WORLD CRYER

David Cryer, the 1958 DePauw University graduate who performs in the record-setting Broadway musical Phantom of the Opera and has shared the movie screen with Clint Eastwood and Richard Gere, will receive an honorary degree from his alma mater next month.... David Cryer's movie appearances include roles in Escape from Alcatraz and American Gigolo, and he has had roles on television's Law and Order, Dallas, Spenser: For Hire, Emergency! and Wonder Woman, among other programs. For several years he was a featured performer on the daytime serials As The World Turns and Where The Heart Is.

Entire feature, here.

Cryer portrayed Phillip Lombard on ATWT from 1989 to 1990. Phillip was the wealthy, controlling father of Brock Lombard (played by Gregory Beecroft, also Tony Reardon on GL and a very unfortunate attempt at recasting Duke Lavery on GH). Brock was in love with Ellie Snyder (with whom he shared a dark and mysterious secret), but married to Marjorie, whom he liked to slap around. Phillip refused to let Brock divorce Marjorie and Brock, being a hen-pecked Daddy's boy (when he wasn't slapping women around), went along. To make sure that Brock understood the seriousness of the situation, Phillip threatened his son with a gun and reminded that Ellie was a threat to the family, due to her knowledge of the aforementioned dark and mysterious secret.

Brock moved on from Ellie to Emily. They performed a tango at the AIDS Ball that people still talk about today (you can watch a blurry clip of it on YouTube.com at the 1:55 mark). Phillip, no more thrilled with Emily than he had been with Ellie, tried to blackmail the Stenbeck hand-me-down into staying away from his son. Brock turned around and blackmailed his father, once again over their dark and mysterious secret. It turned out that the Lombard family was deep into organized crime, and that Brock had done a little "rubbing out" work for Daddy Dearest in the past. When Brock refused to leave Emily -- and even announced he'd be divorcing his wife for her, so there! -- Phillip decided that Emily could use a little rubbing out herself. And, what the heck, get Ellie while you're at it, too.

Brock considered turning state's evidence against his father, but soon was discovered shot dead, with Ellie's fingerprints on the gun. Ellie wore a wire to try and trick Phillip into confessing that he'd ordered the hit on his own son, but Phillip was no fool. It was only when Phillip's wife and Brock's mother turned against him (gee, the guy had her child killed, what did he think she was going to do?), that the police were able to apprehend him.

We at the PGP Classic Soaps Blog can only hope that Mr. Cryer has a better relationship with his real-life son, the Two and a Half Men star, Jon Cryer.