Y&R: Nikki Talks; Plus a Great Michael Muhney Interview

On today's episode of The Young and the Restless, Rafe was nowhere to be seen and Adam was engaged in plotting against Ashley, but Nikki Newman was still focused on the kiss she'd walked in on between the two in yesterday's episode. Who can blame her, really? The image would have been burned in my mind as well, had I actually seen it.

Nikki headed to the hospital, where the family is keeping vigil while Victor & Nikki's young granddaughter is in a coma, and promptly spilled the beans to her daughter, Victoria, though she did at least make her promise first that she wouldn't say anything to Victor or to her brother Nick.

Victoria was shocked to hear that her half brother had been seen making out with Rafe, but they quickly decided that it made sense that Adam was gay: maybe that's why he kept everyone at distance, emotionally speaking. The two women agreed that being the secretly gay son of Victor Newman must put an awful lot of pressure on Adam.

Nikki noted that while Victor is all for diversity elsewhere, it doesn't apply to his own family. Victoria agreed, saying that Victor expected his family members to be strong, successful, and married with at least two children, one of them preferably male. And God help the male Newman who isn't moulded in Victor's own image. Nikki said that even her straight son, Nick, has suffered terribly in trying to live up to Victor's expectations of him. What must it be like for secretly gay Adam, then?

Victoria wondered if Heather, who has been involved with Adam on and off for over a year, knows the truth. Nikki had another concern: Adam was one of the suspects in the gaslighting of Ashley. What if he was using Rafe and it ended up hurting Estella's case?

With that in mind, Nikki decided that she might have to tell Victor after all, for Estella's sake. When Nikki ran into Heather (who happens to be the district attorney) she asked her, hypothetically speaking, what someone should do if they knew that a lawyer was romantically involved with another suspect in the crime their client was accused of.

Heather told Nikki that telling the truth was usually the best policy and Nikki headed off to tell Victor that his son is into guys. Of course, they were interrupted by a phone call before she could actually out Adam, so I guess we'll have to wait and see what happens.

Meanwhile, AfterElton has a fantastic interview with Adam's portrayer, Michael Muhney. Until reading this interview, I knew very little about Muhney other than that I was really enjoying his performance as Adam. Now, having read this interview, I'd have to call myself a fan.

I really enjoyed his insights into the character of Adam and the whole situation with Rafe, including his thoughts about Adam questioning his own sexuality after sleeping with his lawyer:

AE: Now, I hadn't seen it this way, but you said something that made me wonder if you might see if differently: Is Adam sort of curious about this experience, or was this just something he did just because he needed to do it to further his schemes?
MM: I think primarily what makes him tick is self-preservation, so yes, first and foremost, the initial reasoning for doing anything is "How am I going to get out of this scot-free?" It's like act now, think about it later. He doesn't put his emotions first, he puts his motives first.

However, upon doing something like that, I feel as though wouldn't anybody question yourself? Even if the answer to yourself is, "No. No I'm not," aren't you going to at least question it?

Einstein said, "There's no such thing as a stupid question, only stupid answers." He can ask any question he wants, and question that moment as deeply as he might want, and wonder why he did that and why he followed through all the way. Depending on how he can come up with an answer, that's how he's going to be able to handle that situation and digest it and move forward.

I think it would be a natural process to question a situation like that, questioning your sexuality, questioning just how detestable and despicable of a person are you for trying to fool other people into thinking you're someone that you're not. I think if you're not a sociopath, you're gonna question things.

You really should read the whole interview. Michael talks about what's being shown onscreen and leaving things up to the viewer's imagination, he talks about working with Yani Gellman, and even mentions working with Cheyenne Jackson on a pilot, and how Cheyenne clued Michael in about his gay fan base from his role on Veronica Mars.

Honestly, I'd quote the whole interview if I could!