| Jill Foster Abbott | |||||||||||||||||||
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| Jess Walton as Jill Abbott Fenmore (2007) | |||||||||||||||||||
| The Young and the Restless | |||||||||||||||||||
| Portrayed by | Brenda Dickson (1973-80, 1983-87) Bond Gideon (1980) Deborah Adair (1980-83, 1986) Melinda Fee (1984) Jess Walton (1987—) |
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| Duration | 1973— | ||||||||||||||||||
| First appearance | March 26, 1973 | ||||||||||||||||||
| Created by | William J. Bell | ||||||||||||||||||
| Profile | |||||||||||||||||||
| Gender | Female | ||||||||||||||||||
| Occupation | Currently Co-directer of Marketing at Jabot Cosmetics Co-owner and co-CEO of Fenmore's Department Stores |
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| Residence | The Chancellor Estate, 12 Foothill Road Genoa City, Wisconsin |
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| Brenda Dickson as Jill Foster Abbott (1985) | |||||||||||||||||||
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Jill Abbott Fenmore (née Foster; formerly Reynolds, Chancellor, Thurston, Brooks, Sterling, Abbott, and Atkinson) is a fictional character on the CBS daytime soap opera The Young and the Restless. She is one of the series' original characters, and the only one remaining from its debut on March 26, 1973. Much of Jill's history on the series revolves around her long-running conflict with Katherine Chancellor (Jeanne Cooper). Their feud is one of the longest rivalries on any American soap opera.[1]
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The role of Jill Foster was originated by Brenda Dickson, who portrayed the character for nearly seven years before leaving in May 1980. (Footage of Dickson as Jill appears in the film Taxi Driver.) Bond Gideon played Jill briefly before Deborah Adair took over the role for three years. Dickson returned to the role in 1983. Melinda Fee also played Jill briefly in 1984, and Deborah Adair briefly reprised the role in 1986 as a fill-in for Dickson. Dickson continued until June 18, 1987, when she was replaced by Jess Walton.[2] Continuing in the role to the present time,[3] Walton has portrayed Jill longer than all the previous actresses combined.
Walton won a Daytime Emmy Award in 1997 for Lead Actress in a Drama Series for playing Jill,[2][4] and was nominated in 1996[2][5] and 2000.[2][6] She also won the Daytime Emmy for Supporting Actress in 1991[2][7] after a nomination in 1990.[2][8] Dickson won a Soap Opera Digest Award in 1988 for Outstanding Villainess for the role,[9] and Walton won one for Outstanding Lead Actress in 1994.[2][10]
When the series debuts, Jill Foster worked as a shampoo girl and manicurist, helping to put older brothers "Snapper" (David Hasslehoff) and Greg through college. She was a dreamer who gazed longingly at magazines filled with pictures of a life she thought she could never have. Later, she becomes friends with Katherine Chancellor (Jeanne Cooper) and is employed as her personal assistant. Jill and Katherine's friendship turns to animosity as they fight over men, including Katherine's husband Phillip Chancellor II (Donnelly Rhodes). Jill and Phillip engage in sex resulting in a pregnancy. Phillip divorces Katherine and plans to marry Jill. While giving Phillip a ride in her car, Katherine begs him for a second chance. He refuses. She slams her foot down on the gas pedal and the car plunges off the road and over a cliff. Phillip is rushed to the hospital where, on his deathbed, he marries Jill.
The marriage is declared invalid thanks to Katherine who then kicks the Fosters out of the Chancellor Estate. She offers Jill $1 million in exchange for the baby she is carrying. Jill agrees in order to ensure a better life for the child. She later rejects the offer and has the money returned after giving birth to her son, Phillip Chancellor III in 1976. In late 1976, Jill began a small relationship with David Mallory, the recipient of her late father Bill Foster's eye cornea. Jill cared for David, but she didn't have strong feelings for him, but strung him along for the next few months. Meanwhile, she met and began falling for hairdresser Derek Thurston, whom she began seeing on the side while still with David, who proposed marriage to a hesitant Jill. After Liz warned Jill about a loveless marriage, Jill realized she wasn't in love with David and declined his marriage proposal to be with Derek.
