Erica Kane and Dimitri Marick
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Erica Kane and Dimitri Marick are fictional characters and a supercouple from the ABC daytime drama All My Children.[1] Erica is portrayed by daytime icon Susan Lucci, and Dimitri was portrayed by Dynasty star Michael Nader. Sometimes referred to as a "stormy duo"[2] these two carried out a tumultuous relationship spanning the majority of the nineties. While they had their share of antagonists speckled through their romance, the main roadblock always keeping them apart were their own equally stubborn and equally fierce personalities.
The couple is regarded as one of the greatest in soap opera history.[1] Though Erica has been married many times and has had several men over the years, her relationship with Dimitri is considered one of her most memorable[3] and one of All My Children's most successful.[4]
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[edit] Storyline
Erica Kane and Dimitri Marick fall in love under very unusual circumstances: he is attempting a hostile take over of her cosmetics company, Enchantment. They appear in a face-to-face meeting on TV's Market Street Week to debate. Afterwards, the pair meet privately and argue, at which point their animosity turned to passion and he pulls her into a kiss that she responds to. Unfortunately, their relationship cannot go further than that because he is married to Angelique Voynitzeva and she is in a loveless marriage to Adam Chandler. Dimitri pursues her despite this roadblock. Erica turns down his advances, refusing to be anyone's mistress, but Dimitri is determined. Eventually he wears down her resistance and they begin an affair. He promises to divorce Angelique, but has a hard time doing so because she is not in the best of health. Once free of their spouses, Erica and Dimitri travel to Budapest in his native country, Hungary. While there Erica is kidnapped twice. Once by Dimitri's estranged half brother, Edmund Grey, who wants to be acknowledged as a Marick. Then she is kidnapped by Helga, Angelique's mother, who wanted to keep her daughter and Dimitri together. She locks Erica in Hugo Marick's crypt. Working together with Edmund, Dimitri rescues Erica and Helga falls to her death. Once Erica recovers, she and Dimitri marry for the first time.
Married life does not start out harmoniously for the couple. Soon before saying their "I do's" Erica finds out she has a daughter she conceived from rape at the age of fourteen, Kendall Hart. Erica proves she trusts Dimitri more than she ever trusted any man by telling him what happened all those years ago. This is the first time she told anyone besides Eric Kane and she is grateful he does not say she deserved it like her father did when she told him. They bring Kendall into their home as a part of their family and that is when the trouble starts. The young woman wants to find her biological father which Erica is dead set against. Dimitri tries to help Kendall in her search, putting a strain on his marriage. Things heighten even further when Kendall makes sexual advances toward her stepfather and is turned down. Devastated and humiliated, she goes to her mother and lies that Dimitri raped her. Suffering from hallucinations of her own rape, Erica stabs her husband with a letter opener, effectively ending their marriage.
While they are apart, Erica starts up with Jackson Montgomery even though he is married to Laurel Banning at the time. As Erica models a wedding dress in New York City, Jack proposes to her right there on the runway. Unfortunately, for him, she and Dimitri end up getting back together. In a surprise wedding set up by Edmund and Erica's younger daughter, Bianca Montgomery, Erica and Dimitri ring in 1995 as a married couple.
On another modeling shoot, Erica has an accident and suffers injures to her back. With the help of the unscrupulous Dr. Jonathan Kinder, she becomes addicted to the medication she takes for her injury. Dimitri tries to warn her about Jonathan, but she will not listen, thus putting a strain on their marriage yet again. While under the influence of the increasingly higher doses of drugs he gives her, Erica sleeps with Jonathan. Her dependence on her supplier grows until she finally has to admit she had a problem and checks herself into the Betty Ford Center. Once she was out, Erica and Dimitri start to finding their way back to each other which does not sit well with Jonathan. The doctor drugs Erica and tricks Dimitri into thinking they are still sleeping together. After seeing his wife in bed with another man, Dimitri files for divorce and finds comfort with an equally as devastated Maria Santos Grey. Erica has no idea what Jonathan did or why Dimitri is angry with her. He shuts her out and refuses to even explain why he divorced her. Erica does not find out what happened until she and her new friends Janet Green and Skye Chandler corner Jonathan and he confesses. He soon gets the upper hand on the women and is about to assault Erica when Dimitri comes to her rescue, beating him to a pulp.
