMera. Kristen resorts to desperate measures to keep John and Marlena apart, but her schemes are eventually exposed. John and Marlena reunite, and get engaged. They are set to marry in the summer of 1997, but before they are married, Kristen returns to Salem with Roman, who is dying from an illness. Marlena tends to him when she learns he believes she and John are not together. Once he's cured, Roman discovers the truth, and despite his efforts, Marlena and John reunite. Marlena finally marries John on July 5, 1999.
When John's teenage son Brady Black returns home from college, he immediately clashed with Marlena. Marlena believed that Brady was endangering Belle's life, causing a rift between her and John. Eventually, she and Brady made amends, and she and John reconciled. When the Gemini Twins, Rex Brady and Cassie Brady, seemingly fall from the sky, Marlena finds out she had given birth to the twins during the time she was in a coma years before. She comes to believe that she and Tony DiMera are their parents. However, it's revealed that Marlena was only their surrogate mother, and Roman and Kate Roberts are their biological parents.
When a serial killer dubbed The Salem Stalker starts wreaking havoc around town, killing many friends, including Roman, John and Marlena are worried about what could happen to them. The killer, though, is later revealed to be Marlena, though John believes she was forced to by someone else. Marlena is arrested, and sent to prison, while John tries to clear her name. Marlena tries to escape, and is killed by police fire. However, she's later found alive with all of her victims on Melaswen Island, and it's revealed she was brainwashed by Andre DiMera into committing the murders. She reunites with John, but soon after, Marlena finds out she's pregnant with Roman's child, conceived when they were stranded on the island. During an argument between John and Roman, Marlena falls down the stairs and miscarries. She wakes up with amnesia, as a result of the miscarriage. Amnesiac specialist Alex North is brought in to care for Marlena, and she appears to fall in love with him. Alex later reveals that he is Marlena's first husband, and was presumed dead in Vietnam. Since Alex and Marlena's marriage has never been dissolved, Marlena's subsequent marriages are all invalid. Suspicious, John investigates, and finds out that Alex is an abusive husband. John uncovers that Alex is planning to kill Marlena. By the time that Alex is proven to be a fraud, he and Marlena have renewed their vows, and left on a honeymoon. Alex takes Marlena to Morgan Island, but John soon finds them and, after a shootout and scuffle, Alex falls over a cliff and is presumed dead.
When Steve and Kayla Brady are poisoned, Marlena and John fly to Canada to get a drug that might help them. When their plane began to lose altitude, Marlena agrees to jump from the plane, and is rescued by Smokey Robinson, who helps her reconnect with John. The couple go to Italy to investigate the DiMera family after hearing that Stefano might be alive. After renewing their wedding vows, they find Stefano, who appears to be dying. When he gives John the Death tarot card, Marlena makes him promise not to get involved with the DiMera troubles again. John, however, decides to help Roman stake-out EJ DiMera, who puts John in a coma after shooting him.
Marlena joins the hunt for the reasons behind the Brady/DiMera feud, while keeping John on life support. John then comes out of his coma, and helps Marlena and the others on their quest. John is hit by a car, and seemingly dies on October 17, 2007.Stephanie Sloane, "Back In Black," Soap Opera Digest, January 8, 2008. As is often the case in Salem, characters rarely die. On January 8, 2008, EJ discovers John in the basement of the DiMera mansion, being programmed by Stefano to become a super soldier. After he is discovered by the police, John wakes up with amnesia, and Marlena struggles to help John remember. It is discovered that John is the child of Shawn Brady's sister Colleen Brady, and Stefano's father, Santo DiMera. Their affair and its disastrous ending was the beginning of the feud. John's obesession with his DiMera heritage and his changed personality both start to take a toll on Marlena, and she finds it hard to stay with John. Stefano wakes up from a coma (after Marlena purposely sends him into a comatose state in January 2008), and intends on getting revenge on Marlena and taking the DiMera empire back from John. He causes Marlena to fall into a coma the exact way she did to him. However, Marlena wakes up after receiving a ghostly visit from her late sister, Samantha. John relinquishes his control of the empire to Stefano, but Marlena, by then, decides to move on with her life and files for divorce.
