Soap Q: TV Guide chats with Eric Sheffer Stevens about the possibilitiy of RUKE!

We’ve all been so delighted with the arrival of Dr. Reid Oliver who has really breathed new life into As the World Turns. TV Guide has a terrific interview with the actor who plays the sexy doc who is played by Eric Sheffer Stevens.

Here are some excerpts from the interview:

Doesn’t the revelation—or, for some viewers, confirmation—that Reid is gay make us go back and re-think everything about him through that prism? Especially all the mind games he’s been playing with Luke?

You probably will reassess a lot about his relationship with Luke, and also his attraction to Katie [Terri Colombino]. There have been a few red herrings with Reid, so I’m not really sure where this is headed. It’s very strange not to know what’s coming up, but I’m kinda loving that. For Reid, emotions are very messy and silly, but there’s definitely been sexual tension between him and Luke.

How would you feel if they did have an affair?

Great! That would be juicy and I hope the show will really do something with it, you know? There aren’t that many gay relationships in soaps. I’m open to whatever makes my character more complicated.

There’s a scene coming up where Reid’s past comes back to hit him in the face—literally.

A man whose daughter died under Reid’s care comes out of nowhere in the Lakeview lobby and punches him—and keeps punching. It’s a way to get Reid to open up about his past so Luke can get to know him better.

Conveniently, just as Luke and Noah have officially called it quits.

It forces the [Luke-Reid] relationship to develop. Luke wants to know what this incident is all about and, of course, it takes Reid a while to talk about it. But he does reveal himself a bit, and you see he does care and is very upset when something goes wrong with a patient. For all Reid’s talk and self-promotion—and he apparently is as good a doctor as he says he is—he doesn’t have a 100 percent success rate. And that takes a toll on him. He just doesn’t know how to express it. He doesn’t have the facility to comfort the father or to say, “Listen, I’m really broken up about this,” which is what the father really wants to hear. Reid just allows the dad to beat him up. He allows him to have his grief.

So, then, Reid does have a heart!

Two sizes too small, but a heart nonetheless.And he keeps it sewn up pretty tight.