Shawn Christian leads DAYS domination of 15th Annual Soaphunks.net Awards

The fourth time was the charm for DAYS' Shawn Christian, who won Best Hunk in the 15th Annual Soaphunks.net Awards, when winners were announced today.

The DAYS doctor had been nominated for Best Hunk three previous times before finally winning this year and becoming the oldest hunk ever to win the top prize. He also won for Best Butt and Best Hunk Over 40, marking the the second consecutive year that the same person has won both the regular and the Over 40 races in the same year.

The only race lost by Christian was Best Torso, where he finished second to winner Rob Wilson of AMC. Wilson also won a very competitive race for Hunkiest Newcomer. Wilson's wins were the first for AMC since 2005.

Also winning two prizes were Y&R's Marco Dapper, who won Best Pecs and Best Arms; and DAYS' Greg Vaughan, who took Best Face for a record fourth time and whose priest's collar snared him a win as Most Shamefully Clothed.

All other winners claimed a single prize, but they were almost entirely nabbed by DAYS actors. Among the show's overall 10 wins were Nathan Owens for Best Abs, Galen Gering for Best Hair (his 5th win in that category), James Scott for Best Voice (his 7th), Freddie Smith for Best Smile, and Chandler Massey for Best Eyes. Curiously, last year's Best Hunk winner, Eric Martsolf, was shut out this year. Not curiously, DAYS triumphed as Hunkiest Soap for the 8th time.

OLTL alum and two-time Best Hunk winner David A. Gregory won for Most Missed Soap Hunk.

Complete voting results can be viewed at the Soaphunks.net Award archive.

Newcomers, Salemites dominate nominations for 15th Annual Soaphunks.net Awards

Daytime freshmen Nathan Owens of DAYS and Rob Wilson of AMC each racked up a record-tying eight nominations to lead all studs in the 15th Annual Soaphunks.net Award nominations, announced Sunday at soaphunks.net. Eighty nominations were announced covering 16 categories.

As no soap hunk has ever earned more than eight nominations in a single year, Owens & Wilson join AMC's Cameron Mathison, who had eight nods in 1999, as well as Mark Collier (2004) and Mark Lawson (2008) for the record.

Both diaper dandies found themselves with mentions in the top category — Best Hunk — along with DAYS' Shawn Christian, Y&R's Marco Dapper and B&B's Lawrence St. Victor. This is Christian's fourth shot at the top prize that has eluded him thus far. Dapper's nomination here is his second, and St. Victor's nod is his first. None of the five nominees has ever won the Best Hunk title — the third consecutive year that's been the case.

Christian and St. Victor each received four nominations, as did DAYS' Eric Martsolf and Greg Vaughan. Dapper got three total nods.

A total of 37 soap hunks received nominations this year, up four from 2012. With 31 nominations, DAYS led all shows for the second consecutive year. NBC led the networks with 32 nominations. CBS scored 24 nods, with newcomer The Online Network (TOLN) grabbing 17 thanks to the re-emergence of AMC & OLTL. ABC brought up the rear with seven.

Other points of interest:

• Until this year, only one African-American had ever placed in the Best Hunk race (Y&R's Shemar Moore in 1999). With Owens and St. Victor up this year, African-Americans grabbed two of the top category's spots. In fact, the inclusions throughout the ballot of hunks like GH's Sean Blakemore, OLTL's Corbin Bleu and Y&R's Redaric Williams & Lamon Archey helped make this the best year ever for black soap hunks.
• Two more nominations for GH's Tyler Christopher put him in sole possession of an unfortunate record: the most nominations (15) without any wins. Will this be his year to finally win?
• The Hunkiest Newcomer race was clearly its most competitive in years, as nominations leaders Owens & Wilson were joined by Williams, OLTL's Robert Gorrie and DAYS' Casey Moss. Left out were the otherwise eligible Bleu, as well as DAYS' Sean Douglas, AMC's Ryan Bittle, GH's Bryan Craig, and Y&R's Lamon Archey & Hartley Sawyer.
• For the first time since 2005, the winningest soap hunk of all time, Brandon Beemer, is not nominated in any caegory.
• Two of the Best Hunk nominees (Dapper and Owens) have already departed their respective soaps, while Wilson's entire show seems to be on permanent hiatus.

The entire list of nominations is available online. A complete year-by-year history of the awards is also available online.

As always, voting begins December 1 at soaphunks.net.