With Jonathan out of their lives, Erica and Dimitri reunite. He keeps quiet about his affair with Maria but soon finds out she is pregnant and he could be the father. They quietly run a paternity test and find out the baby is his. Unbeknownst to them, Skye Chandler, who is in love with Maria's husband Edmund, switched the test results. Erica also discovers she is pregnant with Dimitri's baby and the two plan to remarry. On the day that should be their third wedding, Erica collapses. She is rushed to the hospital where she finds out she had a miscarriage. The couple are determined to start a family together so they look into adoption. Before they get much further with their plans, Erica finds out about Dimitri's one-night stand with Maria and the child they supposedly conceived. She confronts Maria in a remote cabin where her rival goes into labor. After delivering the baby, Erica tries to take her to the hospital but her car went off a bridge and the baby is presumed dead. Dimitri makes it clear that he still wants a future with Erica and that his affair with Maria was just a mistake. Erica makes it equally as clear that they are over, devastating Dimitri.
From here, both Erica and Dimitri take a dark turn. Losing Erica leads Dimitri to do very cruel things such as conning mentally challenged Stuart Chandler out of his television station, WRCW, in an attempt to get back at Erica for leaving him. He also "kidnaps" and romantically pursues a very taken Gloria Marsh. Erica is far from angelic, too. After Maria's baby is declared dead she finds the little girl and decides to pass her off as a baby she adopts from Russia. Eventually, Erica's baby is revealed to be Maria's and Erica is sent to prison.
Maria is presumed dead not long afterward, leading to a custody battle between Dimitri and Edmund over the baby, Maddie Grey. Dimitri is awarded custody after a few dirty tricks such as drugging Edmund so he will look like an unfit parent. Even after Dimitri finds out he is not the father, he keeps the secret from his brother. From behind bars, Erica finds out Dimitri is not Maddie's father and helps Edmund reunite with his daughter. Edmund helps her get released from prison so she could help her own daughter, Bianca, with her anorexia. Dimitri is also there for his former stepdaughter. At Bianca's intervention he admits he still loves Erica. Slowly, Erica and Dimitri work their way into becoming friends. He escorts her to the Crystal Ball in 1998 and they look to be on their way to a reconciliation. Unfortunately, by the time Erica realizes she still loves him, he is already married to another woman, Alexandra Devane Marick, and presumed dead. Erica does not believe Alex is the type of woman Dimitri would ever be with and doubts they were ever married.
When he is later revealed to be alive, Erica faints upon seeing him. Once she comes to she cannot believe he is going to reunite with Alex even after she moved on with his own brother, Edmund. Erica's feelings for Dimitri continuously cause a rift in her relationship with her current love interest, David Hayward. Eventually she breaks off their relationship. When Bianca "comes out" as a lesbian, Dimitri is there to stand by Erica and help her adjust to the revelation. Bianca is outed to the public by a reporter at the Crystal Ball. Afterwards Dimitri takes Erica back to the hunting lodge where they discuss Bianca's sexuality and reminisce on old times. Erica tells him that every man she has been with since him (Mike Roy, Jack, and David) pale in comparison to him. Despite this declaration Dimitri insists his life is with Alex now. Dimitri soon returns to Hungary with Alex.
[edit] Recurring themes and motifs
[edit] Fairytale
Their romance has often been attributed with fairytale aspects. Erica on her own always acted like a "little princess" (as Nick Davis dubbed her),[5] but add Dimitri's Hungarian Count status and the pair really is a fairytale couple come to life. This point was driven home by their location shoot in Budapest where they fell in love, with the city's Old World beauty as their backdrop. For their weddings All My Children made sure they did it up "in pure fairy-tale style in an elaborate wedding that took its cue from Dimitri's Hungarian ancestors." According to Carol Luiken (AMC's former costume designer), the show "wanted to do kind of a European princess design" for Erica's dress. The effect was so successful that "Erica looked more like a queen than a princess." The same idea was in mind for Erica's second wedding gown, dubbed "the Guenevere dress." Further cementing their royalty status, crowns were used for their second wedding ceremony which was done in a Russian Orthodox style.[6] During their time together Erica and Dimitri have lived in two castles at one point or another. The first being Wildwind, his Pine Valley estate complete with a turret, which is used as a romantic symbol for another fairytale couple, Dimitri's cousin Princess Gillian Andrassy and her husband, Ryan Lavery. The second being Vadzel, the castle in Budapest, Hungary where they traveled early on in their relationship and shared their famous waltz in full Count Andrassy garb.
