How John Candy Helped Days Of Our Lives’ John Kapelos Shape His Career

“Days of Our Lives” star John Kapelos’ career has thus far been extraordinary. He was in no less than three John Hughes classic films — “Sixteen Candles” (1984), “The Breakfast Club” (1985), and “Weird Science” (1986) — as well as an incredible amount of other films and TV shows. Originally from London, Ontario, the Canadian actor set out at age 21 to seek his fortune.

On the podcast “The Mild Adventures of Fred Stoller,” he explained that when he made the decision to become an actor, his father stated: “”Listen, okay if you wanna be an actor, you do it for one year, and if you don’t get a job in a year, you’re going back to school.’” Kapelos rose to the challenge, saying, “So that motivated me and within three months I got a job with Second City in Chicago.” Having already trained at the Toronto branch of Second City, Kapelos was a good fit for its Chicago location and he found there were a lot of jobs in the city.

Kapelos stayed in touch with John Candy. Years after being mentored by the comedy great, Kapelos went to visit the iconic comedian on the set of “Delirious” (1991). Kapelos recalled that the camera person looked at Candy and made an inappropriate joke regarding his weight. Candy didn’t stand for it and yelled loudly enough that the set went quiet. Their friendship would go on until Candy sadly died on set in 1994.