Next, Katherine fell in love with and tricked Derek into marrying her. But Derek was really in love with Jill. But Derek took Kay up on her deal. If he lived with her for a year, she would set up a $100,000 trust for Jill's son and set Derek up in his own salon. Then Derek's ex-wife Suzanne Lynch arrived in town, bent on getting Derek back. She befriended Kay, and gave her candy laced with drugs, which drove Kay into a sanitarium. Kay's roommate went berserk and set fire to the room. Kay escaped, but the roommate's body was identified as Kay because she was wearing Kay's ring. Derek found himself free of both wives, inheriting the Chancellor wealth and free to marry Jill. But Kay showed up at their wedding - very much alive. Kay reclaimed her fortune and Derek, and named him head of Chancellor Industries. They went on a cruise, had a fight, Kay jumped overboard, and was rescued by Felipe Ramirez who held her captive. They fell in love, and he let her loose to return to her world where she divorced Derek.
Around the same time, Jill briefly marries newspaper editor Stuart Brooks. She breaks up a romance he is having with her mother Liz by faking a pregnancy after a one-night stand. Stuart sees through her ruse, divorces Jill, and marries Liz. In 1980 Jill goes to work for Jabot Cosmetics. Jabot's owner, John Abbott, is impressed by Jill's abilities, and quickly promotes her to Head of Merchandising. Around that time, she meets Jack Abbott, John's son. John and Jill become romantically involved. They break up after she cheats on him with his son. She files a sexual harassment suit against Jack when he will not be with her and he has to pay a $10,000 settlement.
Soon after, John and Jill later reunite and marry. However, Abbott family housekeeper Mamie Johnson seems to be a thorn in Jill's new marriage. Mamie, who wants to protect John, seemed to keep a close eye on Jill, which in turn led Jill to wish she acted like hired help instead of a friend to John. Despite Mamie's watchful eye, Jill continued her affair with Jack Abbott. This time Katherine gets a hold of pictures of their tryst. She shows them to John, who then suffers a stroke. By 1986, John and Jill divorce and in the settlement, Jill got 20% of Jabot Cosmetics, a seat on the board of directors, and a cushy executive position with Jabot at $150,000 a year, all in hopes that she would remain silent about her affair with Jack, to avoid a scandal that would hurt Jabot's public image. She ends up becoming very effective at her job, surprising many.
Not long after, Jill is found in her shower, bleeding from a gunshot wound just as her son Phillip Chancellor III returned to town after years away at boarding school. The three main suspects in the shooting are John, Jack, and Katherine. Jack finally confesses to the crime in order to prevent his affair with Jill from becoming public. The real culprit is Sven, a masseur at the Genoa City Hotel. He had been rejected by Jill earlier in the night, and after getting drunk stole the gun from Gina's Restaurant. Sven kidnaps Jill and locks her in a meat freezer. Jack comes to her rescue. Sven escapes to Mexico, but Jack is cleared of all charges.
Jill and Katherine fight over Jill's son, Philip Chancellor III, who is now a teenager. Philip had a past with acting out. A few years earlier, Jill was forced to send him to boarding school. Now, Philip turns to drinking. He fights his alcoholism with help from both Katherine and Jill, along with Christine Blair (Lauralee Bell). His drinking leads to engage in a one night stand with Nina Webster (Tricia Cast). Nina becomes pregnant with Phillip's child. Phillip later dies in a car crash while he was driving under the influence, but in 2009 it's reavled he faked his death.
Jill hired someone off the street to seduce Katherine. His name was Rex Sterling, but his real name was Brian Romalotti, father of Danny Romalotti and Gina Roma. He was previously a con man, but cleaned up and began a romance with Katherine. Rex and Katherine ended up getting married, but Rex soon got annoyed by Katherine's behavior. However, Katherine was gone and replaced by her look-a-like Marge Cotrooke. Jill convinced Rex to divorce Katherine and marry her, which he did in 1991. However, Jill began seeing John Abbott again and Katherine returned. Katherine and Rex remarried, but Rex was shot soon after.
