00:00How are you?
00:01I'm good, you?
00:02Big night tonight?
00:03Yeah, I love these awards. It's always a little bit more relaxed. We don't have to sit in
00:08an auditorium and just be stiff. It's a good, relaxed night.
00:11I absolutely love Mercedes. Dream character to be handed. How much have you loved going
00:16out? Over how many years have you been now?
00:18I was saying to my boyfriend the other day, I don't know if it's like 18, 19, 20, 21.
00:23It's somewhere around that. You lose count because every year there's an absolute blessing.
00:27It's like working with your family. They write the best stories for me and she is the
00:31best character to play.
00:32The hardest time recently though for Mercedes and yourself playing her.
00:36Yeah, it's been really tricky.
00:38Has it been really rewarding though? Lots of people reached out to you.
00:41Yeah, massively. My dad died of bowel cancer when I was 15 so I've got a real personal
00:48connection to it and Instagram's been the place that lots of people have been reaching
00:53out saying that they've helped them, they've raised awareness. Similar type of women to
00:58Mercedes with children that have gone through the same thing and just hearing that and hearing
01:03that it's having an impact and raising the awareness for them is just so overwhelming
01:08for me.
01:09When you hear about storylines like that, do they ask you about your family and do they
01:12know that your dad had that?
01:14They didn't for me personally but it's not something I've ever voiced overly before and
01:19I know sometimes people find it a bit too tricky to do it when it's so close to home
01:24but for me, some of them scenes that I did, it was almost like therapy and grieving. It
01:30was beautifully awful but I hope I told the tale properly for people.
01:41Have you managed to watch it back yet?
01:43I did. I've watched some of it. It's really hard because when I'm in it as well, sometimes
01:47because you have to do so much television on a daily basis, you have to churn out 10
01:52pages, 15 pages. It is quick to just go, right, what do we have to do? Let's get the story
01:57told but with all of that stuff, I don't know, I've had so much patience for it and wanted
02:04to tell it properly that I have been going a little bit method and a bit just let me
02:09get in my own head a bit.
02:10Struggle for your family to watch it as well and your partner.
02:13Yeah, it is. I think it's sad. It's sad to see as well such a character with seven lives.
02:20She's sassy. She's like nobody touches her. She can just crack on with life and the fact
02:25that it can happen to her, I think it does make you think it can happen to anybody.
02:30You're meant to be.
02:31Yeah, I hope.
02:32And how's the leopard print stuck into your own life? Are you a fan of it?
02:35I love it. I love it. I'm like, it's probably more me than Miss Ane is but I might just
02:40blame it on her.
02:41Yeah, you and Mel B.
02:42Yeah, I like it.
02:44And everyone else, what do you think is so great about it? Because it's been on TV forever
02:49and it's so great. What's so special about it?
02:52It's the energy. It's the people there. Everyone says that about places, that the work, oh
02:56it's like a family and everything, but it really is. You come there, somebody could
03:00come and join tomorrow and they're like, I feel like I've been part of this for 20 years.
03:05It's the people. It's the energy. It's the character of the building.
03:08And what do you want to happen next? Do you want to perhaps do other things outside of
03:12Hollyoaks?
03:13I don't know. For now, we're very much investing in Hollyoaks. This next year, obviously we've
03:17gone from five episodes to three episodes, so all the energy has to be there.
03:21How's that affected the actors?
03:24In what way?
03:25Are you doing more work?
03:27It's kind of the same at the minute. I'm like, we're filming half but we're still working.
03:31I'm not sure where does this happen. We need to figure that out. But yeah, we're still
03:36very much in there, like 10, 11 hours every day, grafting and just trying to produce a
03:41television show that we're all proud of.
03:43Would you like to be filmed and do other things?
03:46Yeah, I did a little BBC drama at the start of the year and that was really exciting.
03:50It's called Where You Go Again and that'll be out I think next year, so that was really
03:54enjoyable. I loved it.
03:56Thank you so much.
03:58I think your dad's amazing.
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