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Drama

Young and the Restless
hunk reveals family secret:

He's Jewish.

Don Diamont: "You can't tell the story of the Holocaust
enough, especially since genocide continues today."

.

Naomi Pfefferman ,
Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles

D

on Diamont is the resident hunk on The Young
and the Restless, where his buff muscles and six-.
pack abs make female fans drool.
While his character, Brad Carlton, has done far more than
strut about in cut-offs (he's mourned the loss of an unborn
son, among other weighty scenarios), devotees can't quite
forget his 1994 Playgirl centerfold, his status as one of
People magazine's "50 Most Beautiful People" and his break-
through as one of the first actors to bare his tush on TV.
Now comes a plot twist in which Diamont, 43, exposes far
more than his derriere. "I'm 'outing' myself as a Jew:' he says.
"It's the most meaningful story [line] of my career:'
In the Friday, July 28, episode, the fictional Carlton
revealed that his real name is George Kaplan and that his
mother (Millie Perkins, who starred in the title role of the
1959 film The Diary of Anne Frank) is an Italian Jew who
was forced to catalogue looted Nazi art in a concentration
camp, Diamont says. After the war, she immigrated to the
United States, started a new family and became a kind of art-
oriented Simon Wiesenthal, tracking down stolen works and
returning them to their rightful owners.
Those displeased with her efforts eventually bludgeoned
most of her American family to death, save for herself and
George, who were away from home at the time. Mother and
son subsequently went into hiding, although the Bad Guys
may be close at present.
Diamont — a 21-year Restless veteran — has been sworn
to secrecy about future episodes. He says he only learned
of his character's true name upon reading a script a couple
months ago. He was so startled that he telephoned head

Daytime Drama on page 46

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August 3 • 2006

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