Sally Bretton on Beyond Paradise, Not Going Out and the one thing about Death in Paradise that made her scream
The actress talks exclusively about the new season of Beyond Paradise and why she loves the detective show so much.
Detective drama Beyond Paradise is back for a fourth outing, continuing the adorable love story between Martha Lloyd and Detective Inspector Humphrey Goodman that began on Death in Paradise in 2016. The pair, played by Sally Bretton and Kris Marshall, finally tied the knot in the Christmas 2025 episode, and are now beginning married life together. However, it’s not plain sailing for the newlyweds, as the new season opens with them waking up to discover their houseboat home has drifted away from its moorings and is ominously taking on water. For Bretton, moving the Goodmans off the boat and potentially into a home on dry land was something of a mixed blessing. “I do love the boat, and it is fun, but it’s so hard to film inside it,” she says. “I did like sitting on the deck and doing the scenes there, but it is a bit clustered inside. So it’s bittersweet. “We were also at the mercy of the tides. Sometimes, that beautiful vista outside Anne’s [Martha’s mother] cottage that looks so idyllic would just be mud flats. You’re trying to fit filming in when the water’s high enough, as well as the weather being in the right place and all of that stuff.” Another challenge for the Beyond Paradise cast and crew is the growing popularity of the series has meant that their shooting locations in and around Looe in Cornwall – doubling for the fictional town of Shipton Abbott – are often filled with fans wanting to sneak a look at the cast while they are filming. “Now people know that Shipton Abbott is Looe, and because it is so beautiful, I think there has been an uplift in tourism,” Sally says. “There are more people around, they know what we’re up to, there’s more interest in the show. If Kelby (Dylan Llewellyn) and Humphrey are filming on the beach, then you will get quite a lot of people looking over. “But it’s a warm-hearted, gentle show, and so people just come with that energy. They are often families, and they just want a quick picture and they’ve just seen it on the telly and thought they’d have a look. It’s a very gentle interest, as opposed to anything that feels overwhelming or crowded.” Sally understands that the sweet relationship between her character and Humphrey is one of the reasons fans love the show so much, and why it’s so popular with people of all ages. “They genuinely love each other, they’re thrilled to be around each other,” she says. “You don’t often get to see that in a main pair on screen, because often this happens, or that happens, to make it dramatic. "Instead, Martha and Humphrey are very respectful, but still have lots of fun. I’m relieved that they have found their person, and their person is as wonderful as they think. I think watching that is lovely.” Of course, the now-married Goodmans have had some difficulties over the first three seasons of the show, including the looming presence of Martha’s ex-fiancé, Archie (Jamie Bamber), and the couple experiencing fertility difficulties that eventually led them to explore fostering. While Sally can’t reveal whether their fostering continues in the new season (“I can’t say, it’s on my ‘do not reveal’ red list,” she laughs), she is pleased with how the fertility storyline has been handled in the show so far. “Often on the television there’s a big fertility journey, but with a happy ending,” she explains. “What happens when there isn’t [a neat ending], and the choices you make then? Is two enough, and how does two feel? And that story, which is less seen than the happy ending one, I thought it was really interesting and liked that a lot.” <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/3/2026/03/beyond-paradise-season-4-kris-marshall-sally-bretton-ee5bc10.jpg" width="4284" height="2856" alt="Kris Marshall as Humphrey Goodman and Sally Bretton as Martha Lloyd in Beyond Paradise. They are both clapping and she is looking at him, smiling." title="Kris Marshall as Humphrey Goodman and Sally Bretton as Martha Lloyd in Beyond Paradise" /> There will still be some ups and downs in this season – “we go house hunting and the place we settle on needs a worrying amount of work, so they get stuck into that with various capers and disasters” – but fans can be assured that Humphrey and Martha’s strong relationship remains the beating heart of the show. It’s all the more impressive when you realise that Martha was originally brought into Death in Paradise simply as a device to explain why Humphrey was leaving the island of Saint Marie when star Kris Marshall wanted to exit the Caribbean-set series. “I did two episodes in series 5, and I’m not sure, but I think I was being tested to see if I was a good exit storyline,” Sally says. “I was brought in for that purpose. I did the two episodes and then I was called back to do more for the next series to finish Humphrey’s story.” The Hertfordshire-based actress loved her time filming in Guadeloupe. “I never understand anyone who comes back and says, ‘I didn’t like it very much. I didn’t really like the weather.’ For me, I couldn’t believe I was working somewhere so beautiful. I thought it was unbelievable and stunning. "They do have those Scolopendra things [giant centipedes], you scream a lot with them. But you can get by with a few millipedes to look at, can’t you?” View oEmbed on the source website The longevity of Death in Paradise – it’s now been on air for 15 seasons – raises the question of whether Sally would like Beyond Paradise to run for as many years as the show it was spun off from. “I love this job. I would be extremely happy for that to happen. The show is right up my street. My children watch it, not because I’m in it, because they don’t watch other things I’ve been in, but because they genuinely love settling down and watching something so heartwarming,” says the mum of three daughters. “So yes please!” Even if Beyond Paradise continues for more than a decade, it wouldn’t be the longest-running show Sally has worked on, as she has played Lee Mack’s wife Lucy in the BBC sitcom Not Going Out since the second season of the series back in 2007. With a 15th on the way this June, Sally admits that she shares some characteristics with both her most famous roles. “I think I’m more like Martha than Lucy,” she says. “Maybe I would be a bit exasperated at times like Lucy if I was living with Lee’s character and all the scrapes we get into. But I think Lucy is a bit harsher than me. If she can skip out of any responsibility, she will, and she’ll put it onto him. She doesn’t mind having confrontation with him but she can’t bear it anywhere else, so she tries to get him to fix everything like that. “I think Martha takes responsibility for more things in her life, though she does freak out sometimes. So I’d say I am probably more Martha.” While both roles have made Sally a household name, the 45-year-old actress already had an impressive list of film, TV and theatre credits that stretches back to her first performance, aged just seven, in the mini-series Napoleon and Josephine: A Love Story, in which she appeared alongside Jacqueline Bisset as Josephine’s young daughter. After training at the Central School of Speech and Drama, Sally honed her comedic timing on shows with Harry Enfield and Armstrong & Miller and on the medical sitcom Green Wing, and won acclaim for her stage performances in productions including Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, In Extremis and King Lear. Theatre remains a passion but one of the roles Sally is most proud of is that of Donna, a new employee at the Slough branch of Wernham Hogg in The Office, in which she starred alongside Ricky Gervais, Mackenzie Crook and Martin Freeman. “I really love that I got to be part of something as incredible as The Office, and I got to be in that set with all these people who weren’t very well known at the time, who were all being brilliant, and we were all just hanging out in an office in Slough, creating something that ended up being quite amazing,” Sally says. “I’m not taking any responsibility for that, but to have been part of it and to have seen it, I think that is pretty special.” Add Radio Times as a Preferred Source on Google Keep up to date on what’s worth watching with your favourite entertainment news from Radio Times – see more of our exclusive news and interviews featured prominently in Top Stories when using Google. Beyond Paradise season 4 begins on BBC One and iPlayer on Friday 27 March at 8pm. Add Beyond Paradise to your watchlist on the <a id="OWA8b702c45-bee9-94e4-f018-57518e78041b" title="https://www.radiotimes.com/download-the-app/?af_xp=custom&pid=website&c=editorial_content&is_retargeting=true&af_reengagement_window=30d" href="https://www.radiotimes.com/download-the-app/?af_xp=custom&pid=website&c=editorial_content&is_retargeting=true&af_reengagement_window=30d" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-outlook-id="449c28d9-909e-4aab-b6b8-153454f55d5e" data-auth="NotApplicable" data-linkindex="0">Radio Times: What to Watch app – download now for daily TV recommendations, features and more. Check out more of our Drama coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more TV recommendations and reviews, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
The Other Bennet Sister's Ella Bruccoleri on stepping into Austen's world and stepping away from Call the Midwife
The Other Bennet Sister star talks about stepping into a lead role for the first time, discovering Austen late, and moving on from Call the Midwife.
