Bianca Montgomery

Bianca Montgomery is a fictional character from the American daytime drama All My Children. Until Eden Riegel assumed the role, portraying the character from July 2000 to January 2010, the character was portrayed solely by child actresses: Lacey Chabert, Nathalie Paulding, Gina Gallagher, Caroline Wilde and Jessica Leigh Falborn. When Riegel decided to permanently exit the role, plans to recast were confirmed; in June 2010, Christina Bennett Lind replaced Riegel, and remained on the series through the original television finale episode, which aired September 23, 2011. In February 2013, it was announced that Riegel would be reprising her role as Bianca in a guest-arc on Prospect Park's continuation of All My Children.

The character of Bianca is the daughter of Erica Kane and the late Travis Montgomery, born onscreen on February 8, 1988. Her birthday was revised to February 9, 1984 on January 31, 2002 by the show's producers, and her age was stated as 16 in 2000. The middle name given to the character is Christine, after her paternal aunt, Christine Montgomery, and she is portrayed as sweet-natured and well-loved in the fictional community of Pine Valley. Shown to suffer from Reye's syndrome in infancy, as well as anorexia nervosa later in life, she overcomes both with the significant aid of her family. Her most notable storyline is her coming out as a lesbian in 2000, a moment that has been seen as a milestone for LGBT representation in media.

Outside of fiction, Bianca has emerged as a gay icon within the LGBT community. Newspapers such as The New York Times cite her as the first lead character on a major daytime drama to be a lesbian, and The Advocate calls her "the most famous gay soap role of all time." She has been the subject and study of various academic works, said to have inspired soap opera writers to begin with the scripting of sexual identities of tortured teen characters, and is a heroine. Under Riegel's portrayal, her popularity has been cited as groundbreaking.

As a teenager, Eden Riegel gave up on her pursuit of a successful acting career. She stated that she had seen a "number of talented people" who were struggling, and that she started to doubt whether she would ever have the success that she wanted. She decided that it was time to major in social and political theory, go to law school, and become a lawyer. This changed while she attended Harvard. While there, she received "a call from a casting director who thought that the five-foot-six beauty should audition to become Erica Kane’s daughter." Later, the character would eventually be revealed to be a lesbian. Producers did not tell Riegel she would be portraying a lesbian until after she won the role. "I was surprised," she said.

All My Children creator Agnes Nixon cites that scripting Bianca as a lesbian was in part inspired by Chaz Bono's memoir Family Outing. Nixon explained the feelings she wanted expressed with the character's mother, Erica. She wanted to showcase the thought process and actions "most parents" have upon finding out that their child is gay: "I think the right word for Erica's reaction is denial," said Nixon. "I read Family Outing by Chastity Bono. Cher had loads of friends who were gay, but she wasn't able to deal with [Chastity's being gay]. In this prejudicial society in which we live, the first reaction from a parent usually is, 'What did I do wrong?'"

Nixon, well known for her socially relevant storylines, said that the makings for the Bianca story began in 1947; a college housemate "came out" to Nixon when Nixon was the same age Riegel had been in 2000. Nixon acknowledged that the show's original story featuring lesbian characters, which was broadcast in 1983, which lasted two months, did not work out as well at the time as she had hoped, and wanted to try again. "Now, in a soap, if you want to do a story about a social issue seriously, the character has to be really well integrated. Bianca's story is the result of that — with growth and maturity," she stated.

Riegel discussed Bianca's storyline with her sister, Tatiana. Tatiana, who is a lesbian and eighteen years Riegel's senior, became one of the primary people Riegel wanted to impress with the storyline. With Tatiana living in Los Angeles, where she works as a film editor and Riegel having lived on the East Coast most of her early life, the sisters did not grow up together but maintained a close relationship. Riegel took the role as an opportunity to bond with Tatiana over a character project, and said Tatiana was one of the people she was most concerned about in portraying Bianca's story.

At the time Riegel took over the role of Bianca, there were strict instructions from the show's writers and producers not to reveal Bianca as gay to anyone outside the show (as the storyline had not played out on television screens yet). Despite this, Riegel informed Tatiana two months before the storyline finally began. The revelation was easily envisioned by the sisters as a storyline from a soap opera due to Riegel having told Tatiana Bianca's secret on the day of their father's third wedding. Tatiana said that Riegel was "very excited" about informing her of Bianca's sexual orientation and that she was happy for her sister. "I just thought it was a kick that she would be playing a lesbian — specifically, Erica Kane's daughter!" said Tatiana.