Cyndi Lauper Visits Oakdale

Image credit: Jimmy Wood

Cyndi Lauper ''I think they're young, these guys, and they're sweet,'' the singer says of Luke (Van Hansis, c.) and Noah (Jake Silbermann)

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It's Gay Pride in Oakdale! Or at least it was on May 27 when Cyndi Lauper stopped by to tape an episode of CBS' As the World Turns (which will air July 3). Lauper takes the tiny stage at Yo's for a benefit concert where she stands beneath a ''Oakdale U. Pride loves Cyndi Lauper'' sign — and in between two posters advertising her new dance album, Bring Ya to the Brink (out now), and her second annual True Colors tour (kicking off May 31). The singer performs two songs: her new single, ''Into the Nightlife,'' and her classic diversity anthem, ''True Colors.'' The former finds her dancing with Luke (Van Hansis), Noah (Jake Silbermann), and a few grateful extras; the latter, she dedicates to Luke, whom she gets to know when he interviews her for the college paper.

Lauper's visit to Oakdale makes sense for a couple of reasons. For one, it supports an issue that's long been important to her — equality. Lauper was raised to believe that you ''stick up for your own,'' she says, and her older sister, Ellen, is lesbian. Lauper has also followed the Luke-Noah storyline enough to have an opinion on whether the couple — which shared the first gay kiss in daytime last August but has yet to spend the night together — is moving too slowly.

''I think they're young, these guys, and they're sweet,'' she tells EW.com. ''They're taking their time and struggling with the heart issues, which is even more endearing than just being like the straight couples, half-naked and having sex all over the place. The best way to people is through the heart, and that's why I think it's kind of interesting the way they've done it. It's about love.''

The pop icon's audience at Yo's is not unlike the one that inspired her new album. ''I did The Threepenny Opera [on Broadway with Alan Cumming in 2006], and I went out dancing a lot with him and other friends. I was thinking then how I was gonna go back to my world, and I would miss them, and we wouldn't dance together anymore. Then I was thinking, 'Unless you made some music that they played in these places, and then we'd still be dancing together.' That's where the idea [for a dance album] came to me.''

NEXT: All My Children's Cameron Mathison on his Emmy hosting gig.