Susan Lucci Looks Back at the Special Way Her “All My Children ”Mom, Frances Heflin, Would Reassure Her After Filming a Scene

Angela AndaloroMon, June 29, 2026 at 8:03 PM UTC

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Susan Lucci and Frances Heflin as Erica and Mona KaneCredit: ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty -

Susan Lucci has dedicated a large portion of her career to portraying Erica Kane on All My Children, from 1970 to 2013

The actress, 79, credited the actors she worked with early in the series for teaching her the finer points of the craft

Lucci remembered the way that the cast thoughtfully worked toward delivering impactful scenes, particularly her on-screen mom, Frances Heflin

Susan Lucci credits the talented actors who helped guide her in her early career for the success she's enjoyed since.

Appearing on Canada's The Social daytime talk show, Lucci, 79, talked about the supportive environment on the set of All My Children. The actress portrayed Erica Kane on the soap opera from 1970 to 2013.

When it came to crafting great moments, Lucci said, "We really didn't think about [Emmy Awards] from one end of the year to the next. Sometimes one of the associate producers — and gosh, we were a family from top to bottom — they would make notes of scenes that they were watching in the control room while we were doing them."

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Lucci says she benefited from working with older actors who were bringing a wealth of different experiences to the table.

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"As a young actress starting out, I was very lucky to work with such amazing senior actors and actresses who had careers on Broadway and in London and so on, and the only thing we wanted to do was to make the scenes work," she shared.

Frances Heflin and Susan Lucci on 'All My Children' in 1982Credit: ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty

"And I remember Fra Heflin, who played Mona, after we would do a scene, she would say, 'I think that worked, darling, don't you?' That was the main thing and everybody in that building was on the same page."

Frances 'Fra' Heflin played Mona Kane on All My Childrenfrom 1970 to 1994, the year Heflin died at 73. In a 2011 interview with Newsweek, Lucci and creator Agnes Nixon, who died in 2016 at age 93, talked about crafting the Mona-Erica relationship, which was at the center of the show's early drama.

"Erica and I both have an abandonment complex, which is very valid. Of course, the way I reacted to it is certainly not the way Erica has," Nixon said of her personal connection to the character.

Kendall (Sarah Michelle Gellar), Erica (Susan Lucci), Bianca (Gina Gallagher) and Mona (Frances Heflin)Credit: Ann Limongello/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty

"One of the reasons I created her was that I wish I could have talked to my mother the way Erica talked to Mona. My mother would ask me if I missed having a daddy and I would say no. Where Erica would say, 'It's your fault he left!' "

Lucci added, "In my eight-page audition scene, Agnes established character and history between Erica and Mona, and a real mother-daughter relationship where a 15-year-old girl was rolling her eyes at her mother like in real life. And Agnes brought so much humor to it, too. It was a role that immediately transcended and there was no reason for me to leave."

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Source: “AOL Entertainment”