‘NCIS’: Michael Weatherly Reveals if He Ever Dated Kelly Ripa
Former NCIS star Michael Weatherly was an actor long before he began playing Special Agent Tony DiNozzo. During the early part of his career, he became friends with Live! host Kelly Ripa. The two became close but did they date? Weatherly revealed what really happened between them.
Michael Weatherly was a star on the soap operas ‘Loving’ and ‘Guiding Light’
Weatherly met Ripa during his days as a soap star. His first daytime drama appearance was in a 1991 episode of Guiding Light. He played the role of a preppy killer. After that, in 1992, Weatherly starred in 15 episodes of Loving. He played the role of Cooper Alden.
Weatherly once told Chicago Tribune he felt soap operas were more like cartoons. “Am I contributing to moral decay by being on a soap?” said Weatherly. “I can’t take them that seriously. Soaps are like comics, cartoons,” he continued. The NCIS alum mentions one thing he did like about being on Loving, which struggled with ratings at the time, was that he could walk freely without being mobbed by fans.
Ripa starred on All My Children from 1990 to 2010. She played the character Hayley Vaughn. Ripa tells Entertainment Weekly that being on All My Children changed her entire life. “I wound up getting the job. But it was really — I mean, talk about happy accidents. It really was a happy accident,” said Ripa. “It changed my life. It changed my entire life — not just my acting life, but changed the whole trajectory of my life.”
Michael Weatherly describes Kelly Ripa as ‘spunky girl’
Weatherly and Ripa have known each other for years. “Michael and I go way back when I was on All My Children and [he] was on Loving,” Ripa shared during one of her Live! segments.
“We used to work in the same building, but we would hang out in each other’s dressing rooms all the time. There was a group of us that hung out.” Weatherly says Ripa was very “spunky” back in the day and she had a lot of energy. “There was a lot of energy coming out of the Ripa!” he exclaimed.
Did Michael Weatherly and Kelly Ripa ever date?
During an interview with Watch! magazine Weatherly addressed whether he and Ripa ever had a romantic relationship. In that issue, he had a candid conversation with Robert Wagner, the actor who played Tony DiNozzo’s father on NCIS.
Weatherly started by talking about his experience as a soap star. He says it was tough to memorize all the lines for his scenes on Loving. “I was 23, living in New York,” said Weatherly. “It was a great opportunity, but still, it’s terrifying. I had to memorize 60 pages of dialogue a day. And you have one take.”
Wagner then asked Weatherly if he worked with Ripa. The actor says he tested with Ripa for a role and they worked down the hall from each other. Wagner then asked Weatherly if he ever had a romantic relationship with Ripa.
“Never, sir, never,” Weatherly answered. “That one you missed, huh?” Wagner playfully replied. So, it appears Weatherly and Ripa didn’t get together during their soap star days.
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