Galen Laius Gering (born February 13, 1971) is an American actor most known for his portrayal of characters on daytime soap operas. He currently plays the role of

Rafe Hernandez Rafe Hernandez is a fictional character on ''Days of Our Lives'', an American soap opera on the NBC network. Portrayed by Galen Gering and created by Dena Higley, Rafe is introduced in 2008 as the FBI agent assigned to protect the troublesome Sam ...

on the long-running

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...

soap opera ''

Days of Our Lives ''Days of Our Lives'' (also stylized as ''Days of our Lives''; simply referred to as ''Days'' or ''DOOL'') is an American television soap opera that streams on the streaming service Peacock. The soap, which aired on the American television net ...

.'' He also appeared on the

daytime soap opera ''

Passions ''Passions'' is an American television soap opera that originally aired on NBC from July 5, 1999, to September 7, 2007, and on DirecTV's The 101 Network from September 17, 2007, to August 7, 2008. Created by screenwriter James E. Reilly and pro ...

'' as

Luis Lopez-Fitzgerald Luis Lopez-Fitzgerald is a fictional character on the NBC/DirecTV soap opera ''Passions'', portrayed from 1999 to 2008 by original cast member Galen Gering. Debuting in the series' premiere episode, Luis is introduced as an honest, hard-working ...

Early life

Galen Laius Gering was born in

Los Angeles, California Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

, to Alan Gering and Michele de Oñate, a renowned west coast artist. He is of Russian Jewish descent on his father's side, and French and Spanish/Basque descent on his mother's side (one of his maternal great-grandfathers was a Basque immigrant). He has an older sister, Charissa. Gering was close to his grandmother, who was also an artist. At the age of 18, Gering moved to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

to start a modeling career and finished high school remotely. He traveled Europe as a model before attending

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then-Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, the ...

for a year. Gering finished college at the

University of Miami The University of Miami (UM, UMiami, Miami, U of M, and The U) is a private research university in Coral Gables, Florida. , the university enrolled 19,096 students in 12 colleges and schools across nearly 350 academic majors and programs, incl ...

where he studied creative writing and film.

Career

In 1999, Gering learned of a role in an upcoming NBC daytime soap called ''Passions'' through

Irene Marie Models Irene Marie Models was a modeling and talent agency in Miami Beach, Florida. The agency was one of South Florida's first exclusive agencies. The agency closed in 2009. History Irene Marie Models was founded in 1983 in Fort Lauderdale, Florid ...

. By the time Gering graduated from UM, he was already taping ''Passions'', on which he had landed the role of Officer Luis Lopez-Fitzgerald. Gering was named one of ''

People A person (plural, : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of pr ...

's 50 Most Beautiful People'' in 2000, and remained with ''Passions'' until its cancellation in 2008. On October 31, 2008, Gering debuted on another NBC soap, ''

'', as Rafe Hernandez, an FBI agent who is hired to guard

Sami Brady Sami Brady is a fictional character from ''Days of Our Lives'', an American soap opera on the NBC network, portrayed by Alison Sweeney since 1993. The character is first seen as a newborn baby in the episode of October 16, 1984, in which mom Ma ...

while she is under witness protection. He has also appeared in over 50 national commercials. On September 25, 2011, Gering and his wife, Jenna, starred on the E! reality series ''

Dirty Soap ''Dirty Soap'' is an American reality television series that debuted on E! on September 25, 2011. The hour-long series focuses on the personal and professional lives of daytime soap opera stars and their off-screen time. The series is being prod ...

'' together with their kids. The show ended on November 13, 2011, after only one season.

Filmography

Personal life

Gering is married to Jenna Hudlett and they have two sons together.

References

External links