Friends

Though they've only known each other for a year and a half, Eva La Rue and Sarah Michelle Gellar are tight. The two started working on AMC within a few weeks of each other, and eventually found themselves sharing a dressing room. "That's when we got to be really good friends," says La Rue. Perhaps that's because they share similar habits. "We're both incredibly messy," says Gellar. "Our dressing room frequently looks like a tornado hit it. Other actors stop by and find themselves tripping over things. "We do clean it up. Eventually."
Friendships usually need more than sharing the same space to cement them; these two soon discovered a common passion for shopping. "that's what we spend most of our time together doing when we're not at work," says La Rue. "my phone will ring, and it'll be Sarah saying,'Sample sale.'" Their bond was also strengthened, La Rue believes, by their both being new kids on the block. "We were both happy there was someone else learning the ropes."
Inevitably, talking and thinking about work occupies a good deal of their time together. "We're always brainstorming about our characters, trying to second-guess what the writers are going to do," says La Rue. "We can talk and laugh about work in a way I wouldn't be able to with a friend who didn't work in daytime." Gellar agrees: "Being on the same show, we can identify with and understand each other's problems that much more quickly. You know what the other person is going through."
But there are drawbacks to working on the same show as well. "Sometimes you find yourself talking too much shop," admits La Rue. "Sarah and I were recently at brunch at Sydney Penny's (Julia) house, and all we were talking about was All My Children! Finally one of us said, "We've got to stop talking about the show! Surely we all have other things going on in our lives!' You can talk it to death if you're not careful."
Outsiders might wonder how Gellar and La Rue manage to overcome the 10-year gap between them. According to La Rue, "Sarah's like a 40-year old woman trapped in a 17-year old body. She's wise way beyond her years."
Still, this maturity can be deceiving, which La Rue discovered when she found out the main differences between them: Gellar's passion for talking on the phone. "There was one morning when she came to work exhausted because she'd been up to 3 o'clock in the morning talking to friends. When I asked her why she didn't just turn the ringer off and go to bed, she said, 'I'm a teen-ager. I'm supposed to talk on the phone for hours.' It was like being slapped in the face by reality. She's so mature that it's easy to forget she's only 17 years old."
One incident made it hard for La Rue to forget her own age as well. "Sarah and I were doing a personal appearance together, and this woman walked over to us and said to me, 'Is this your daughter? She's beautiful.' My daughter! Do I look old enough to have a teen-age daughter?! All I could think was, 'Time to stock up on the wrinkle cream!'"
Age aside, these two have a mutual admiration society going, with what appears to be good reason. "Eva's one of those people who I know will always be there for me," says Gellar. "I think it's what I love most about her. No matter what kind of mood I'm in, she can cheer me up. Once I had a very bad day at work, and the next thing I knew she was at my door. She's a great support system." La Rue says the same of Gellar: "She's a very loyal, very loving friend. And she's very professional. It's rare to see someone her age who's that focused about her work."
With Gellar's nomination for a Daytime Emmy last year, one can't help but wonder whether the specter of competitiveness raised it's head, even a little. Absolutely not, asserts Gellar. "I swear we are each other's biggest fan. Anything good that happens to one makes the other feel incredibly proud."