“I love doing something different every few months.” That makes Mary Bennet, lead in the BBC’s 10-part drama The Other Bennet Sister an interesting move for actress Ella Bruccoleri. Nebbish, bookish, and, at least outwardly, pious, the middle sister of Pride and Prejudice’s Bennet doesn’t have change in her bones. You’d be forgiven for thinking that piety comes naturally to Bruccoleri, who was brought up Roman Catholic but tells Radio Times she’s now agnostic. She’ll be familiar to many as Sister Frances in Call the Midwife, others might have recognised her in a small role as Sister Rosita in Paddington in Peru. Those roles don’t find her because of her upbringing, however. “I just have this kind of nun-like face!” she says. “I maybe find it more difficult to play pious characters than would be expected because I've broken away from [Catholicism], and maybe I feel a bit of guilt because my family is still very Catholic,” she continues. “It would feel easier maybe to play a role that's more cynical of, or being worn down by, organised religion.” Appropriately, Mary Bennet’s relationship with religion is hard to decipher, even as the BBC’s adaptation of Janice Hadlow’s novel of the same name expands her beyond Pride and Prejudice. It grants Mary a complexity lacking in other adaptations but for Bruccoleri, in her first lead role, it was a new experience. “I was filming every day, sometimes six days a week, for four months,” she says. “It tested my stamina in ways that I’d never experienced.” For which, she suggests, Call the Midwife was the perfect training ground. Read more: The Other Bennet Sister star reveals why she left Call the Midwife and talks beloved Pride & Prejudice character Ruth Jones reveals what she told Gavin & Stacey icon Alison Steadman about the beloved Jane Austen role they now share Drama school hadn’t prepared Bruccoleri for interacting with the camera, so she learned on set. The fast-paced production of Call the Midwife – 15 seasons in 15 years – and embodying the same character for four seasons helped her “work the muscle repeatedly.” It made clear just how prepared one needed to be when coming onto set, whether that’s in Call the Midwife’s East London or The Other Bennet Sister’s shifting setting from Longbourn, London, and The Lake District (represented by the Brecon Beacons in-show). That movement made Bruccoleri's filming experience elastic. Portraying the more morose side of Mary in Longbourn and later Pemberley, “I felt really conscious that it was slightly on me to set the tone for how filming went,” she says. “I would sometimes start to inhabit Mary a little too much on the set of Longbourn because I had all my sisters around me with these beautiful dresses and I was there in my grey monk’s robe. I sometimes felt a bit grumpy.” <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/3/2026/03/BBC-TOBS-03a724a.jpg" width="4281" height="2854" alt="A young woman wearing glasses and a pale Regency-era dress stands in the foreground outdoors, looking determined. Behind her on a set of stone steps stands a small group of well-dressed people—several young women in colorful empire-waist gowns, an older woman in a floral dress, and an older man in a dark coat. They all look toward her as sunlight filters through the surrounding trees, creating the atmosphere of a tense moment in a garden setting." title="The Other Bennet Sister" /> When Mary’s sadness was harder to come by, Bruccoleri fell back on past experience – whether that’s in her own life or watching, she says, particularly depressing documentaries. As The Other Bennet Sister transports Pride and Prejudice into a more modern understanding of family, both families of origin and choice, Brucolleri dug into her own relationships for a mirror to Mary’s complex relationship with her mother, Mrs Bennet (Ruth Jones). “I have people in my life who are estranged from their families and have had to build a family from scratch through people they trust and not blood relations,” she says. “I would think about my friends and I would get really upset, [they’ve] done an incredibly brave thing by stepping away. That doesn’t get easier.” That contrasted with the experience of filming in London where, as Mary opens up under the purview of the Gardiners (Richard Coyle and Indira Varma), Brucolleri also lightened. This was, in part, for having children on set and that necessitating a less serious mood in between takes. “[But] they’re also like big children, Indira and Richard,” Bruccoleri says. “They’re such brilliant actors, and two of our most respected actors, [but] they’re incredibly silly people.” “One day, Richard just found an orange in his hand,” she continues,” and he was like, ‘I don’t know how this got here.’ He was genuinely shocked!” It’s part of a broader program by Varma and Coyle to help relieve some of pressure Bruccoleri felt by making “Ella regress into a million giggles,” she says. “A good reminder you shouldn't take anything that seriously.” That sense of support filters through the entire series for Brucolleri. First, with Richard E. Grant as Mr. Bennet – “he’s been wanting to play that character for a long time” – and Jones, and later Varma and Coyle. “I had days where I felt really held by other people,” she says. Not just by her more experienced cast-mates, but also a crew she says dedicated itself to bringing Austen and Hadlow’s world to life through a vibe that often ran counter to the drudgery that Mary experiences. “I've done jobs where I'm just showing up and doing the work and maybe I'm not insanely passionate about this, or invested in this,” she says. “I understand if other people show up and it's just a job for them. That was not the case with an ybody on that set. I was blown away by how everyone really cares and was really invested in the story and in their character, and people were putting in so much time and effort behind-the-scenes.” <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/3/2026/03/547460-3ec956f.jpg" width="5120" height="3414" alt="A young woman wearing a light beige, early-19th-century style dress sits in a wooden armchair beside a window. Soft daylight from the left illuminates her face as she gazes thoughtfully outside. She has short brown hair and wears round glasses. The room around her is dim and warmly toned, with patterned curtains, upholstered furniture, and a small table with fruit in the background, giving the scene a quiet, historical, period-drama atmosphere." title="The Other Bennet Sister" /> Now it’s over, Bruccoleri is settling back into the unpredictable rhythm of moving in and out of roles. That doesn’t mean she’s using her spare time to catch up on Call the Midwife, however. “I had best intentions of keeping up with it!” she says. “I just genuinely have not watched TV in a really long time.” Choice paralysis, she calls it, it’s too much commitment; she’s better at watching films. “I think I’m a bit of a commitment-phobe generally.” It also makes her reticent to take on anything as long-term as Call the Midwife right now. She doesn’t rule it out – nor a return to the series when it returns from its hiatus. “It