On General Hospital, Tracy Quartermaine has been hit hard by the passing of her sister-in-law and longtime frenemy, Monica, who the show will say a poignant farewell to this week — Monica’s memorial service is set to air on Thursday and Friday. In a new interview with Variety, the actress who brings Tracy to life, Jane Elliot, opened up about saying good-bye to her friend and co-star of many decades, Leslie Charleson (Monica), who passed away in January at the age of 79.

A Lifetime of Friendship

The two actresses became GH co-stars in 1978, when Elliot made her debut a year after Charleson assumed the role of Monica from Patsy Rahn. But they had actually met some 15 years earlier, as Elliot explained to Soap Opera Digest in 2023. “Leslie Charleson and I met in the ’60s when I was in a play on Broadway,” The Impossible Years, “and she was dating a guy in the cast and she would come and hang out in my dressing room,” Elliot recalled, adding that as their friendship deepened during their Port Charles years, “Leslie gave me my wedding shower when I was getting married” to Luis Rojas, who was a GH cameraman; the couple later split.

Speaking with Variety, Elliot shared that she found it challenging to play out scenes in which Tracy referred to an off-camera Monica as alive after Charleson’s real-life passing. “It extended the mourning because we had to keep her alive when she wasn’t,” the actress said. “I had to mourn her death twice.”

Elliot acknowledged that the passing of a fictional character is not quite the same thing as losing their real-life portrayer, but after working together for so many decades, “they blended,” she said of Charleson and her alter ego. “Monica was Leslie, and Leslie was Monica. I had shared experience with Monica, and I had shared experience with Leslie, so she left me twice.”

The actress has been grieving for her friend and colleague for months, while Tracy’s grief over Monica is painfully fresh. After losing both of her parents, her beloved brother Alan and her great love Luke Spencer, “They were the last two standing,” Elliot said of Tracy and Monica. “So losing her was like losing an arm.”

That feeling is what drove Tracy to try to escape her pain with a gambling spree in Atlantic City, and fans will have to tune in later this week to find out if she can bring herself to offer a eulogy at the memorial service set to be attended by characters like Jason, Ned, Olivia and Elizabeth. “She’s adamant she’s not going to do it,” Elliot noted. “The question is, will someone get her to change her mind?”