Soon after, Jill began an affair with Victor Newman and Jill assumed she would certainly be the next Mrs. Victor Newman. Hapless Jill, no more than shared her elation at the prospect with Jack, than Victor let her know that she was just a fling, and he had no real intentions where she was concerned. Mortified, Jill quickly found her way back into John's heart, and they remarried, much to his children's dismay. Jill wanted to have a baby, though John felt he was too old. But Jill managed to get pregnant before John got a secret vasectomy. When he discovered she was already pregnant, he insisted she have an abortion but Jill couldn't do it. John did wonder if Billy might actually be Victor's, since he knew they had been together earlier.
Jill's affair with Jed Sanders due to John's impotence caused their second divorce. However at first John suffered a stroke and the with the divorce underway, John's housekeeper Mamie, admitted that she loved John. John confessed similar feelings. However, when Jill learned of their relationship, she fired Mamie and offered her millions of dollars to leave Genoa City, which she agreed to. Soon after John and Jill reunited, but eventually the divorce happened. This resulted a bitter custody battle over Billy and a stroke for John. John got custody of Billy and, unable to bear Jabot under Newman, they moved to New York City.
In 1998, Jill discovered a letter written by her late husband Philip Chancellor II in which Jill was named the sole owner of the Chancellor Estate. Jill quickly evicted Katherine, but Katherine found a legal loophole allowing her to stay on the Estate. Not only that, but with a teenage Billy Abbott and Brock Reynolds' lost teenage daughter, Mackenzie Browning coming into town as well, they quickly developed a relationship.
After the turn of the century, Sean Bridges came into Genoa City as Jabot's new website designer. He quickly developed a relationship with the much older Jill. Jill was curious of his intentions, but gave in and allowed him to move into the Chancellor Estate. Soon after though, Sean moved away to New York City.
Soon after, Katherine allowed an ex-con Larry Warton to move in and do some work around the house. Jill quickly began an affair with him, but wanting to keep it a secret because Larry was "beneath her". However, Katherine found out and attempted to confront Jill about it, but she continued to deny it and even insulted Larry. An angry Larry, walked in on a Jabot Meeting and emptied a box of Jill's sex toys across the table.
In 2003, Liz Foster is diagnosed with a brain tumor and admits to Jill that she is adopted and that Charlotte Ramsey (who years later it was discovered had lied to get revenge on Kay) has provided proof that Katherine Chancellor,is her birth mother. In addition to being mortified to learn that she is the daughter of her sworn enemy, this revelation presents another crisis for Jill. For years, her son Billy Abbott and Katherine's granddaughter Mackenzie Browning had been in love, in a passionate but platonic relationship. However, the supposed mother-daughter connection between Katherine and Jill would mean that Mackenzie and Billy are first cousins. Unaware that they are supposedly blood relatives, the young couple is married, while a paralyzed Katherine could do nothing but watch. A horrified Jill and John try to stop the wedding, but they are too late. Eventually, Jill informs the newlyweds of the shocking news before the marriage is consummated. Heartbroken, Billy and Mackenzie have their union annulled, and the two separately leave town. Jill helps Katherine to recover and the two eventually resolve their differences.
In early 2007, Katherine uncovers repressed memories of kidnapping Phillip III years ago just after he was born and switching him with another baby. Jill refuses to believe this at first, DNA testing of the corpse in Phillip III's grave confirms that he was not Jill's biological son. She is soon led to believe that her true biological son is revealed to be Ethan "Cane" Ashby (Daniel Goddard), an Australian national whose visa has expired and is fighting deportation. As the true Phillip III, he would be a native-born American citizen and is thus permitted to remain in Genoa City. Cane soon forms a strong bond with Jill and Katherine.