would be nice to revisit that part of my life in a low-stakes way,” she says. Though adds that she feels she’s taken Sister Frances as far as she can. “Once I put something to bed, I do find it quite difficult to go backwards.” An answer that might have been different immediately after exiting when, with no work booked, she did doubt momentarily whether it was the right decision. But if leaving is something Mary fears then Bruccoleri has accepted the natural rhythm of a working actor that makes change a gift; albeit laced with the occasional worry when jobs end. “I just really love variety,” she says. “I love doing something completely different.” That makes what comes next for an actress that, despite an abundance of nuns in her career thus far, has already collated a body of curious and characterful roles. Here, however, her upbringing does have an impact. “I’d like to do more art-house cinema,” she says. “That’s the stuff I was raised on: I grew up on Shane Meadows and Ken Loach. I’d like to do more Northern stuff.” This prompts Bruccoleri – who hails from North Yorkshire – to return to The Other Bennet Sister for a final thought. As it brings modern sensibilities to regency period dramas, she takes a moment to note how the series is packed with Northern actors and, more importantly, Northern voices. It’s part of a diverse cast of voices that’s opening up a story often reserved for Southern voices on-screen. “Growing up, I was really into Brontë because Brontë feels more about where I’m from,” she says. “I thought Austen was really posh and alienating.” Having come to Austen later in life as a result, Bruccoleri hopes The Other Bennet Sister, following in the footsteps of series like Bridgerton – in which Brucolleri has also appeared – might erode some of the barriers past voices may have erected around period dramas. Whether it’s Northern actors still speaking with received pronunciation – “We were all a bit taken aback by how many Northerners they trusted to do that,” she says – or those speaking in their own regional accents. “I would like to see more regional accents on TV. I just don’t think you see enough of it. I think [Austen] feels just as much at home in that accent as it does in received pronunciation,” she says. “I do feel very proud of that – and I do feel proud of the colourblind casting, as well.” A recent trend in modernised period dramas, combining authentic production and costuming with more modern sensibilities and ideas, offers a more accessible way into period dramas. If The Other Bennet Sister changed some minds about Austen, and the broader genre; “if this could be a gateway drug to reading more Austen,” Bruccoleri says, “that would be really, really cool". The Other Bennet Sister premieres on BBC One and iPlayer on Sunday 15th March 2026. Check out more of our Drama coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more TV recommendations and reviews, listen to The Radio Times Podcast. Add The Other Bennet Sister to your watchlist on the <a id="OWA8b702c45-bee9-94e4-f018-57518e78041b" title="https://www.radiotimes.com/download-the-app/?af_xp=custom&pid=website&c=editorial_content&is_retargeting=true&af_reengagement_window=30d" href="https://www.radiotimes.com/download-the-app/?af_xp=custom&pid=website&c=editorial_content&is_retargeting=true&af_reengagement_window=30d" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-outlook-id="449c28d9-909e-4aab-b6b8-153454f55d5e" data-auth="NotApplicable" data-linkindex="0">Radio Times: What to Watch app – download now for daily TV recommendations, features and more.
Classic EastEnders star teases potential future comebacks for Clare Bates as she resurfaces for Nigel’s story: "When he passes it will be so sad"
The soap icon talks exclusively to Radio Times about growing up on screen and her contribution to two continuing dramas.
When Nigel Bates returned to EastEnders in 2024 after 26 years, fans with fond memories of the 90s hoped stepdaughter Clare would follow. It may have taken Nigel’s worsening dementia to bring the character back to Walford, but at last the time has come. It’s not just the audience who’ve been waiting for this emotional reunion; Gemma Bissix herself admits that since Paul Bradley rejoined the cast as her fictional father, she’s been poised to reprise the role of Clare, who she first played back in 1993 when she was just nine years old. “I was definitely hoping, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t,” she begins, speaking exclusively to Radio Times. “This time last year, when I went back to Hollyoaks (where she plays devious Clare Devine, more of her later) my agent contacted EastEnders about my potential availability, and they said they’d been thinking about bringing Clare back but much further down the line. I never told anyone in case it didn’t happen.” Thankfully, it has, and at a point in the story that makes Clare’s presence even more heartbreaking. Nigel’s condition has deteriorated to the point where his wife Julie Bates (Karen Henthorn) and best friend Phil Mitchell (Steve McFadden) can no longer provide the care he needs, meaning he needs to go into a home. Even though confused Nigel has asked to see his daughter, despite years of estrangement, when she appears at his hospital bed he doesn’t even recognise her. “Julie has told Clare over the phone that Nigel is ill, but not how far gone he is,” continues Bissix. “Clare thinks Julie has deliberately kept this from her to be hurtful. Julie is bitter as to why Clare hasn’t been in contact with Nigel, but Clare also feels abandoned as he didn’t reach out to her. “Clare felt pushed out when Nigel married Julie. For many years it was just Clare and Nigel, she lost her mum Debbie at an early age, had no relationship with her biological father Liam who was in prison. Nigel was her stepdad and Clare saw him as her proper dad, but maybe she felt that lack of blood relation during her teenage years.” Nigel and Clare’s falling out was alluded to in 2008, when Bissix made a brief return, where we saw the sweet, sensible schoolgirl had grown up into a manipulative maneater and con artist. No wonder her dad had washed his hands of her. “That was all a bolshy façade,” defends Bissix. “Clare was searching for somewhere to belong and still processing her mum’s death. Towards the end of those few months in 2008, we started to see a more genuine side, but the audience was ready to see the back of her by then. She’s definitely matured. “The beauty of her coming back now is we get to see the Clare from the 90s again. She’s still got that sting in her tail, but that’s her protective armour, which comes off in some big scenes with other characters. I’ve got some lovely stuff obviously with Paul, as well as Karen Henthorn and Steve McFadden, who I adore.” Facing the inevitable as far as Nigel’s condition is concerned triggers a wave of emotion Clare isn’t prepared for. Not only is she recalling her grief for Debbie (Nicola Duffett) from 30 years ago, but Bissix believes her alter ego is also full of regret at the years she’ll never get back with her dad. “Clare took Nigel for granted and