The Young And The Restless: Chance Chancellor's Mysterious Past Explained
In 2019, Chance Chancellor made a comeback to "The Young and the Restless" and the fictional city of Genoa City, Wisconsin, a place he hadn't been seen in since 2011. Since 2019, Chance has been through a lot. He got married, nearly died on a secret government mission, and became a father while he was on that mission, although not in the conventional way.
However, many longtime "Y&R" fans who skipped a few years of viewing might not realize who Chance is or where he came from. And that is because his name isn't really Chance. While he is a legacy character, meaning he was born on-screen to one of the soap's core families, he started out with a different name and was called that name for the first two decades of the character's life. Yes, he is a Chancellor and he is named for both his father and grandfather, so who is this mysterious crime-fighting man Abby Newman (Melissa Ordway) wed?
A one-night stand resulted in Chance
Nina Webster (Tricia Cast) first came to Genoa City in 1986 as a pregnant teen who was taken in by a woman named Rose DeVille, played by future "The Bold and the Beautiful" star Darlene Conley. After Nina gave birth, Rose, who was involved in a black market baby business, kidnapped Nina's baby and sold him. Nina was left to go on without her child with the support of her new friend, Christine Blair (Lauralee Bell), according to Soap In Depth.
It's too bad Nina fell for Christine's boyfriend, Philip Chancellor III (Thom Bierdz). After one night together, Nina found herself pregnant again and gave birth to a baby boy she kept, naming him Philip Chancellor IV. Sadly, his father was allegedly killed in a car crash when Philip IV was a baby and Nina was left to raise him on her own. Nina went on to marry Ryan McNeil (Scott Reeves), who wanted to raise little Philip as his own, but after Ryan was tragically murdered, Nina packed up her son and moved out to California to begin life anew (via Soaps In Depth).
Philip changes his name to Chance
In 2008, Nina Webster returned to Genoa City without her son, who was now all grown up and serving the United States in the war in Iraq. A year later, Philip IV (then played by John Driscoll) returned to the city of his birth, but he was now going by the name Chance. The war veteran had a lot to deal with when he returned home because he learned the father he never even knew had faked his own death because he was gay and didn't want anyone to know, feeling Nina and his son would be better off without him (via Soaps In Depth).
Father and son got to know one another and Chance settled into life as a detective for the Genoa City police department. He entered into a romance with Chloe Mitchell (Elizabeth Hendrickson) for a time, while also discovering that undercover cop and FBI agent, Ronan Malloy (Jeff Branson), was the baby that Rose DeVille stole from Nina before he was born. In a drug bust that went awry, Ronan shot Chance and he was believed to be dead. However, like his father before him, he faked his death to catch the bad guys, but by 2011, he left town to work for the government.
Chance returns to Genoa City years later
When Chance, now played by Donny Boaz, resurfaced in 2019, he had a connection to the recently-returned-from-the-dead Adam Newman (Mark Grossman), but the show never really delved into what that connection was. All we knew was that they knew one another in Las Vegas when Adam had amnesia and was going by the name Spider (via Soaps In Depth). However, Chance had another Newman on his mind almost immediately after his return when he fell for Adam's half-sister, Abby Newman (Melissa Ordway).
As Chance settled into life outside the government, he and Abby realized that they always wanted to have children, but never found the right person, per Soaps in Depth. That prompted them to hastily get married and try to have a baby right away as Chance resumed work with the Genoa City PD. However, that's when things got tricky for the newlyweds as they learned having a child of their own was not going to be as easy as they believed.
Chance and Abby had fertility issues
Abby didn't waste any time after she failed to get pregnant after one month of trying and visited her doctor. That's when she learned that her uterus was badly damaged from a miscarriage a few years prior and she wouldn't be able to carry a child. However, her eggs were healthy so Abby and Chance decided they would use a surrogate to carry a child created by the both of them (via Soaps In Depth). However, when Chance visited their fertility doctor, he learned he was sterile. And that's when things really went off the rails for this pair.
Chance and Abby then decided they would use donor sperm and her egg, as well as a surrogate, so they could be parents, but before Abby could blink, Chance was called away on a secret government mission and all he left her was a note. Abby, whose baby fever would not subside, decided to go along with their plan anyway and informed Chance via FaceTime that she had created a baby with their friend Devon Hamilton (Bryton James) and their other friend, Mariah Copeland (Camryn Grimes), was now carrying this child.
Chance becomes a dad, is presumed dead, and makes his comeback
After an eventful pregnancy in which she was kidnapped and held hostage by Abby's ex, Stitch Rayburn (Sean Carrigan), Devon and Abby delivered baby Dominic in a remote cabin and Abby was finally a mom. Sadly, she soon learned she was a single mom as Chance was presumed dead in an explosion in Spain.
However, something didn't seem right to Abby so she dropped her baby off with Devon, told him he might be the only father Dominic would ever know, and took off in search of Chance. She did indeed find him in Spain — alive and hiding out — and brought him home (via Soaps In Depth). By then, Devon was attached to his biological son, Chance (now played by Conner Floyd) couldn't form an attachment with him, and Abby didn't know what to do. It also turned out Chance was suffering from PTSD, so he convinced Abby to let Devon be Dom's second dad legally, according to Soaps.com. And that is where Chance stands as of this writing, getting help for his PTSD and trying to heal his marriage and family.