the ONLY cast member to have a "lifetime" contract with DOOL is Frances Reid. John Clarke retired in 2004, and I have searched several DOOL contract sites and nowhere have I been able to find that John Clarke had a "lifetime" contract. As a matter of fact, the character of Mickey Horton was recast with John Ingle, who played Mickey Horton for just one year and then asked and was granted to be released from his contract, and has since been portraying the patriarch Edward Quartermaine on General Hospital.