Y&R's Dapper leads nominees for 14th Annual Soaphunks.net Awards

Y&R hottie Marco Dapper landed seven nominations to lead the pack in the 14th Annual Soaphunks.net Award nominations, announced Wednesday at soaphunks.net. 79 nominations were announced covering 16 categories.

It is the first time a Y&R actor has held the yearly nominations lead.

One of Dapper's nods came in the top category — Best Hunk —along with B&B's Scott Clifton & Adam Gregory and DAYS' Shawn Christian & Eric Martsolf. Gregory, Christian, and Martsolf have six previous Best Hunk nominations between them, but none has ever won the top prize.

Christian, Gregory and Martsolf each received five nods, as did DAYS' Chandler Massey. Clifton got four total nominations.

A total of 33 soap hunks received nominations this year. With 28 nominations, DAYS led all shows for the first time in four years, though it was CBS that led the networks with 32 nominations. NBC scored 29 nods, with ABC at 18.

Other points of interest:

• With his five nominations this year, DAYS' Eric Martsolf passes B&B's Don Diamont for the second-most total nominations all-time with 33. Diamont's two 2012 nominations give him a lifetime total of 32. (AMC's Cameron Mathison remains in first place with 38.)
• The Best Voice nomination for Y&R's Daniel Goddard ties the Aussie actor with GH's Tyler Christopher for an unfortunate record: most nominations without any wins.
• After having won the award for Most Missed Soap Hunk the past two years, DAYS' just-debuted Greg Vaughan turned his one week of eligibility this year into a nomination for Best Face, the 18th nomination of his career.
• The good news for GH's Erik Valdez and DAYS' Schuyler Yancey is that both were nominated as Hunkiest Newcomer. The bad news is that both have already received walking papers from their respective shows. A third nominee, GH's Nathin Butler, was killed off earlier this fall.
• With four of the five nominees in the Best Face category, DAYS becomes the first soap to accomplish that feat since OLTL landed four hunks in the Best Arms race in 2010.
• GH's Drew Cheetwood, who has recurred on the soap since 2006, finally stripped down in 2012, and his first Soaphunks.net Award nomination followed (Best Arms).

The entire list of nominations is available online. A complete year-by-year history of the awards is also available online.

As always, voting begins December 1 at soaphunks.net.

Gregory wins 5 Soaphunks.net Awards as OLTL leads way

In an overall strong showing for ABC's One Life to Live, newcomer David A. Gregory won five awards, including Best Hunk, when the 12th Annual Soaphunks.net Awards were announced live Wednesday.

It's only the second time that a soap freshman has won the site's top award, following co-star his Mark Lawson's 2008 feat. Gregory also converted wins for Hunkiest Newcomer, Best Torso, Best Pecs, and Best Butt.

Hearing about his wins, Gregory offered his Facebook followers thanks and indicated he was grateful to his fans and quite flattered. His five wins tied the record for most wins in a single year. 

OLTL won for the second time as Hunkiest Soap, and Gregory's on-screen brother--fellow newcomer Nicolas Robuck--won Best Face. David Fumero, a two-time Best Hunk winner himself, won his first Soaphunks.net Award in six years with a victory for Best Arms. The win marked Fumero's seventh career win.

Last year's Best Hunk winner, B&B's Brandon Beemer, registered two more trophies for Best Abs and Best Eyes. Those are his fifth consecutive wins in both categories, and they put him in first place all-time for career wins, with 15. DAYS' James Scott, the winner for Best Voice, is right behind with 14 career wins.

GH's Steve Burton won Best Hunk Over 40 in his first year of eligibility, while former co-star Greg Vaughan achieved the night's most dominant win as Most Missed Soap Hunk, with over 45% of the vote in that race.

Other winners: DAYS' Shawn Christian (Most Shamefully Clothed) and Eric Martsolf (Best Smile) and B&B's Zack Conroy (Best Hair).

Voters continued the drought for GH's Tyler Christopher, who now is 0-for-13.

Complete voting results can be viewed at the Soaphunks.net Award archive.

Beemer, DAYS sweep 11th Annual Soaphunks.net Awards

A clean sweep for Brandon Beemer gave the B&B stud his first win as Best Hunk in the 11th Annual Soaphunks.net Awards, announced live Wednesday.

Beemer won all five categories in which he was nominated. In addition to the top award, he also won trophies for Best Pecs, Best Abs, Best Butt, and Best Eyes. The abs & eyes awards are his fourth consecutive wins in both of those categories.

Hearing about his wins, a wry Beemer told TVGuide Canada's Nelson Branco, "It's extremely flattering. Soap fans are so loyal. I was very impressed with the voter turnout because my competition was, um, stiff. As long as I make people happy, especially in these dark times, I'll continue to take my shirt off while acting my heart out."