Jill begins a romantic relationship with William Bardwell (Ted Shackelford), the District Attorney, who has just inherited a fortune from his late uncle. Gloria Fisher (Judith Chapman), who wants Will for his money, drugs Ji Min Kim (Eric Steinberg) and Jill with libido pills and arranges for William to walk in on them. A broken-hearted William eventually marries Gloria.
Jill and Ji Min develop genuine feelings for each other. Katherine is furious with Jill upon learning that her daughter is planning on eloping with Ji Min. Mrs. Chancellor offers him a bribe not to marry her daughter, but he declines. Ji Min Kim is murdered in September 2007 by David Chow, before he can marry Jill, which devastates her.
In 2008 Katherine retires as CEO of Chancellor Industries and makes Jill her successor. Jill feels that Katherine is constantly looking over her shoulder, and second-guessing her decisions. This is especially true when it comes to Chancellor subsidiary Jabot Cosmetic's new CEO, Nikki Newman. In October 2008, for the first time Jill has both her sons Cane and Billy at home. Billy does not like that Jill has made Cane CEO of Jabot over him. In November 2008 Katherine Chancellor is believed to have died in a car crash. However, the true victim is her look-a-like Marge Cotrooke.
Due to the Abbott Family and Jeff and Gloria Bardwell, Chancellor losses control of Jabot, resulting in the firings of Jill and Cane. Jill and Victor Newman formulate a plan to destroy Jack Abbott and return control of Jabot back to Chancellor Industries.
In 2009, two DNA tests seemingly indicate that Marge is impersonating the presumed-deceased Katherine. However, the corpse buried in Katherine's grave is exhumed and subjected to a third test. Ultimately, Jill's DNA matches neither the corpse nor Katherine (whom Jill believes to be Marge). Thus, Katherine's claim about her true identity is bolstered, and it is proven conclusively that Jill is not Katherine's biological daughter after all. After a final pair of DNA tests between Katherine and her son Brock are a match, not even Jill can deny the truth any longer. She bitterly rejects Katherine's overtures of affection, and the ensuing argument reignites the feud between the women in full force.
Weeks later, just prior to Cane's wedding to Lily Winters, Jill learns that the bank in Cayman Islands where she has deposited all her monies has collapsed. For the first time in decades, Jill is virtually penniless, with her 50% share in the Chancellor mansion and her shares of Jabot as her only assets. Shortly thereafter, Jill returns to her original occupation as a manicurist, albeit in another town outside of Genoa City to keep it a secret from others. Following his wedding to Lily Winters, Cane recalls his telephone conversation years earlier with a man named "Langley" regarding their joint plan to con Jill and Katherine. The man bears a startling resemblance to the supposedly deceased Phillip. On June 10, 2009, it is revealed that "Langley" is indeed Phillip, and that he is still very much alive (unknown to everyone except Cane). Nina Webster (who was Phillip's wife at the time of his supposed death) begins background research on Cane, as part of her efforts to adapt Katherine's memoir into a screenplay. Her suspicions about Cane continue to grow, and she eventually orders the exhumation of Phillip's body for genetic testing. When it was discovered that Phillip's casket is empty (and, in fact, never contained a corpse at all), Nina demanded that Cane submit to DNA testing to verify his status as Jill's biological son. Upon learning of Nina's demand, Cane retrieved a vial of Phillip's blood from a carousel of vials he kept in a hidden freezer for use in DNA testing. Thus, it became apparent that Phillip is Jill's biological son, not Cane. Not only that, but Phillip Chancellor III returned to Genoa City to protect Cane. Phillip claimed that Cane was to fill the void that he left when he faked his own death. Apparently, Phillip had been living a lie all of his life, in that he was actually a homosexual and couldn't stand the pressure of being the Chancellor heir. However, the Winters family had enough of Cane, and he planned on leaving town. Once Jill heard, she called Michael Baldwin to a meeting of changing her will. She wants her estate split three ways between Phillip, Billy, and Cane—despite the fact that Cane is not her son.
