‘As the World Turns’ Alum Joins ‘General Hospital’: Van Hansis Is the New Lucas Jones

General Hospital is continuing, with the long-running soap opera bringing in an As the World Turns alum. TV Insider reports that Van Hansis, best known for his role as Luke Snyder on CBS soap, has been tapped to take over the role of Lucas Jones, most recently played by Ryan Carnes. Hansis will make his debut as Lucas on the Oct. 4 episode of General Hospital.

While Hansis has been busy with other projects since As the World Turns ended in 2010, General Hospital will be his first soap opera in 14 years. However, he says getting back into the genre is “a little bit like riding a bicycle.” He continued, “Once you get in it, you’re like, ‘Oh, yeah, I know how to do this, and I know how this works.’ But there is definitely a difference. This is the first soap I’ve done since As the World Turns, and it moves incredibly quickly. On As the World Turns, we would shoot a full episode a day usually, and the way we shoot here is there might be three or four episodes shooting in one working day, just depending on what sets are available.”

“It’s such an awesome family environment,” Hansis shared. “From what I’ve seen, everybody really lifts each other up in a nice way because daytime has its own challenges in so far as having to work really, really quickly. Everybody’s been super helpful. I’ve had scenes with a lot of different people because Lucas was born on the show, so he knows a lot of people in town. I did as much research as I could, but there were sometimes where I just asked whichever actor I was working with, ‘How do I know you? Do we like each other? Am I happy about you being back with so and so?’ And everybody was so helpful in filling in the back story.”

The character of Lucas Jones was originated by Justin Cooper back in 1996 and has been played by numerous actors since then including Logan O’Brien, C.J. Thomason, Ben Hogestyn, and Matt Trudeau. Ryan Carnes played the role the longest, from 2004 to 2005 and returning in 2014 until 2020. He briefly came back to the role in January for two episodes. Now, with Hansis taking over, there’s no telling what could be in store for him. Fans will just have to find out on Oct. 4 on ABC.