thought he’d always be there. Maybe her opportunity to apologise for putting her walls up and not reaching out could be lost, it might be too late.” Someone who wasn’t even born the last time Clare was in the Square turns out to be her greatest support. Lexi Pearce (Isabella Brown) knows what it’s like to lose a parent when you’re barely in double figures, having lost her mum, Lola Pearce-Brown (Danielle Harold), in 2023. “The relationship between Clare and Lexi is organic as they’ve been through the same thing at the same age,” says Bissix. “They bond as Clare talks about Debbie and recalls how Nigel was there for her. It’s recapping those old episodes with Clare’s memories, which also made me think about my early days on EastEnders.” A “loud and over-the-top child,” by her own admission, Bissix began attending drama classes once a week after school when she was eight. After signing with an agency, she got an audition for EastEnders, not realising the impact it would have on her life. “The only reason I got the part was because I looked like Nicola Duffett, who was playing my mother,” she remembers. “And I guess I was confident enough to read a script. At nine years old, you either deliver lines and sound natural, or like a robot.” Her clearly natural ability impressed producers who cast her for what was initially just three episodes, which became six years. Add Radio Times as a Preferred Source on Google Keep up to date on what’s worth watching with your favourite entertainment news from Radio Times – see more of our exclusive news and interviews featured prominently in Top Stories when using Google. EastEnders enjoyed a huge peak of popularity in the mid-90s. In the days before streaming, and with only four terrestrial channels, it regularly achieved ratings of around 20 million. For nine-year-old Bissix, not only was she instantly famous, but she was also working with some of TV’s most high-profile stars. “I’ll never forget Steve McFadden coming up to me on my first day,” she laughs. “He asked me if I knew my lines. I said yes quite confidently. Then he took my script away and told me to recite them! I was terrified, but he said you’ll never be scared of anything else ever again! Steve really helped me, he is a masterclass. EastEnders is where I learnt my craft, how to conduct myself and be professional. “Although I do remember getting a telling off once. Susan Tully (Michelle Fowler) and Letitia Dean (Sharon Watts) were doing a scene where I had to come in at the end with just one line. The girls were particularly giggly that day, and it took about six or seven takes. They finally did it and kept a straight face. I opened the door for my line and started laughing, ruining the take where they’d got it right! Since then, I’ve never corpsed!” Bissix was surrounded by legendary pros, and namechecks one particular Walford icon for encouraging her. “Barbara Windsor was such a champion of mine and gave me so much confidence as a child. She was quite hot on people knowing their lines and was very strict, but my father was quite strict growing up, so I responded well to that kind of discipline. I wanted to impress her, and whenever you did something right or showed effort, she really complimented you. “She helped me get an agent after leaving the child acting agency. I’m still with the same agent today. After she passed, her husband Scott said Barbara always spoke so highly of me – that’s still bewildering and amazing to me. I’ve kept good luck cards from Barbara and Martine McCutcheon, from when I left in 1998.” Clare was written out when Bradley quit, with Nigel getting a happy ending, or so we thought, which saw him move to Scotland with his new love, Julie Haye. “Part of me was quite happy to leave,” reflects Bissix. “I’d lived EastEnders from the age of nine, by then I was nearly 16 and felt I’d missed out on growing up a bit. It’s like when you have a hobby and it's everything gets taken up with it. I was happy to go back to being normal.” After trying her hand at everything from qualifying as an electrician to training as a bra fitter for Marks and Spencer, Bissix made a spectacular return to soap in 2006 as Hollyoaks’ super villain Clare Devine, as wildly different a character from her EastEnders’ namesake as you can get. “I’m a happy-go-lucky, friendly person, so it was nice to play someone so steely who murders people for fun. It’s obviously very far-removed from me! Clare is like the alter ego you wish you could’ve channelled if anyone was mean to you at school.” Cruel Clare became one of Hollyoaks’ biggest characters, whose popularity means she’s cheated death on several occasions to ensure semi-regular comebacks. In 2025, she was resurrected, 12 years after being zipped up in a body bag. Clare is in prison for killing her sister, but Bissix reveals the character has unfinished business… “I’ve been back at Hollyoaks doing some filming, but I can’t tell you anything else! It’s not a long stint, but Clare is the kind of character who dips in and out. She could never live in the village as she’s done too many bad things. But whenever Hollyoaks needs a bit of drama, you can rely on Clare to bring it!” In stark contrast to the heightened space of Hollyoaks, Bissix admits she’s enjoying the more grounded material provided by EastEnders. “I’ve really enjoyed that natural acting style and raw emotion. When Clare Devine cries, you never know if it's fake tears! EastEnders feels more real. Clare Bates is the character that’s closest to who I am.” Bissix is brimming with enthusiasm at being back in her professional childhood home. As Nigel settles into full-time care, there’s a sense he may not have long left, meaning there is scope for Clare to make more visits. “It’s inevitable Nigel won’t last forever," notes Bissix. "When he passes it will be so sad. Clare leaves, having built some bridges, especially with Julie. "It would be nice to explore their stepmother/daughter relationship and for them to call on each other. I would hope Clare would return for a funeral as and when it happens, but nothing is set in stone yet." She added, "Clare is now married and has a child. I’d like to see them one day. Maybe my daughter, who’s 10 now, could come in and play Clare’s little girl – how good would that be?" Read more: 5 EastEnders spoilers this week: Clare Bates's emotional return and Max Branning seeks revenge EastEnders finally confirms emotional return after 18 years for Nigel’s dementia storyline EastEnders' Callum Highway fears for his future after incriminating Ben Mitchell scam in BBC iPlayer release Visit our dedicated EastEnders page for all the latest news, interviews and spoilers. Add EastEnders to your watchlist on the Radio Times: What to Watch app – download now for daily TV recommendations, features and more. Check out more of our Soaps coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more TV recommendations and reviews, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
EastEnders' Jake Wood on flash-forward secrets and why Max has his eye on Jasmine
The actor talks exclusively to Johnathon Hughes about his 20 years in Walford.
