DAYS’ Paul Telfer Talks Xander’s Identity Crisis and Future with Sarah

Steven Bergman/AFF-USA.COM / MEGA

Xander’s life was upended when he learned that his late uncle, Victor, is actually his biological father — news that was abruptly delivered by his estranged mother, Fiona, during his wedding to Sarah. The paternity revelation has kicked off an intriguing storyline for Paul Telfer. The actor opens up to Digest about the huge twist and its implications for the longtime black sheep of the Kiriakis clan; plus, the future of Xander and Sarah and his delightful new Days of our Lives mom, Serena Scott Thomas (Fiona).

Soap Opera Digest: How is Xander processing the discovery that he is Victor's son?

Paul Telfer: Xander is slowly putting together what it all means for him. It's incredibly conflicting because it's not like he and Victor had a chummy relationship, especially at the end. It was in very bad shape. So the idea that this person that Xander had come to kind of despise, even though he loved him… To have this horrible tension in their relationship that was never resolved while Victor was alive, and now on top of it find out that he was his father is just a lot. There's a whole swirling turmoil of emotion.

Digest: Do you have any regrets regarding the twist?

Telfer: Obviously it would've been great to have gone through the storyline with John [Aniston, ex-Victor] . But at the same time, it's also a really good thing that these secrets would come out and be revealed in the aftermath of John's passing and therefore Victor's passing. The fact that they're using my mum to basically do that… It's like I get both my wishes at the same time. I get a mummy, and I get a daddy, retroactively.

Digest: What are Xander’s feelings toward Fiona ?

Telfer: He's enraged at his mother for lying to him his entire life about who his father was, and Victor's not there for him to scream at. There's no real explanation as to why they did it, and Victor's not there to explain his side of it. So Xander is just reeling and lashing out at everybody except for the two people in the world left that he loves and trusts, which are Maggie and Sarah.

Digest: What’s it been like getting to know Serena Scott Thomas (Fiona)?

Telfer: She's full of energy, super-funny, and everything that starts to drive soap actors that stick around for a while mad after a while, she found so amusing. It was all the little things that are specific to daytime; the little crafty things we have to do like the lingering at the end of scenes, the pickups… Everything's a little bit different here to any other type of screen acting, and we all tend to roll our eyes about it. But she kept saying, “Oh, that's fun.” Fun became the little catchphrase. Now whenever something that would normally annoy me happens, I go, “Well, this is fun.”

Digest: It sounds like Serena fits in well.

Telfer: Oh, so much. And [with] Linsey [Godfrey, Sarah] and Suzanne [Rogers, Maggie] as well. The four of us formed a little mini family and really took care of each other, because there’s some very emotional stuff, without spoiling the storyline as it goes, things that relate specifically to Linsey’s and my personal lives. Trauma kind of stuff from [Xander’s] childhood comes up, and we have to play it out in fiction, but still it can be quite heavy. So we were all really taking care of each other through what is the biggest and heaviest story I've had to do on the show, certainly since baby Mickey, losing the child and all of that. But this has just felt so much more grounded and personal.

Digest: How does this paternity news affect Xander moving forward?

Telfer: Ultimately, he feels that nothing has really changed. He doesn't really want anything to do with the Kiriakises at this point, certainly the family business and all of that. He's made peace with the fact that he's never going to be placed in charge of it, and he's never going to be accepted as a true Kiriakis. He's been in that mental space for months, maybe years. He just wants to marry the love of his life and get on with the happy life that he was building.

Digest: But he is the main heir to the Kiriakis fortune. How is he going to deal with that?

Telfer: He still doesn't want it, and he's still in a bit of a quandary as to whether to accept it. And if he does accept it, what does he do with it? Like I said, he's spent the last couple of years becoming much more independent and his own person. So does it negate all of that to then step into the role of the musical chair CEO of Titan? Will that really fix anything about him? Or should he stay on this healthy track of self-improvement that he's been on for the last couple of years? The other part of it, obviously, is that finding out that Victor was in fact his father does make a lot of things start to make sense, like the way Xander is, the type of person he is. He's very similar to Victor in many regards, certainly the criminality aspect and the darker aspects.

Digest: In many ways, Xander’s always seemed like a lost, unloved child.

Telfer: What Xander never had was security. He was always a very insecure, grasping individual trying to climb into the family and up the ladder of respect within the family. And now all of that is obviated by the fact that he's Victor's son and heir. So that allows him, once he accepts it, to start stepping into a more mature and secure version of himself. That's what I've tried to portray as the storyline goes along, that he starts to grow into finally full manhood and taking on this mantle of potentially being a patriarch.

Digest: In the interim, will Sarah be by Xander’s side encouraging him along?

Telfer: Yes. Sarah is someone who he loves and trusts and is there for him as he’s finally coming to understand who he is. And if he can understand himself, maybe other people can understand him as well. And if he isn't as desperate to prove himself all the time, maybe he won't do such desperate things. If he can relax into his role and mature a bit as a father, as a husband, and as a captain of industry, then why not just let himself [lead the Kiriakis empire]? It's what he always wanted. He convinced himself that he didn't want it anymore, because it was so painful. But now it isn't. It's his to make what he wants of it.

Digest: What about Sarah and Xander’s wedding? Are they content to wait until the time feels right?

Telfer: It's actually really lovely in a way, because they're still desperate to get married, but they want it to be under the right circumstances. Or certainly, Sarah does. Once Xander accepts that and understands that, he sees that as even more loving than just getting married straight away just because we said we would. It's like, "No, we want it to be its own joyous occasion." Xander doesn't feel capable of experiencing much joy right now, so let's wait until they all are. So that's what they do.

Digest: Lastly, there's the subject of Theresa. She is in Xander's crosshairs because of her role in the paternity deception, as well as Victoria's kidnapping.

Telfer: He wants to stop her from leaving town, because she has perpetrated a very significant crime…. As much as Xander's angry about the Alex thing and angry about being lied to and being usurped of his inheritance, what he really cares about is that Theresa endangered Victoria and [involved her] with Konstantin. That just sends him to a whole different level of hatred towards Theresa.