[edit] Hunting Lodge/Port in the storm
Wildwind's Hunting Lodge has always held great meaning for Dimitri and Erica. In this place Dimitri forced Erica to admit her feelings for him and they made love for the first time. He also gave her the lodge as a wedding present. Many times during their reign as a couple, the two of them came to the lodge for intimate moments or defining events in their relationship. Even when they moved on with other people Dimitri took Erica there when she was in a moment of distress and in need of comfort. It is sometimes referred to as their "port in the storm" because the lodge literally provided them shelter during a thunderstorm during the beginning of their storyline. In the wedding vows for their first marriage, Dimitri promised to be Erica's port in every thunderstorm. That also holds significant meaning since Erica has very negative reactions to thunderstorms after being raped during one when she was fourteen.[5] During their wedding vows for their first union, this theme was referenced heavily:
| “ | When we met, I wasn't looking for love. I had lost once too often. I had resigned myself to my life. But someone knew better and that someone let it rain and rain and rain. And thanks to one glorious port in the storm, I looked into your eyes and I found love. We've had more than our share of trouble, but we've overcome and forgiven. Today we are marrying as a family. And our family will not look backward but forward. I vow to do everything in my power to make everyday of your life as dazzling as you are. I vow to be your port in every thunderstorm and your partner in all life to has to offer.[6] | ” |
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— Dimitri Marick, episode 6/22/93
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[edit] Cultural impact
Dimitri and Erica might not have been together in years, but time has not diminished their notoriety. To this day, the soap community and the entertainment industry at large have not forgotten their epic romance. Soap Opera Digest listed their 1992 love story as one of All My Children's hottest summer plots, saying "the duo's passion for each other became too hot to ignore."[3] Entertainment Weekly also recognized the pair as one of soap opera's greatest supercouples along with sixteen others from various soaps including couples from both daytime and nighttime serials. The article sites the strength of Erica and Dimitri's love and how it helped them overcome even the highest of obstacles.[1] When asked to name their favorite All My Children couple the majority of viewers gave Erica and Dimitri that honor.[7]
This couple is mentioned in various books. Other Worlds: Society Seen Through Soap Opera, Dorothy Anger's book on the study of soap opera's effects on society, sites Erica and Dimitri's notability among viewers and non-viewers, saying, "I know I can enter any house in my community, even that of perfect strangers, and mention Nikki and Victor, Erica and Dimitri, Lucky and Liz-someone, if not everyone, will know who I'm talking about."[8]Real Things: An Anthology of Popular Culture in American Poetry by Jim Elledge is a collection of poetry about many different subjects in popular culture. One poem focus's on All My Children and features Dimitri and Erica during their affair while he was still married to Angelique.[9]. In a murder mystery novel, Murder Under Blue Skies by Willard Scott and Bill Crider, the couple and the frequent bumpiness of their relationship are mentioned.[10]
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ a b c West, Abby. "17 Great Soap Supercouples: Erica and Dimitri", Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved on 2008-01-29.
- ^ a b "Soap Opera Digest 30th Anniversary Favorite Covers", Soap Opera Digest. Retrieved on 2008-11-02.
- ^ a b AMC's Top Summer Plots. Soap Opera Digest. Retrieved on 2008-02-02.
- ^ Many Happy Returns. Soap Opera Digest. Retrieved on 2008-02-02.
- ^ a b "All My Children: The Complete Family Scrapbook", Amazon.com. Retrieved on 2008-02-02.
- ^ a b "Love, Honor and, and Cherish: The Greatest Soap Moments from All My Children, General Hospital, and One Life To Live", Amazon.com. Retrieved on 2008-02-02.
- ^ Love Shack. soaptownusa.com. Retrieved on 2008-02-12.
- ^ Other Worlds: Society Seen Through Soap Opera. books.google.com. Retrieved on 2008-03-11.
- ^ Real Things: An Anthology of Popular Culture in American Poetry. ecampus.com. Retrieved on 2008-03-11.
- ^ Murder Under Blue Skies. amazon.com. Retrieved on 2008-03-11.
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