Frisco Everlasting: Why Jack Wagner will forever be known as his legendary General Hospital character

When General Hospital’s Blackie Parrish (John Stamos) hired Frisco Jones (Jack Wagner) to be the lead singer for his band Blackie and the Riff Raff, no one knew that the performer would go on to be an international spy for the WSB. After getting involved in several adventures, Frisco became a police officer and worked his way up until he was tapped to join the Bureau. He would later (off-screen) be promoted to director of the spy agency, only to be ousted by Jack Brennan eventually. While Wagner has gone off and made memorable characters on other shows like The Bold and the Beautiful and When Calls the Heart, the actor admitted to which one remains his most famous.

His fan bases are similar

In promoting the season finale of Hallmark’s When Calls the Heart, Wagner was a guest on the Still the Place podcast in a special episode titled A Melrose Minute with Jack Wagner. The hosts are his former Melrose Place co-stars Daphne Zuniga (Jo), Laura Leighton (Sydney), and Courtney Thorne-Smith (Allison), and they got into a conversation about how WCH fans are called “Hearties,” which reminded Wagner of one of his first starring roles.

“It does remind me a bit of…General Hospital in the 80s,” he explained, continuing, “That was kind of my big break, and that fan base of that soap opera is still there, you know?” He surprised the host when he further added, “I still get called Frisco probably more than [anything else].”

He remarked that as fans start to “Fall in love with the characters” on TV shows, it becomes “very real for them, and it reminds me a little bit of the GH fans back in the 80s.” Frisco was last seen in Port Charles in 2013 when he tried to make up for not being there when his and Felicia’s (Kristina Wagner) daughter Georgie (Lindze Letherman) was murdered by a serial killer and also to generally repair his relationship with his estranged family. He even tried wooing Felicia back, but that didn’t work, and he left town again, eventually getting promoted to the Director of the WSB.

He’s always in fans’ thoughts

As Wagner pointed out, Frisco isn’t very far from the fans’ minds, and neither is it from the show. In a recent episode, Felicia was having a heart-to-heart with Carly (Laura Wright) and name-dropped Frisco when she explained that, unlike the dangers posed by Sonny’s (Maurice Benard) mobster lifestyle, which are occasional, the dangers of dating a WSB agent are far greater. She was, of course, warning Carly to rethink getting close to Jack (Chris McKenna).

And prior to that, in a February episode, Maxie introduced herself to Jack, who already knew who she was, calling her “Frisco’s daughter, Mariah Maxmilliana Jones.”

In another recent storyline, Valentin (James Patrick Stuart) told Jason (Steve Burton) that despite Jack being a simple WSB station chief, he could still be the head of the Bureau. With that said, and WCTH taking a break, perhaps now is the time for Wagner to return to GH as Frisco and get the spy agency in order.

You can watch new episodes of General Hospital on ABC and Hulu.