Peter Bergman Talks Making ‘Y&R’ History With Nikki-Jack Intervention Episode

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On Thursday, May 2, The Young and the Restless’ Peter Bergman (Jack Abbott) and Melody Thomas Scott (Nikki Newman) will do something that’s never been done before on the show as they become the only two actors to appear in the episode. Of the history-making turn, in which Jack stages a one-man intervention for Nikki, Bergman says, “It is pretty special. A lot was asked of us, and hopefully it comes through. It’s a really solid idea, and the idea behind it is, ‘How far are you willing to go to help someone?’ And Jack’s more determined than we knew.”

The two-person episode special came as a surprise to the actor. “I was talking to one of the sound engineers here and he said, ‘Hey, I heard about your show next week,’ ” Bergman recalls. “I said, ‘What?’ and he said, ‘Yeah, you got a show. It’s just you and Melody.’ I said, ‘The whole episode is just me and Melody?’ So, the next day, I was eager to get that script. There’s an assumption, ‘Peter can learn anything. He’s so good about knowing his lines.’ Oh my God, I think it was 49 pages long.”

Despite the heavy workload, Bergman appreciates that the tale is rooted in the duo’s past. “This is a desperate attempt on Jack’s part to help Nikki and it has history,” he explains. “When they were married [from 1990-1994], she fell into the bottle and Jack was an enabler. He was not the right person for her at that time, and he never forgave himself for that. So to have a second chance, Jack takes it crazy-serious, to the point that it’s now affecting his marriage and Jack’s dropping things to run to Nikki and there’s a real story behind that.”

Monty Brinton / © CBS /
Courtesy Everett Collection

Working closely alongside Scott again has been a welcome turn for Bergman. “It is the best thing about being on a soap opera,” he enthuses. “I have years and years of history with her, literally decades of history with a character; the first day, I worked with her. And then to have this one show that builds that even further is just amazing.”

To prepare for the episode, the actor did a lot of studying. “For starters, I just learned those lines over and over and over and over again,” Bergman says. “If it was the only show I had that week, that would be great. I was doing three other episodes that week and, you know, Jack is a little on the verbose side, so I had so many words in my head. It was unbelievable.”

Sonja Flemming/CBS

On the actual day of taping, “It was easy for us to make contact,” Bergman reports. “But it’s not the Nikki we’re used to seeing and it’s not the Jack we’re used to seeing in this desperate effort. It will bring these characters a lot closer, and grow the depth of the relationship between Jack and Nikki. But with that comes lots of problems when this is all over. Among them, Jack has to go home and explain to [his wife] Diane why he’s been gone all night.”

Jack will then make a shocking decision that, Bergman teases, “will have repercussions for a lot of people. A lot of people.”

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