New Year’s resolutions are always made with the best intentions, but as the months roll by they can be hard to maintain – just ask Max Branning. EastEnders’ tormented lothario vowed to atone for his sins in 2026 and be a better dad, but a flash-forward to January 1st 2027 showed the character embroiled in all manner of chaos. Exactly how Max gets himself into these mysterious multiple scrapes will be explained as we get closer to New Year’s Day. It’s not just fans entering into a year-long guessing game, actor Jake Wood is just as in the dark as to what’s to come for his chaotic character. “There are so many questions and directions they can take it in, it’s almost open-ended,” begins the star, speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com. “I was surprised when I read the script for the flash-forward and found out what Max was up to – did he really plan to murder someone or has he been framed? Is he the father of that woman’s baby? Who is he marrying? We just don’t know. Max is one of those characters who is almost capable of anything.” The soap has explored similar territory before with ‘The Six’ murder mystery pegged on a single scene set 10 months ahead, but this much-hyped gaze into the crystal ball is the first time EastEnders has devoted an entire episode to a flash-forward, and gone as far into the future. It’s an audacious concept with many logistical challenges, not least of which is the actors having no context as to their motivation, but Wood praises the ambition of the team pulling together to make it work. “Everyone has to be connected and on the same page. Although actors are feeling their way through because we don’t have the specifics, each department has enough information that allows us to tell the story in this way. It’s an incredible thing to be part of.” One of the main talking points was the identity of Max’s anonymous bride. Several potential Mrs Brannings were posited, some of whom Max has romantic history with – Linda Carter and Cindy Beale – and others he’s barely spoken to before now, including his sister-in-law, Denise Fox. “Max might’ve been on a date with Denise years ago, I can’t remember – he’s dated most of the women on the Square,” grins Wood. “They throw themselves at him! He just has that effect… Denise is an interesting possibility as a potential bride. At Christmas, Max found out Jack had slept with Stacey, one of the biggest loves of Max’s life. There could be a revenge motivation for Max if he’s with Denise.” What about Dee’s daughter Chelsea also being in the mix? “There’s definitely a spark between her and Max since he returned, although they don’t know each other very well. It depends how their paths cross over the next year.” The 2027 wedding looked fraught with drama, perhaps that’s a sign from the universe for Max to give up on the idea of marriage, having spectacularly failed at it four times already? “Even though this would be wedding number five, Max needs to be with someone to feel grounded,” observes Wood. “He’s not good on his own. He is an eternal optimist and can be a loving, attentive partner when he wants to be. He’s an eternal optimist!” Every move Max makes is being analysed for potential clues to explain the flash-forward. His feud with son Oscar Branning’s girlfriend, the enigmatic Jasmine Fisher, is ramping up, setting Max on a dangerous path as he tries to protect his boy. “Jasmine is quite conniving when she wants to be. She plans to take Oscar away from Walford, Max wants to rekindle the relationship with his son and doesn’t want him to leave. Jasmine accuses Max of doing something he is actually innocent of, he has his work cut out to persuade Oscar it wasn’t what happened. “Max is determined to repair things with his children. He can be ruthless and single-minded, and there are other people who want to take Jasmine on, so she better watch out!” Add Radio Times as a Preferred Source on Google Keep up to date on what’s worth watching with your favourite entertainment news from Radio Times – see more of our exclusive news and interviews featured prominently in Top Stories when using Google. Max’s many flaws have made him one of the EastEnders’ most enduringly fascinating and multi-layered characters. Despite his womanising, lying, and all-round bad behaviour, you can’t help but feel sorry for him. “Max is a troubled guy and always connected to his origin story,” says Wood, who began playing the role 20 years ago. “He is still deeply scarred by what happened to him as a child. Max had a difficult relationship with his dad Jim, and is motivated to be a better father to his kids than his own dad was to him. “He’s very self-aware and doesn’t shy away from knowing what his problems are, but genuinely feels bad when he messes up. In his mind there is always a chance to turn things around but he’s also very easily distracted, which is part of the tragedy of the character.” Wood’s instinctive and authentic performance imbues Max with sympathy he often doesn’t deserve. His magnetic screen presence has helped create some of the soap’s most unforgettable moments, notably the reveal of Max’s scandalous affair with daughter-in-law Stacey Slater on Christmas Day 2007, and Stacey’s murder confession to Max in EastEnders’ first ever live episode in 2010. Like many Walford alumni, Wood developed the acting bug at Anna Scher’s famous children’s drama club in Islington, north London, where he grew up. Gillian Taylforth, Patsy Palmer and Natalie Cassidy, among others, were also inspired by the legendary tutor at a young age. “I’d done plays in primary school, I remember being in Peter Rabbit and Bugsy Malone, and got into Anna Scher’s when I was 10 years old. It was life-changing. Kathy Burke talks about her experience in her autobiography and how she describes it is almost identical for me and thousands of kids who went through those doors. To have someone who made you feel valued and celebrated for who you were, and allowing the freedom to express yourself at that age was revelatory. “Anna set it up in the late 1960s primarily to get kids off the streets. It gave young people like me, who grew up in a council flat in Islington, opportunities they might not have had otherwise. “Casting directors would come looking for child actors and I got my first TV job within a few months. I did an episode of The Gentle Touch in 1984, a big police drama at the time, and I loved it. Everyone was aware it was my first job and I felt I was being welcomed into the industry.” View oEmbed on the source website Consistent work followed and over the next 20 years, Wood appeared in everything from Only Fools and Horses to Red Dwarf, and even had a brief stint as a stand-up comedian (“One of the toughest jobs in showbiz,” he reflects). After a small role in EastEnders as a homeless teenager in 1990, his professional path eventually led back to Walford for his most high-profile part. “I enjoyed doing different things and playing different characters, but what changed things for me was having a family. “When I got offered Max my daughter was one year old [Wood has two children, Amber and Buster, with wife Alison], I’d been working away a lot and the timing was right to do something with more stability. The Branning family originally came in on a three-year contract, which is unusual to be signed for that long.” Having returned last autumn after five years away, it already feels like Max never left the Square. Wood admits he likes to be busy and in the thick of things when he’s there, which he certainly will be for the next year at least. Alongside his EastEnders commitments, he also spins other creative plates as sidelines – he recently took part in The Celebrity Apprentice for Children in Need (above), he and comedian friend Henning Wehn, the self-styled ‘German Comedy Ambassador’, recently started a weekly podcast called Wood Wehn in the Membrane (“We make each other laugh, it’s basically two mates talking a load of rubbish!”), and Wood is also a successful artist: one of his portraits of inspirational figures was recently sold to Vinny Jones. But being Max Branning remains his top priority for now, and keeps the actor on his toes. “He still fascinates me, I’ve never been bored by playing this well-drawn character. Max has always felt very real to me. Even after 20 years in the job he has never failed to hold my attention, I hope that’s the same for the audience. “I’m honoured and humbled to have had such amazing storylines, right up to the flash-forward. To be at the centre of a huge story in EastEnders is one of the best jobs on TV, I never take it for granted.” Read more: 5 EastEnders spoilers next week: Mark Fowler Jr returns as Joel Marshall trial twist rocks Vicki EastEnders airs dark Ravi Gulati scenes amid revenge story in early BBC iPlayer release EastEnders airs dilemma for Priya Nandra-Hart following Nugget Gulati's assault in BBC iPlayer release EastEnders 2026 preview: 10 spoilers for the year ahead from Max Branning twists to Sukeve adoption 10 EastEnders characters who need to have a huge 2026 – from Chelsea Fox to Oscar Branning Visit our dedicated EastEnders page for all the latest news, interviews and spoilers. Add EastEnders to your watchlist on the Radio Times: What to Watch app – download now for daily TV recommendations, features and more. Check out more of our Soaps coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more TV recommendations and reviews, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Louis Emerick on his Hollyoaks future after Brookside crossover twist
The actor talks to exclusively to Johnathon Hughes about Mick, Donny and going back to the Close.
