Actor Eileen Fulton, known for her long-running role as Lisa Grimaldi on the CBS soap opera “As the World Turns,” has died at 91.<\/p>\n
Fulton died July 14 in Asheville, N.C., after a period of declining health, according to an obituary posted by Groce Funeral Home in North Carolina.<\/a><\/p>\n She would become one of the longest-serving soap opera actors, playing Lisa with only a few interruptions from 1960 until the show’s end in 2010. Fulton played the character as a villain, telling The Times in 1990<\/a> that Lisa was initially “a conniving, screaming witch” who “lied and wanted everything her way,” a characterization that led fans to scorn her. Throughout the course of the show, Lisa was married eight times.<\/p>\n But over time, Lisa evolved and “matured and learned from her mistakes.” Fulton said she began to receive “love letters” from fans who admired the character’s spunk.<\/p>\n Fulton was inducted into the Soap Opera Hall of Fame in 1998 and received a Daytime Emmy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2004.<\/p>\n Fulton was born Margaret Elizabeth McLarty on Sept. 13, 1933 in Asheville. The daughter of a Methodist minister and a public school teacher, she graduated from Greensboro College in 1956 with a bachelor’s degree in music and performed in an outdoor drama in North Carolina before moving to New York to pursue a career in acting, according to her obituary.<\/p>\n She later adopted the stage name Eileen Fulton, and in 1960, she was cast in the drama “Girl of the Night.”<\/p>\n In addition to her soap opera career, Fulton had a cabaret act for years in New York and Los Angeles.<\/p>\n She retired in 2019 and moved to Black Mountain, N.C. She is survived by her brother, Charles Furman McLarty, a niece and other family members.<\/p>\n