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Yesterday, we said farewell to John Black on Days of Our Lives as Marlena held him and comforted him until he breathed his final breath. Today, word of his passing is spreading throughout Salem and those closest to him are mourning in a way that feels all too real. Part of that is because we, as Days of Our Lives viewers have also come to love John dearly in the past four decades that he’s been in our living rooms.
But part of that is also because we know that farewell comes with the real life loss of Drake Hogestyn, who died in September of last year after fighting his own battle against pancreatic cancer.
Usually when an actor passes away on a show, their costars have to go through the grief twice, in a way. Once when losing that person and a second time when the show says farewell to their character. In Hogestyn’s case, though, he was still fighting his cancer with everything he had when Days of Our Lives filmed John’s death. His costars, friends and loved ones had to go through the grief of saying goodbye before it had even happened.
It’s impossible to imagine how difficult that was, even as they still held out hope that he would recover. Eventually, Hogestyn, like John rested. Deidre Hall understands all of this, even as she’s faced her own grief of losing her longtime acting partner and friend, she knows that the Days of Our Lives fans (and indeed, much of daytime) have also grieved his loss.
So when she shared a message on Instagram writing simply and beautifully, “I know. I know. Hardest day ever,” the fans spoke up with a groundswell of support. They shared their own grief, while letting Hall know how moved they were by her performance — and their understanding of the real pain and emotion behind it.
And over on her own Instagram stories, Martha Madison (Belle) posted a screenshot of Marlena leaning in to John as he lay in the hospital bed, wanting to take, “A moment for the Queen.” And in another slide, she shared a photo of Belle and John hugging, with a message echoing what Marlena told her beloved just before he closed his eyes to finally rest: “Forever in our hearts.”
And Eric Martsolf (Brady) paid tribute to his TV dad on his own Instagram stories, sharing, a photo of himself and Hogestyn behind the scenes, writing, “Thank you, Drake. Portraying your son will always be the highlight of my career.”
As Marlena said on the show and Madison noted in real life, John Black may be gone, but he will never be forgotten. And so, too, will Hogestyn. That’s something to keep in mind in the coming days and weeks as Days of Our Lives deals with his death and John’s loved ones process their grief.