In June 2010, Jill's mother Liz Foster had fallen ill on a flight to Genoa City to visit her. Once at the hospital, Jill reunited with her adopted brothers Greg and Snapper Foster, but Liz took a turn for the worse, and confessed to Snapper that she has been aware of the identity of Jill's biological father for quite some time. Apparently Jill's father was Neil Fenmore, the father of Lauren Fenmore Baldwin. Liz ended up dying on June 18, 2010 with all of her children by her side. Snapper ended up telling Jill the truth, and once it is confirmed by a DNA test, she in turn legally changed her surname to Fenmore, much to Lauren's chagrin.
With this new bond between Jill and Lauren Fenmore Baldwin, Jill attempted to forge a sisterly relationship between them, but Lauren constantly rejecting the idea. Lauren's rejection even got to the point that Jill began to fear that it could be the beginnings of another rivalry like hers with Katherine. The feud took a turn for the worse when Jill filed a lawsuit asking for half of Neil Fenmore's estate. Despite Michael's attempt to get them to at least talk, Lauren had no intention of ever accepting Jill as a sister. However, once Joanna Manning, Lauren's mother, testified that Neil knew of an illegitimate child, the court ruled that Jill was entitled to half of the Fenmore estate. Jill quickly fit into her new role as Co-CEO of Fenmore's Department Store, and even took control of the store once Lauren took a leave of absence when Daisy Carter returned to town and was quickly released from jail into the custody of Phyllis Newman because of her pregnancy. Lauren eventually came back, and she and Jill began getting closer.
Around the same time, as Chance Chancellor attempted to prove his innocence that he was not behind a police drug operation, he was shot to death by his own half-brother, Ronan Molloy, who had been Nina Webster's long-lost stolen son; however he has since returned, alive having been in the Witness Protection Program. Jill became engaged to Australian businessman Colin Atkinson. Unbeknownst to her, he is Cane's biological father and the head of an organized crime syndicate in Australia. Katherine strongly advised Jill not to marry, however she went ahead and married him as Blake, one of Colin's henchmen, shot down Cane just outside with Lily and the twins watching. Cane (like Chance) was revealed alive months later, and Caleb (Cane's identical brother) was the actual one that died.
The night that Colin's plan is put into place, he explained to Jill that he needed to go to San Francisco. However, she seemed suspicious and figured that Colin was going to surprise her with the twins, so she followed Colin around. However, when she confronted Colin at an abandoned estate, she saw Cane, who is pretending to be Caleb. When Jill saw him, she fainted. Jill eventually came too just as Colin and "Caleb" were ready to steal the twins. Colin explained the situation to Jill, and she was horrified to learn that their marriage was a ruse. Suddenly, Neil Winters came by just as Colin walked into the estate where he heard music playing. Walking around, he saw his late daughter's ashes and pictures of her laid in the formation of her body. Genevieve confronted Colin. They argued about his role in the death of Samantha, and she explained the truth about Cane, that Caleb died, not Cane. Colin, however, didn't seem surprised. As they arguing, she pushed him over the edge of the porch. As he hung on for his life, Jill saw him and ran up to try to save him. Once there, Genevieve explained that she was the real Mrs. Atkinson, and Jill suddenly let Colin go. As for Cane, he punches out one of Colin's henchman and saves the twins when a fire erupts. However, Cane is confronted by Neil, Lily, and Daniel Romalotti. Neil explained the truth to Lily, but everyone wanted Cane gone. Later, Cane explained the situation to Lily, but she didn't want anything else to do with him.
Colin ended up surviving his fall, and was tormented at the hospital by Genevieve. When Jill rushed in, he explained that he was still legally married to Genevieve, thus their marriage was invalid. Once Katherine discovered the truth about Colin, she threw all of his stuff out of the Estate, while Jill began drinking heavily. At Gloworm, Genevieve ended up trying to warm up to Lily, but Neil, Jill, and Katherine wanted her gone. Suddenly, to everyone's surprise, Colin was back. He had just been released on bail, and explained to Jill that he was to stay in Genoa City to try to win her back and prove his love for her. Nonetheless, Jill further tricked Colin into a fake relationship to arrest him, and he has since departed for Jail.