There was more to the much-hyped return to Brookside Close than pure nostalgia, as the special crossover with Hollyoaks for its 30th anniversary revealed an almighty twist that uncovered an epic plot with decades of dramatic backstory. Detective Donny Clark, who arrived in Hollyoaks village 18 months ago to reconnect with long-lost daughter Vicky Grant, has actually been Mick Johnson from Brookside all along. If this audacious development has shocked the audience, imagine how Louis Emerick felt when he was told he’d been playing his most famous role in plain sight, and didn’t have a clue? “I was summoned by our executive producer Hannah Cheers for a meeting, but she wanted to walk and talk in the park, not in her office,” recalls Emerick, speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com about the day he was let in on one of the biggest soap secrets of the year. “It was all quite covert, like a spy film. She pitched the whole thing: the Brookie crossover, the storyline that connected it, and Donny turning out to be Mick. I was waiting for her to say it was an April fool, only this was July! “Before she actually told me, Hannah was going round the houses trying to explain it and seemed to be soft soaping me, to prepare me for what she was about to say. I wondered whether Donny was going to turn gay in his middle age or something unexpected – I was ready for anything! The whole idea was so far out of left field, but I was really excited.” Explanatory dialogue tells us that 20 years ago, in the shared Brookie-Oaks universe, Mick Johnson had an ill-advised affair with gangster Froggy Black’s wife. Vengeful Froggy planned to have Mick murdered, so to protect his family, Mr Johnson faked his death and made a fresh start under the new identity Donny Clark. With Froggy now living in the same village as ‘Donny’ – what are the chances? – the detective’s past has come back to haunt him and his identity has been compromised. This forced a return to Brookside Close to warn daughter Gemma, along with assorted old pals including Sheila Grant and Billy Corkhill, who took in orphaned Gemma, that they could be in danger from Froggy’s criminal empire. The story continues in a hard-hitting edition of Hollyoaks Later, but where does this leave Donny/Mick in the main show? And what should we call him now? “Initially they wanted the character to be known as ‘Mick’ from this point, but I thought that was a step too far and went against it,” explains Emerick. “Hannah went with it too. There’s more drama in as few people as possible knowing the truth. “So Mick is gone and he’s still Donny, but trying to keep his past a secret. Donny has been a police officer for years, how will he explain he used to be someone else? And will those who know use it to their advantage? There are threats against him and his loved ones. And you’ve got to ask yourself, Donny’s kept all this hidden for 20 years – what else is he hiding?” Emerick confirms Mick’s grown-up daughter Gemma, played by ex-Coronation Street star Tisha Merry, will be sticking around in Hollyoaks wanting answers from the father she grieved for. Brookside viewers, and Emerick, remember Gemma as a sweet little kid – to say she’s changed is an understatement… “I think my Gemma has been substituted by an alien! The sweet girl Mick left is like the lead character in The Devil Wears Prada times 10! Gemma is a scheming baddie and the brains behind some terrible things that happened in the Later episode. And she’s dating Warren Fox! “Gemma wants to punish her dad. Tisha and I have spoken about this and I think it’s a bit harsh. Her dad went out of her life for 20 years but for the right reasons – Gemma’s life was in danger. We’ll see Gemma trying to get at Donny’s fiancée Misbah, and even have a go at Mercedes McQueen! Vicky likes the idea of having a big sister, and her and Gemma seem to have a good relationship. But Gemma’s not to be trusted so I’m sure somewhere down the line that’s all going to change…” Hollyoaks was conceived in 1995 as a younger-skewed spin-off from Brookside, and there were occasional crossovers and Easter eggs in the early days that acknowledged it occupied the same fictional world. Over time, and once Brookside was axed in 2003, that aspect was discarded – until now. Respectfully paying tribute to its parent show is a master stroke on Hollyoaks’ part, and has seen a wave of nostalgic appreciation for the groundbreaking Brookie, which changed the face of television drama when it was launched back in 1982. It’s also got Johnson recalling his journey to the show, and how he has an old neighbour to thank for helping him on his way. “It was 1989, I was a jobbing actor but was out of work at that time. An old lady who lived opposite called Rita knocked on my door one day, because she knew everyone else was out at work, saying she had a leak in her house and water was coming through the ceiling. I’m to DIY what an elephant is to hang gliding so I didn’t have a clue, but I knew to turn the stopcock off! So the water stopped and she got a plumber. “Rita was so grateful. My phone had been cut off, because I couldn’t pay the bill, so she offered to pay it as a thank you. I said there was no need, but asked if I could give her phone number to my agent – this was before mobile phones – so they could get hold of me. Two weeks later I got the Brookside audition, and Rita’s coming back and forth with my schedule and call time written on a sheet of A4. She was the go-between with my agent! It was a domino effect from there, one ep of Brookie led to a BBC film with Miranda Richardson and Zoë Wanamaker, then I went back into Brookside and the rest is history.” Emerick’s blend of roguish charm and air of authority has seen him work constantly since he quit Brookside in 2001, with recurring roles in Coronation Street, Casualty and Last of the Summer Wine, along with numerous guest appearances in everything from New Tricks to Vera and on stage. The charismatic actor is full of stories from his early days on Brookie, where he got his big break alongside seasoned performers who were experiencing soap fame in their later years. “Bill Dean, who played Harry Cross, was in Scum which was a huge, groundbreaking film in the 70s, and also in Dennis Potter’s TV drama Pennies from Heaven. I was already starstruck, and being a Brookside fan before I was in it, I couldn’t believe I was working with Harry Cross! I used to go down the corner shop near the Close to get Bill’s ciggies. “Another one I remember was Gladys Ambrose, who was Billy Corkhill’s mother-in-law, Julia Brogan. She and her husband were in the circus back in the day as a comedy acrobatic act, then she went on the variety circuit. She was wonderful and so glamorous, always in ridiculously high heels. When they made her a regular after years of guest stints she burst into the green room saying: ‘I’ve waited 45 years to become an overnight success!’ Hollyoaks inherited Brookside’s mantle of tackling taboo topics no other television show will touch, highlighting incel culture two years before Adolescence, and recently exploring sibling sexual abuse with unflinching commitment. As a final reflection on the impact of Sir Phil Redmond’s creations, Emerick says he is proud to have been a part of both shows that have broken so many boundaries, and praises the genre’s ongoing efforts to shine a light on uncomfortable issues. “For the audience, seeing characters on a soap go through what they’re going through in real life enables them to reach out and get help. They can relate to it. Soaps are very much still a vital part of our lives, and will continue to be for some time.” Read more: Yasmin Davies cast as legacy character Esme for Hollyoaks Later spin-off and Brookside crossover Beloved Channel 4 soap Brookside to return for major crossover with another major soap 4 things we need to see in Brookside's big Hollyoaks crossover Emmerdale icon joins Hollyoaks as "notorious" villain - 8 years after last beloved soap character died Brookside icon Anna Friel delivers verdict on revival - and whether she would return Coronation Street star Claire Sweeney reveals verdict on Brookside revival and whether she will return Episodes of Brookside are available to watch on STV player. Hollyoaks is available to watch on catch-up on Channel 4. Visit our dedicated Soaps page for all the latest news, interviews and spoilers. Check out more of our Soaps coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. 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Jodie Whittaker on forgiving Suranne Jones, keeping Doctor Who secrets and the role she would have loved to play
Three years on from Doctor Who, Jodie Whittaker swaps the TARDIS for Tenerife in ITV’s darkly comic heist drama Frauds, a tale of friendship, betrayal – and a few bruising fight scenes.
