‘General Hospital’: Dominic Zamprogna and Lisa LoCicero on Playing Mother and Son When They Are Closer in Age
Lisa LoCicero and Dominic Zamprogna play one of the most important mother-son relationships on General Hospital in Dante and Olivia Falconeri. Their relationship is just as strong off-screen as it is on-screen.
Dominic Zamprogna and Lisa LoCicero on ‘General Hospital’ as Dante and Olivia Falconeri
Dante was brought onto the show as a cop named Dominic Pirelli. The character was initially investigating his biological father, Sonny Corinthos, who he didn’t know was his father at the time. He was later revealed to be Sonny’s son with Olivia. Aside from his storylines involving his mother and father, his other storyline for Dante have included his romance with Lulu Spencer, who he later married.
The character has had relationships with Brook Lynn Ashton and Sonny’s former lover, Brenda Barrett. He has one child with Lulu, Rocco Falconeri. Rocco was carried by Britt Westbourne, who stole their embryo and made people think that the child was her own son with Patrick Drake. Now, Dante and Lulu have no been married since he left town the first time.
As for Olivia, was introduced on the show as the cousin of Connie Falconeri aka Kate Howard. She appeared on the show for the first time in 2008 and has been playing the character on the show since then.
She came to town for Kate and Sonny’s wedding. Olivia was also involved with Sonny when they were all teens in Brooklyn’s Bensonhurst neighborhood. It was soon revealed that Olivia had Dante when she was 15 and she kept she kept the secret from both him and Sonny for years.
The two actors have a bond with each other outside of the show
In a new interview with Soap Opera Digest, both LoCicero and Zamprogna talked about their characters and the relationship that they have that goes beyond their on-screen alter egos.
LoCicero remembered the very first time that she met Zamprogna. “Well, the first time I saw him, Mark Teschner [the show’s casting director] showed me his headshot,” she said. “And I will only say this now because I’ve already said this to you, Dom — that headshot looked nothing like you! But then we corresponded by text and I was very happy to see that he had a great sense of humor and he was cool. Then he came [to Los Angeles] looking for a place to live and he showed up on my doorstep and we went and looked at apartments. You looked very young, because you had a baseball hat on backward — and that was in your day of wearing lots of gold chains, I believe.”
Though they play mother and son on the show, there isn’t a big difference in their ages in real-life.
“I remember meeting you and thinking, “Wow, she’s very beautiful,” and yeah, it’s a little on the less-believable side that I could be your son, but it didn’t really matter,” Zamprogna explained. “It felt like the friendship we had, which we formed really quickly, and our bond, we could exploit when we were on camera and make it real.”
General Hospital airs weekdays on ABC.