Aside from Beemer's wins, everything else went to Sony's soaps, DAYS and Y&R. The well-organized DAYS voting bloc, in particular, managed a first-ever shutout of nominations leader ABC. (ABC voters managed a reverse rout in 2005.)

DAYS claimed the Hunkiest Soap title for the sixth time and saw five of its stars win individual awards: Shawn Christian (Best Hunk Over 40 & Best Arms), Mark Hapka (Hunkiest Newcomer & Best Face), Eric Martsolf (Best Chest), Galen Gering (his fourth Best Hair win) and James Scott (Best Smile & Best Voice).

The wins for Scott and Beemer moved both into a tie for the most Soaphunks.net Awards ever. Each actor has a career 13 wins from 18 nominations.

Voters also ended the staggering droughts of two Y&R hunks this year as Thad Luckinbill & Shemar Moore both won their first awards. Luckinbill's win as Most Shamefully Clothed was his first in 18 nominations (a record). Memo to Y&R: Get Luckinbill naked now! Moore's win as Most Missed Soap Hunk was his first in 13 attempts and was no doubt aided by Darius McCrary's recent casting as Malcolm Winters.

Those wins now move GH's Tyler Christopher into the role of the Soaphunks.net Susan Lucci, as now he holds 12 career nominations but no wins.

Complete voting results can be viewed at the Soaphunks.net Award archive.

11th Annual Soaphunks.net Awards: Polls open!

It's December 1st, so voting for the 11th Annual Soaphunks.net Awards officially started at midnight ET. You can access the ballot at soaphunks.net/vote.

As always, we have gone to great lengths to provide evidence for each nomination to help make you a more informed voter. "Review the Evidence" links are all over the ballot. Click them before voting! This is one ballot that you will want to spend some time on!

And as usual, in the top category of Best Hunk, we have For Your Consideration videos of all of the five nominees' hunky achievements from 2009. Behold the beauty, then go vote!

11th Annual Soaphunks.net Awards announced!

With six nods each, DAYS' Shawn Christian and OLTL's Mark Lawson led all nominees Wednesday as the 11th Annual Soaphunks.net Award nominations were announced live at soaphunks.net. 80 nominations were announced covering 16 categories.

Both Christian and Lawson placed in the top category, Best Hunk, along with B&B's Brandon Beemer, OLTL's David Fumero, and Y&R's Daniel Goddard.

Lawson won Best Hunk last year, while Fumero won in both 2001 & 2002. Beemer is now only the third person to be nominated for the top award in three consecutive years. This is Christian's second career Best Hunk nod, and Goddard's debut appearance here marks Y&R's first inclusion in the top category since 2005.

A total of 39 soap hunks received nominations this year, a tie for the second-most ever. With 18 nominations, OLTL led all shows for the second consecutive year, helping ABC lead the
networks with 33 nominations. CBS scored 28 nods, and NBC nabbed 19.

Other points of interest:

• The good news for CBS: B&B once again broke its own record for nominations, with nine nods spread amongst Beemer, Don Diamont (scoring his 26th career mention), Texas Battle, and Rick Hearst. Similarly, sister soap Y&R had its second-best year ever, with 14 nominations. (The CBS flagship soap received 17 nominations in 2000.)


• The bad news for CBS: ATWT posted its worst showing in six years, scoring only three nominations. What's worse: the de-hunkified sudser saw all three of those nods (Van Hansis, Billy Magnussen, & Jake Silbermann) in the Most Shamefully Clothed Category. Memo to ATWT's powers-that-be: Shirts! Off! More!

• The nominations for Murray Bartlett and Lawrence St. Victor mark the final nods for GL, bringing its series total to 28 nominations...and no wins.

• Will you guys ever give the boy a trophy? The Soaphunks.net Susan Lucci, Y&R's Thad Luckinbill, is back with two more nominations, extending his unfortunate lead in the no-wins race, with 18 career nominations but no wins.


• AMC's Cameron Mathison, suddenly finding himself eligible for Best Hunk Over 40 honors, picked up two more nominations this year, widening his lead as the most nominated soap hunk ever, with 37 career nominations.

The entire list of nominations can be streamed online, while the text version is also available. Complete year-by-year history of the awards is also available online.

As always, voting begins December 1 at soaphunks.net.

A Christian act

Soap guru recently sat down with DAYS stud -- and Adonis 2009 finalist -- Shawn Christian, along with his co-star Nadia Bjorlin. A good interview...check it out!