John begins seeing Dr. Charlotte Taylor to regain his memories. Charlotte is the daughter of Marlena's mentor, but it doesn't take long for Marlena to see that something was off about Charlotte. When Brady returns to town, he helps Marlena discover that John is remembering, but Charlotte is actually keeping him in the dark. Charlotte comes to Marlena's apartment and tries to kill her, and explains that she is jealous of her because of how her father seemed to favor Marlena over Charlotte. However, John bursts in at the last minute, and ends up getting attacked by Charlotte. Charlotte is arrested while John is rushed to the hospital. He wakes up with his memory restored. Marlena finds out that John is paralyzed, but he can be treated at a clinic in Switzerland. John and Marlena reunite, get remarried, and head off to Switzerland to treat John's paralysis on January 23, 2009.
Brady gives Kristen a second chance when he finds out she stopped John's attempt to seduce her, but when Marlena overhears Kristen say she slept with another man while separated from Brady, she aims to find out what Kristen is up to. With the help of Nicole Walker, Marlena is able to find a flash drive in Kristen's possession that could reveal her crimes. Kristen finds out, though, and has thugs beat Marlena up to get the drive back. She's unsuccessful, and Marlena is later able to recover it. The drive is encrypted, though, and she asks for the help of Victor Kiriakis to decode it. He's able to open the drive, and tells her that it's proof Kristen slept with another man. He convinces Marlena to play it at Brady and Kristen's wedding ceremony. Marlena discovers, though, along with the rest of the congregation, that the man in the video is her son Eric, who was drugged and raped by Kristen as revenge against Marlena. Marlena had to try to repair her relationship with both Brady and Eric. Marlena got caught up in the drama surrounding her children's lives, as Eric decided to leave his priesthood and pursue a relationship with Nicole, and Sami was accused of murder.
Marlena reconciled with John after he was hit over the head and left in a coma. At the same time, Kristen was arrested for what she did to Eric. She told Marlena that she could give John a cure if the charges against her were dropped. Making a deal with the devil, Marlena convinced Eric to drop his testimony against Kristen, and get her released. John received the cure, and woke up from his coma. Marlena soon started counseling baseball player Paul Narita, who was struggling with being gay. She later was caught in the middle when Paul admitted to sleeping with Marlena's grandson Will Horton, even though he was married to Sonny Kiriakis. To make matters worse, John found out that Paul was his son. Marlena was at odds with John, in an attempt to protect her grandson. Will enlisted Marlena's help, wanting Paul to leave him and Sonny alone. In an attempt to help Will, Marlena ended up heading to Italy by accident, and found Kristen. The two ended up in a struggle, and Kristen fell out of a window; she was presumed dead. Marlena returned home, but was soon captured by Stefano, who wanted revenge for Kristen's death. He planned to kill Marlena in Italy, but she was saved at the last second by Stefano's son, Chad DiMera. Marlena returned home to John and her family. In 2021, Marlena is repossessed by Satan, intent on getting deadly revenge on Salem.
Deidre Hall has won many awards for her portrayal of Marlena. These include two Best Actress Soapy Awards in 1982 and 1983. She has also won three Soap Opera Digest Awards for Outstanding Lead Actress in 1984, 1985 and 1995. Deidre was the first recipient of the Soap Opera Digest Award for Outstanding Contribution Award by a Lead Actress/Actor in 1986. Hall also received an award with Drake Hogestyn in 2005 for "Favorite Couple: John and Marlena". Deidre was twice voted Best Actress by the Soap Opera Update Awards in 1994 and 1995. She has been nominated for a Daytime Emmy in 1980, 1984, and 1985. She has, however, never won an Emmy.
As a special treat in 2007, SoapNet rebroadcast Marlena's possession for Halloween.
In 2020, Charlie Mason from Soaps She Knows put Marlena at first place on his list of the 35 most memorable characters from Days of Our Lives, saying "Thanks to a combo platter of Deidre Hall’s unforgettable performances, unpredictable writing and an enviable array of love interests, viewers have been tuning in since 1976 to find out, ahem, what’s up, Doc?". In 2024, Mason included Marlena in his list of the best mothers in American soap operas, writing that is a "good thing Sami and Eric's mom is a shrink; otherwise, she might have long ago gone mad trying to curb her daughter's tendency to act on impulse and her son's "here today, gone tomorrow" approach to his priest's collar." Mason also placed Marlena fourth on his ranked list of Soaps' 40 Most Iconic Characters of All Time, commenting, "Eat your heart out, Frasier Crane. Deidre Hall's indefatigable Doc is the shrink whose following keeps growing along with the list of travails she's endured".
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