"The Young and The Restless" star Burgess Jenkins just recently confirmed that he was leaving CBS daytime drama show where he played the role of Billy Abbott. Jenkins only portrayed the role for more or less 18 months.
According to Soap Opera Spy, in an interview with Soaps In Depth, the actor talked about portraying Billy's role. He was asked how he was able to portray such big emotions especially during the reveal of Adam, portrayed by Justin Hartley.
Jenkins' shared that filming that scene was a tough one given that it involved complex emotions. He explained, "I had to put myself through hell for those scenes [when Billy learned of Gabriel's true identity]. There were so many layers of emotion- anger, sadness, guilt, and rage."
Burgess added, "Billy had always blamed himself for Delia [Sophie Pollono] death. It's been his own personal demon. Adam's return brought back those feelings- something he tried to sweep under the rug for over two years."
It has been previously reported that Burgess had a hard time trying to fit in Billy's role considering that Billy Miller was able to portray it very well.
Aside from that, Burgess also shared how difficult it was for him to take on his character during Delia's death. Jenkins said, "I have an eight-year-old daughter-same as Delia- so the storyline had a rawness of palpable to me."
He then added that "I didn't have to go too far to imagine the horror of a parent living this nightmare. It is truly a parent's worst nightmare to lose your child to an accident that you could have avoided. You can't just say you are angry in a storyline like this. You have to feel the pain to make the audience feel your pain,"
That is why at the end of the day, Burgess feels completely exhausted both on physical and mental aspects. He said, "You are emotionally worn out."
To an extent, Jenkins compared it to his high school football practice but still he feels more worn out after a day on the set which involves filming Adam and Delia's storylines. Jenkins explained how exhausting it was and said that his "mind becomes like Jell-O, your body says ENOUGH."
To sum it all up, Burgess said that Billy can never find peace in his storyline as he explained, "You can never completely get over losing a child, but you can learn to forgive and forgive yourself. Billy is reaching that point."
The heightened emotions was quite tough for Burgess to deal with, but his fans were able to see how his character has evolved accordingly after everything that happened. Burgess' fans were reportedly sad when they found out that he will soon leave "The Young and The Restless."
