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Daytime Emmy poll: Who will win lead actress?

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Some of the grande dames of daytime TV clash with a few fresh faces in the race for lead actress at the Daytime Emmys.

This is the last chance for Colleen Zenk, who played Barbara Ryan on ‘As the World Turns’ from 1978 until the show’s cancellation last year. After 32 years on the soap, this year marks only her third nomination, after a supporting nod in 2001 and a promotion to the lead category in 2002.

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Zenk lost the 2002 race to Susan Flannery, who won the second of her three Emmys for ‘The Bold and the Beautiful’ (she won a fourth for ‘Days of Our Lives’ back in 1975). The two go head-to-head again this year in a race that very well might come down to the two of them. Zenk submitted an emotional episode to the Emmy judges in which she marries a younger man. Flannery entered a poignant encounter with a homeless woman.

Both nominees need to get past Debbi Morgan, who won the supporting actress prize in 1989 for playing Dr. Angie Hubbard, half of daytime’s first African American super couple. She left the show in 1990 but returned in 2008, and now she may make history again. If she wins, she will be the first African American woman to win lead actress at the Daytime Emmys.

Nominee Michelle Stafford has won two Emmys in eight previous nominations for her role on ‘The Young and the Restless.’ Alicia Minshew celebrates her second nomination for ‘All My Children’ and her first in the lead category; she plays Kendall Hart, the same role that earned Sarah Michelle Gellar an Emmy in 1995.

Rounding out the category is Laura Wright, who is nominated for the first time after 20 years starring in daytime TV (including roles on ‘Loving’ and ‘Guiding Light’). She is the third actress to be nominated for the role of Carly on ‘General Hospital’: Sarah Brown won three Emmys for the role between 1997 and 2000, and Tamara Braun received a lead actress nod in 2004.

Wright suffered misfortune at the Emmys over the years while her costars were showered with accolades. On ‘General Hospital,’ she shares scenes with Emmy winners Maurice Benard and Steve Burton, while on ‘Guiding Light’ her sister was played by four-time winner Kim Zimmer. Her role on ‘Guiding Light’ was recast after she left the series. Her replacement, Nicole Forester, received a lead actress nod in 2008.

— Tom O’Neil

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