Who was responsible for Kevin and Michael being brothers on The Young and the Restless

The Young and the Restless fans embraced from the beginning that Michael Baldwin and Kevin Fisher were long-lost half-brothers. But that wasn't the show's original plan. Greg Rikaart, who plays Kevin, and Christian LeBlanc, who plays Michael, are revealing how their sibling connection came to be.

The Young and the Restless, he ain't heavy

On an episode of Soapy, the online talk show hosted by Rikaart and his real-life pal (no, really, despite the bantering, they are besties!) Rebecca Budig (Taylor, The Bold and the Beautiful), LeBlanc, and TV wife Tracey Bregman (Lauren) chatted about numerous topics, including how Kevin and Michael became brothers.

Originally, Kevin was brought onto the canvas to do a social issue storyline that warned kids and their parents about the dangers of online dating and unsafe connections. Kevin preyed upon teen Lily (Christel Khalil). The two hooked up, and Kevin infected the unsuspecting Lily with chlamydia. After Dr. Olivia Hastings (Tonya Lee Williams) helped her niece, her hookup was set to head off the canvas. "Kevin was supposed to be there for a couple of months," Rikaart recalls.

Jack Smith, the show's then head writer and co-executive producer, was inspired to make the two actors play brothers after the show's summer fan event. "It was just the dumb luck of it all," Rikaart recalled on Soapy. "I'd only been on the show for a month or so."

LeBlanc and Rikaart were serendipitously seated next to one another on stage despite there being no connection between them at the time. "Jack, [his wife] Norma, and [their daughter] Asia [who played Sierra] were all there," Rikaart says. "So they all take credit for it."

He's my brother, and she's our mother

"It was an amazing first scene," LeBlanc recollects of his and Rikaart's first scene together. "I thought it was genius to play the whole thing, and then, they brought on Joan Van Ark to play [Gloria, our mother]."

Van Ark was on the show for a brief period, but Rikaart shared that the actress left the show, in part, due to the fast pace with which they worked. "And that was before we started going [even more] fast," Bregman says.

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"Joan was very in her own world until she got onto the set," LeBlanc says. He recalls Gloria arriving at the hospital to see Kevin. "She comes in and we're doing our first scene, and...on the count, she gave me a huge hug, and I had only known her that day," LeBlanc shares. "The instinct for someone to know that she could do that and that would benefit the situation...was amazing."

Catch all-new episodes of The Young and the Restless on CBS and Paramount Plus.

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