In the three years since she retired her sonic screwdriver in Doctor Who, Jodie Whittaker has tackled serious roles in gritty Australian drama One Night, Jimmy McGovern’s acclaimed prison series Time and the fact-based miniseries Toxic Town. Jodie’s latest role, however, gives her the chance to mix the dark scenes she often plays with funnier ones as she teams up with Suranne Jones to play Sam and Bert, two old friends and former partners in crime who embark on one last money-making heist together in ITV’s Frauds. Co-created by Jones (who plays Bert) and writer Anne-Marie O’Connor, the project appealed to Jodie, 43, because it was so different from anything she had done before. “I think what is amazing about Frauds is having Suranne as one of the creators and she’s telling stories that she doesn’t feel that she’s been a part of before,” Jodie says, speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com. Filmed in Tenerife (doubling for mainland Spain), the series begins with the pair reconnecting when Bert is released from prison after serving time for a crime they were both involved in. While Sam is pleased to see her friend, she is also wary of their relationship (which Jodie describes as “toxic”), especially when Bert uses devious means to convince her to commit a dangerous robbery. “Sam is such a different kind of role for me to play within this dynamic,” Jodie explains. “It was a wonderful challenge to have that kind of repressed rage that she has, and also there’s such a complicated back story between them, and having the moments where it flashes. It’s like someone trying to contain this, and contain Bert, but also themselves. "I’m used to playing a lot of different types of roles, but I would say that a lot of the time I play people where their emotions are quite quick to the surface, and Sam is the opposite of that.” The role of Sam is also quite physical, with Jodie and Suranne’s characters having a play fight in a bull ring in the first episode that involved Suranne wielding a shirt like a bullfighter’s cape close to her co-star’s face. “I think there was many a time we were kicking or accidentally bashing into each other, and there were definitely some close calls, but it’s all fine and I can forgive her instantly,” Jodie laughs. Read more: Jodie Whittaker and Suranne Jones on what makes Frauds "fresh" – and the impact they hope it has Jodie Whittaker on showing a 'different side' in Frauds – and why she hasn't worked with Suranne Jones before Another action scene involved the pair fighting in a swimming pool after Sam discovers that Bert has betrayed her. “That was the scene that made me want to take the job, in a way, because you don’t usually see that. You don’t see women of that age having that kind of response to each other, but that response is as normal as crying and cuddling each other, but we only normally see the crying and cuddling,” she says. “What I loved about Frauds is it explores fear, the relationship between these two women, and it shows the versions that are within all of us but aren’t necessarily shown on television.” “So when we got to film that, I was really super excited. Obviously, once you are four hours in, you’re a bit like, ‘oh, god!’ but they are really fun to do. I love the fact that within a stunt scene there’s always a massive amount of choreography so it feels really satisfying, because it becomes this rhythmical dance between you. And once you’ve got that down, then you can add all the elements, the dramatisation, the tension and the humour. That’s one thing I love about every scene in this. There was always something in it that kind of had that tone, where you sit in what you think it is, and then the tone slightly shifts, and it’s something completely different.” During the making of Frauds, Jodie had to pull off her own secret operation – a quick return to Cardiff to film scenes for the surprise return of her Thirteenth Doctor in the series 15 finale of Doctor Who that was broadcast in May this year and marked Ncuti Gatwa’s final regular appearance as the Fifteenth Doctor. “Suranne and the production team on Frauds didn’t know I was going to shoot it as it was under a complete pseudonym,” she explains. “They knew it was a pick up [the filming of extra footage after a main production has wrapped] on something. Of course, it wasn’t a pick up, it was a brand new day. "It had a whole level of secrecy, because Doctor Who has to have its pool so tight. Wonderfully for me, Frauds released me to film it, I got to get there and no one leaked it.” Jodie admits that her time on Doctor Who has meant she is “brilliant at keeping secrets”. “I think I loved how secretive it was, because I understood the sadness when you’ve spent six to 10 months working on something, and for someone to not even casually, to intentionally leak a spoiler, and you’ve worked so hard on it.” “I’m the least affected, it’s the art department, it’s the writers, it’s all the creatives and also the real fans and the Whovians, the most loyal and wonderful group of fans you could ever encounter. They love Doctor Who because it can go in any direction and be a surprise, so to have the spoilers is just frustrating. So I understood the level of secrecy, and I love a rule! If you say, ‘don’t tell me, don’t tell anyone,’ I won’t tell anyone. I am a vault. I was a good Doctor because I never leaked anything.” Jodie inhabited the role of the Thirteenth Doctor from 2017 until 2022, and it’s clear that playing the Time Lord holds a special place in her heart. “I love Doctor Who more than I can ever describe,” she says. “Our seasons were longer than any other job I’ve ever done and I moved to Wales to film it, so it wasn’t just the job, it was the people, it was the life.” There are other past roles she is particularly fond of, especially trainee nurse Samantha in writer/director Joe Cornish’s cult sci-fi comedy horror movie Attack The Block, where she starred alongside John Boyega, battling aliens invading a south London council estate. “Attack The Block was one of my happiest times,” she remembers. “As a kid, I was hugely influenced by all the 80s creature features, and the 90s adventure films. I was in our version of that, and I adored it.” Fans have been calling for a sequel since the film was released in 2011, and Jodie admits she is one of them. “There’s been talk of a sequel for years and I know no more than last time [it was rumoured]. I would absolutely do it. There’s probably no job I wouldn’t go back to. If someone said ‘do you want to do Black Mirror again?’ I’d say yes. I don’t think I have had an experience I wouldn’t revisit and I think with Attack The Block there is always that chat. So hopefully that continues. Maybe I should be sending a self-tape to Joe Cornish as I could definitely pop up again. I could send him an aggressive email!” West Yorkshire-born Jodie was 29 when she was cast in Attack The Block, and just 23 when she made her big screen debut in the movie Venus, for which her co-star Peter O’Toole was nominated for his eighth Oscar at the age of 74. Looking back, it’s a role she describes as “such a gift” that has shaped her view on acting in the years since. “It was one of the last roles he played in his life and he was at the end of what can only be described as a phenomenal, inspiring career,” she says. “He’s one of the great British or Irish acting legends, and he was a wonderful human who was such a joy to be around. I was fresh out of drama school and it was a master class with people like Vanessa Redgrave, Peter O’Toole, Richard Griffiths, Leslie Phillips and director Roger Michell. "And it goes to show that you can still be doing phenomenal parts in your seventies, and I think what an exciting thing that is.” With a career that has included the aforementioned Black Mirror (the 2011 episode The Entire History of You), acclaimed drama Broadchurch, medical series Trust Me and the upcoming Dear England, as well as stage performances in Antigone and The Duchess, Jodie Whittaker has already played a rich variety of roles, but admits there is one part that she would have loved to have taken on… though sadly she wasn’t quite the right age for it. “I would have loved to have been Eleven in Stranger Things,” she reveals. “I would have loved to have been a kid with a shaved head!” “When I saw the first series I thought, ‘Oh my God, to be Millie Bobby Brown right now, what a part. The first season of that show was incredible. It homages everything I adore, and that part is incredible. If I could have been a child with a skinhead, that would be the role for me, but I don’t think I was in the running. So, no animosity to Millie Bobby Brown,” she laughs. “Maybe if I had tried a little bit of sellotape to make me look a bit younger?” Frauds premieres on ITV1 and ITVX at 9pm on Sunday 5th October. Add Frauds to your watchlist on the <a id="OWA8b702c45-bee9-94e4-f018-57518e78041b" title="https://www.radiotimes.com/download-the-app/?af_xp=custom&pid=website&c=editorial_content&is_retargeting=true&af_reengagement_window=30d" href="https://www.radiotimes.com/download-the-app/?af_xp=custom&pid=website&c=editorial_content&is_retargeting=true&af_reengagement_window=30d" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-outlook-id="449c28d9-909e-4aab-b6b8-153454f55d5e" data-auth="NotApplicable" data-linkindex="0">Radio Times: What to Watch app – download now for daily TV recommendations, features and more. 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From Emmerdale vicar to Hollyoaks villain – John Middleton on his surprising soap return
The actor talks exclusively to Johnathon Hughes about his villainous new role.
