Actor Marnie Schulenburg, who played Alison Stewart in more than 300 episodes of the US soap opera As The World Turns, died Tuesday in Bloomfield, New Jersey ― two years after being diagnosed with breast cancer, according to The Hollywood Reporter. She would have turned 38 on Saturday.
“Please don’t say Marnie lost her battle to cancer. It’s simply not true,” her husband, Succession actor Zack Robidas, wrote, per Variety. “I watched her kick cancer’s ass everyday since diagnosis. She is incredible. We chose to attack her diagnosis with blind optimism. We only talked about the future and continued moving forward. I don’t know if this was right but it’s all we knew how to do.”
On Mother’s Day, Schulenburg posted a photo with her two-year-old daughter Coda and her mother. She lamented being a “half-life version” of herself for her child, but felt optimistic about her survival prospects.
“My mother showed up 100% all day everyday for me growing up or at least it seemed that way. I want to give Coda the same but I must be kind to myself and remember that nothing is permanent,” Schulenburg wrote.
Schulenburg, a native of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, who earned a theatre degree at DeSales University in Pennsylvania, had her first regular role on the soap opera “As The World Turns” from very late 2006 to the show’s cancellation in 2010, according to IMDB. She earned a Daytime Emmy nomination for the final season, which featured Alison getting engaged, Variety noted.
She also appeared in nine episodes of the One Life to Live reboot in 2013.
Her most recent recurring role was on Showtime’s Kevin Bacon-starring crime drama City On The Hill airing this year.