The polls are open!

It's December 1st, so voting for the 10th Annual Soaphunks.net Awards officially started at midnight ET. You can access the ballot at soaphunks.net/vote.

As has been the case the last few years, we have bent over backwards to provide evidence for each nomination to help make you a more informed voter. "Review the Evidence" links are all over the ballot. Click them before voting!

And as usual, in the top category of Best Hunk, we have For Your Consideration videos of all of the five nominees' hunkitude from 2008. Behold the beauty, then go vote!

10th Annual Soaphunks.net Award Nominations Announced!

OLTL newcomer Mark Lawson scored a record-tying eight nods Wednesday as the 10th Annual Soaphunks.net Award nominations were unveiled at soaphunks.net. 80 nominations were announced covering 16 categories.

Lawson's eight nominations include the top category, Best Hunk, and tie him with Mark Collier's record-setting number of mentions from 2004.

Also up for Best Hunk and scoring four nominations each were B&B's Brandon Beemer, DAYS' Shawn Christian, OLTL's John-Paul Lavoisier, and PASSIONS' Eric Martsolf, who helped that now-cancelled soap to its final haul of eight total nominations, for a series total of 96 nominations.

Christian's nod marks the first time in awards history that a contender for Best Hunk Over 40 also landed in the overall top category. Beemer, Lavoisier, and Martsolf each have one
previous Best Hunk nomination, though none of them has ever won it. Beemer is the only nominee to have also been in the top category last year.

DAYS' James Scott, who won Best Hunk in 2006 and 2007, in addition to summertime Adonis titles both years, was left out of the race this year, though he did score three other mentions,
including Best Chest and Most Shamefully Clothed. (His relative lack of onscreen shirtlessness in 2008 was to blame.)

A total of 42 soap hunks received nominations this year, five more than in 2006 or 2007. With 20 nominations, OLTL led all shows for the first time in history, helping ABC lead the
networks with 33 nominations. (ABC was in last place in 2007 on that count.) CBS scored 28 nods, and NBC nabbed 11. DirecTV's network The 101, which aired the final season of
PASSIONS after it left NBC, got credit for that show's eight nominations in 2008.

Other points of interest:

• B&B had its best year ever in the nominations, thanks to strong showings by Beemer and newcomer Texas Battle. The show managed seven nominations.


• ATWT's Jon Prescott scored a Hunkiest Newcomer nomination, despite the fact that he has already been released from the sudser. Perhaps even more noteworthy was the strong showing of his former co-star, Dylan Bruce. He has also been let go from the soap, but managed four total nominations, tying him for second place this year.


• The two nominations for Y&R's Thad Luckinbill (Best Hair & Most Shamefully Clothed) extend his unfortunate lead in the no-wins race, with 16 career nominations but no trophies.


• GL crashed and burned this year, scoring a worst-ever single nomination (Murray Bartlett for Best Voice).
  
• Like it or not, the absence of James Scott (and GH's Greg Vaughan) in the Best Hunk category sets up the most unpredictable Best Hunk race in years.

The entire list of nominations can be streamed online, while the text version is also available. Complete year-by-year history of the awards is also available online.

As always, voting begins December 1 at soaphunks.net.

McCouch back to ATWT; Prescott out

In a surprising development, fan favorite and Soaphunks.net Award winner Grayson McCouch is set to return to ATWT on Sept. 24, less than a year after being killed off the sudser. No word yet on how McCouch's Dusty Donovan will be able to turn up very much alive.

McCouch is known for a very loyal online fan base, who helped him to strong finishes in the Adonis 2004, 2005, and 2006 contests.

In other ATWT soap hunks news, the latest recast for Mike Kasnoff (Jon Prescott) has been axed from the soap for "budgetary reasons." Prescott took over the role earlier this year, following the tremendously popular Shawn Christian and Mark Collier. Soap hunk fans will surely note that while Prescott was in the role, Mike--one of the most frequently shirtless characters in daytime history--went topless a total of zero times.

ATWT casts third actor to play Mike Kasnoff

After the two previous actors to play ATWT's Mike Kasnoff (Shawn Christian and Mark Collier) ended up being voted as being among the 10 sexiest soap hunks of all time, it should be apparent that the newly-cast Jon Prescott has some hunky shoes to fill.

Prescott begins airing in March as Mike returns to Oakdale to re-enter Katie's orbit. (Meanwhile, Christian will begin airing as a hunky new doctor on DAYS the same month.)