Daytime TV Performer of the Week: ‘General Hospital’s Genie Francis Gives Us All the Feels as Laura Remembers Luke

General Hospital honored the late Anthony Geary, who died on December 14, 2025, with a tribute episode at the end of last week. Genie Francis, who plays Laura Webber Collins, the love of Luke’s life, particularly shined as several characters who were close to Luke remembered the beloved anti-hero.

The episode began with Laura’s assistant speculating that her grandson Aiden (Colin Cassidy) likely wants his first car to be a convertible. That observation prompted a wistful look to come across Laura’s face. The show didn’t need to spring for a flashback of Luke and Laura’s 1993 return to Port Charles in a Cadillac convertible. We saw what Francis was emoting in the moment, and we knew what she was thinking. That’s the beauty of following a character for decades as GH viewers have done with the Daytime Emmy-winning Francis.

While Lulu (Alexa Havins), Luke’s daughter, and Tracy (Jane Elliot), Luke’s ex-wife, realized that the local church wasn’t the right venue to pay their tributes to Luke, Laura found it to be the perfect place to speak to her late husband as she reflected on their life together.

“No one would ever accuse us of being boring. We burned too brightly for that,” Laura spoke to Luke, as GH rolled a flashback of Laura jumping out of a plane and their truck outside the Triple L Diner going up in flames.

“Even when we built a family, we never stopped being an adventure,” Laura continued. “That’s because of you, my love — because you were a force of nature. You didn’t just walk on this earth. You changed it. You changed me.”

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It’s been said that death ends a life, but not a relationship. Francis’s Laura proved this to be the case as she talked to Luke about their children, Lucky (Jonathan Jackson) and Lulu, as if he were silently listening to her.

“I see glimpses of you,” Laura said with a sense of both sadness and joy. “Every day of my life. In every brave choice I make. Whenever I stand my ground. When I really feel like I want to turn and run. I think that’s why it’s so hard for me to accept that you’re gone. It feels wrong — even saying it sounds like a lie.”

Luke was mourned before when the character was killed off in early 2022, and Geary had retired. However, there was always the hope or the chance that we might see him again as long as Geary was alive.

Francis’s performance hit harder because we know now that this is indeed a final farewell in many respects.

“I know you’re not here on this earth with us anymore,” Laura emotionally acknowledged, hastening to add, “Luke, you never left me. Not once. I feel your presence when life gets too heavy, and I feel like I can’t go one more step. It’s your voice that I hear, calling me, ‘Angel,’ reminding me of who I am. And then somehow, I find the strength and I do go on because what we had, Luke, was never really over for me. It just transformed because our hearts are bonded together, beyond time, beyond loss, beyond this lifetime. Nothing can change that. Nothing.”

“Thank you for the dance. Thank you for the adventure,” added Laura. “And thank you for the love of a lifetime.”

There’s a social media tag that reads “#genieisGH,” and it’s performances like the one in this episode that have earned Francis that endearing handle.

Later, Laura gathered with Lulu, Tracy, Sonny (Maurice Benard), Carly (Laura Wright), and Elizabeth (Rebecca Herbst) to toast Luke. Once Laura was surrounded by friends and family, Francis was able to play Laura a little bit less alone. She found comfort in being with other people who loved Luke.

They six gathered at the dock, where Luke had said his final goodbye in 2015, to toast him with whiskey, his favorite drink.

Laura comforted her daughter by telling Lulu that Luke’s not the type of person you bid a final goodbye to. Laura said that with Luke, it’s more like “see you later.”

ABC / Everett Collection

Back at her office as the Mayor of Port Charles, Laura’s assistant informed her she’d gotten her a birthday card for Aiden. On the card was a picture of a Cadillac. The card read: “Happy birthday, Hope it’s a great ride!!”

GH then gave us the flashback we didn’t need at the top of the show (but now, we kind of did) with Luke and Laura in a pink Cadillac. We were treated to other memorable flashbacks, including the couple’s dance at Wyndham’s department store during the famous “love on the run” storyline from the summer of 1980 and the couple dancing at their wedding the following year.

Was it a mere coincidence that Laura’s aide had chosen a card that resonated with Laura’s life with Luke — or was it Luke sending a message from the other side? The knowing look on Laura’s face gave us our answer.

Soap opera viewers come to think of actors in daytime as their characters and they think of those characters as family members. Remembering Luke wasn’t just important for Lulu, who was still in her coma when her father died. It also was important for GH viewers.

Brava to Francis for delivering an emotional tour de force as Laura paid tribute to both the man she loved and to the iconic actor who played him.

General Hospital, Weekdays, ABC