If you thought the past few weeks were an exciting time for Beyond the Gates, executive producer Sheila Ducksworth warns that we haven’t seen anything yet. And because the show is written months in advance, she says it’s not just the rest of 2026 that will thrill viewers, but what’s coming in 2027!
“It’s going to be a real rollercoaster over the next few months,” she says excitedly. “It’s a race to the end of the year and beyond. What unfolded in September will snowball. What already happened was jaw-dropping, but it’s just the beginning. That’s the nature of soap opera.”
That’s quite the promise, given that September saw one of the show’s biggest storylines explode when Hayley’s scheme went from fatal-for-Bill to ill-fated, period! “Hasn’t Marquita Goings been fantastic,” enthuses the exec of Hayley’s portrayer. “And Hayley’s not done yet!”
In fact, as headwriter Michele Val Jean told the folks at TV Insider, this fall will find the devious beauty being “cold as ever. She’s definitely not done scheming, and she’s not done with Bill.”
Ducksworth is able to speak confidently about what’s to come, given that the show is currently written through the spring of next year. With that in mind, she says that viewers whose jaws have dropped “might as well leave them there” because there are further shocks, surprises and twists ahead.
To those who might be late to the party, Ducksworth sends both an invitation and a reminder that it’s never to late to RSVP. “The beauty of this genre is that you don’t have to have watched from Day One. Soaps are a living, breathing, organic medium that you can jump into at any point.”
Her hope is that when people tune in for special events — such as the tornado, cotillion or recent celebration of HBCUs — they’ll wind up sticking around. “We hope they see something they’ve never seen before or, if they have, something that resonates with them, and that they continue joining us every day for the ride! We have so much incredible and thrilling stuff coming up!”
