Eric Martsolf Talks Filming John Black’s Tearful ‘Days’ Funeral: ‘It’s Going to Fill Your Heart Up’

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Grab your tissues, Days of Our Lives fans. John Black’s (Drake Hogestyn) funeral begins on June 9 and is sure to be a tearjerker.

Saying goodbye to the popular character was an emotional challenge for the cast on multiple levels. Not only had Hogestyn been a beloved presence on set for nearly 40 years, but in real life, he was quietly facing the final stages of pancreatic cancer.

“It felt very unnatural to film a funeral of a character and a man who you knew was still with us,” says Eric Martsolf, who plays Hogestyn’s on-screen son, Brady Black. “It was extremely hard, primarily because we were all holding out hope for Drake to beat this awful illness that coincidentally had taken Isabella Black, my fictitious mom, and also took my biological mom four years ago. So, I was ready for pancreatic cancer to just be eradicated from the planet. This disease really took a chunk out of my world.”

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Martsolf reports that the cast banded together to navigate their way through the painful episodes. “I’ve never had a mountain that high to climb as an actor before in my life,” he reveals. “We realized that we were all going to have to do this together. We’re asked every day to bring some reality to these fake circumstances on soap operas, but when the circumstances are very real and just heart-wrenching, it makes it that much more difficult to do it. So, it was a team effort that day, and we all just held each other’s hands so tight. Everyone’s knuckles were blue from holding each other, and we all just kind of got together and said, ‘We can do this. We can all get through this.’ ”

But in many instances, it was easier said than done. “We didn’t keep it together all the time,” Marstolf relays. “There were a lot of takes. There was a lot of apologizing. There was a lot of inability to continue. So, we would stop tape, and people would get their composure, and they’d come back to the table and do what they knew they had to do and get those words out. People that have been working with Drake for decades, we were bawling like school children. As hard as it was to do, it was necessary. And Drake, above all, loved telling stories, and it was just beautiful to witness all the stories that each character had about Drake and John Black, and I was very proud and honored to be a part of that group. It was a beautiful two days.”

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Despite the heaviness of the task at hand, Martsolf previews that there’s also some levity to the proceedings. “I was so thankful to the writers because they did bring a celebratory sense to it that I believe honored Drake,” he praises. “I know he wouldn’t want all of us to be sitting around bawling our eyes out with our heads down. He would have wanted us to lift everything up and celebrate his life and celebrate what he brought to the canvas of the show, and we did that.

“My speech in this particular funeral sequence is funny,” Martsolf continues. “Without giving away too much, it’s a giant tribute to his eyebrow, which will probably go down in soap history as a very iconic mannerism for a character. It was hard, though. It was hard through it all. There was an equal amount of tears and laughter that day.”

Martsolf, who joined the soap in 2008 after a six-year run as Ethan Winthrop on Passions, cherishes the connection he had with Hogestyn. “It was very much like a father-son relationship, honestly,” he reflects. “He showed me how to have fun here, but he also showed me how to work hard here. I think that’s the secret to longevity in this business and enjoying your job. I think that’s the difference between people that do soaps for six months and people that do it for 40 years. They find that beautiful balance between enjoying it here and not taking it too seriously.”

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Hogestyn’s professionalism was evident until the end, Martsolf reports. “The last week Drake was here, he didn’t have an iPad, he didn’t have a script in his hand,” he recalls. “He knew [his lines] before he walked in the doors, and we don’t always see that work ethic these days from actors. He educated everybody on how to do their job well around here. But he was also just a jokester and a goofball.”

Their final moments at the studio are memorable for Martsolf, where they alluded to Hogestyn’s real-life plight. “He wasn’t really forthcoming with what was going on with him, but I’d heard rumblings in the halls,” Martsolf relays. “I remember we were [on set]. They took a short break for like a minute, and he just kind of stood there at the table, and I looked at him and said, ‘How you doing, man?’ and he just looked at me and said, ‘Dude, I’m on a mission. I’m just on a mission.’ He was just a pillar of composure through the whole thing. Strong ’til the end.”

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And Hogestyn’s legacy still looms large in the Burbank studio. “He was one of our best,” Martsolf sums up. “He was a beautiful dude that really loved this place. There’s a giant hole between John Aniston [Victor Kiriakis, who passed away in November 2022] and Drake Hogestyn. Those were two monsters that loved the genre and gave so much to these hallways. They’re a little empty, but day by day, we’re filling it up and trying to honor his work. Brady references his father a lot in the upcoming months, and he and Marlena [Evans, Deidre Hall] have a lot of chat, so his spirit is still threaded through the dialogue, and that’s terrific.”

While the funeral might not be the easiest watch, Martsolf encourages the audience to be a part of it. “Don’t be afraid to tune in,” he says. “Don’t think it’s going to be a giant black cloud of despair. Give him the honor of taking it in and soaking in the memories and the good stuff, because there is a lot of that. It’s going to fill your heart up. It really will.”

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