For 21 years, he was affable Ashley Thomas, Emmerdale’s resident vicar who provided guidance and support to his parishioners and was a stable stalwart of the close-knit community. Now, actor John Middleton has swapped the dog collar for a prison tabard to make a surprising return to the world of soap, as Hollyoaks’ newest villain, Fraser 'Froggy' Black. The granddad of devilish Clare Devine, glamorous gangster Grace Black and roguish Rex Gallagher, as well as being the father of feared Fraser Black Junior (RIP), Froggy joins one of Hollyoaks’ most notorious clans and might just be the nastiest of the lot – you couldn’t get any further away from Reverend Thomas if you tried. “It was a great attraction that Froggy is a total contrast to Ashley,” begins Middleton, speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com as his first Hollyoaks scenes air. “People have said it would be good to see me in a different light after playing the same role for 21 years, when this opportunity came along my agent and myself were very keen. It’s totally different to anything I’ve done before. “Ashley was the pillar of the community, an upright person, and before him I’d played numerous clerical, medical and professional types. Now I’m a moral degenerate descending on Hollyoaks!” We first meet Froggy in prison, fittingly, where he rules the roost on the same wing where Tom Cunningham is doing time. Froggy is a career criminal who has been inside for decades, and as a visit from estranged granddaughter Clare teases, his relationship with the family is somewhat fractured. “Froggy is top dog, people live in fear of him. At the same time, he is also quite well read and bookish, and runs the prison library! He’s been locked up for 21 years, one imagines he’s done something heinous. “He’s a seriously bad character, but there is a something in his family’s past he feels guilty about – he should’ve intervened but he didn’t. Froggy feels terribly vindictive towards Clare, as it emerges she and her father, Froggy’s son Fraser, conspired together to get Froggy out of the picture many years ago.” His arrival comes at a point where Hollyoaks is delving even further into the brilliantly bonkers backstory of the Blacks – only recently did we learn Grace had a baby as a teenager who she believed had died, but as it transpires is actually still alive. Conniving Clare appears to know more than she’s letting on, but does she genuinely want to help her sister reunite with her long-lost child or is there an ulterior motive? “Froggy is much closer to Grace and wants to reconnect with her, which is connected to the guilt he feels about a situation that has taken place,” explains Middleton, who confesses he’s still getting to grips with the complex story so far of his on-screen brood. “All will be revealed soon! He meets Rex in prison and tells him he’s his grandfather. Going forward, Froggy’s driving wish is to get his family back together. Once they’re all reunited, who knows what sort of power they would all wield?” Eight years on from his lengthy Emmerdale tenure, Middleton is delighted to be back in the world of continuing drama. He’s already familiar with the fast pace, the hectic schedule, and some of the cast. “James Sutton (who plays John Paul McQueen) was in Emmerdale for years (as Ryan Lamb), it’s great to see him again. I met Louis Emerick (Donny Clark) years ago when we did a celebrity edition of Stars in Their Eyes. I think he was Lionel Richie, Charlotte Bellamy (who played Ashley’s wife Laurel in Emmerdale) and I were Bing Crosby and Grace Kelly performing True Love. I hesitate to mention it because Charlotte and I were both traumatised and barely talk about it. Never mind nerves – that was naked fear! “Everybody has been very welcoming at Hollyoaks, I’ve been bowled over. Gemma Bissix and Tamara Wall, who play my granddaughters Clare and Grace, are wonderful to work with and have been so generous. They’re used to playing characters who are threatening and intimidating, now they’re intimidated by me, which gives me the space to establish Froggy. He really shakes up the Blacks’ dynamics, he knows things about their past they’d rather he didn’t.” Middleton has been acting for over 35 years, and even before finding fame in Emmerdale had notched up guest roles across the soaps. The genre is practically in his blood. “I did lots of what I used to call ‘smash-and-grabs’; you go in, do the job and come away. During the body under the patio trial in Brookside, I was on the jury; the Daily Mail described me as ‘the yuppy from hell’ because I wanted to send the Jordaches down! In Coronation Street, I was the motorist who knocked over and killed Lisa Duckworth, and I was a siege negotiator in Emmerdale – 18 months later I came back as Ashley! “I have a lot of time for soaps. I believe in popular drama, not elitist drama. They bring incredibly important issues to the fore so people can talk about them – obviously I had the dementia story with Ashley, which still stays with me.” Ashley’s diagnosis of vascular dementia and tragic deterioration over two years won praise from fans, critics and a slew of awards for Middleton and Bellamy’s emotive performances. It’s one of the most impactful soap storylines of recent years, and despite it leading to Middleton being written out in 2017 as Ashley succumbed to the disease, he remains proud of what it achieved. “We did a lot of research and had to get it right; if we cheapened the story in any way it would’ve infuriated those living with the condition and their families. It had to be as realistic as possible. “The Alzheimer’s Society gave lots of advice and approved scripts, and would occasionally have an adviser on set. I still work with them, and another charity called Dementia Forward, based in North Yorkshire, where I live. Once you walk into that issue you can’t walk away. It’s an awfully sad, cruel disease. “We did a special episode entirely from Ashley’s point of view, so the audience could experience how the symptoms affected the way he experienced the world. Small details like the circles in Ashley’s wallpaper becoming eyes, or the back of a chair having these hideous monster faces made you realise how disturbing that sense of paranoia was for the character. It was very absorbing as an actor. Rather flatteringly, people still talk about the episode nearly 10 years later.” Middleton is full of fondness as he reflects on Emmerdale, and cites having the late, great Freddie Jones play his on-screen father Sandy as a career highlight. Seeing Jones in a production of Play Strindberg when Middleton was dabbling in youth theatre inspired him to pursue acting as a profession. For now, he’s immersing himself in the high-octane world of Hollyoaks, and teases big things to come not just for Froggy, but for the show in general as it hurtles towards its 30th anniversary celebrations in October. “Froggy knows a lot about a very big character outside of the Blacks, and it’s something they would rather not be revealed. There is also an extraordinarily exciting event coming up which I can’t tell you about, other than that it is jaw-dropping. It’s going to be major and you’ll be shocked!” Judging from what we already know about Froggy, we wouldn’t be surprised if he’s behind the upcoming carnage… Visit our dedicated Soaps page for all the latest news, interviews and spoilers. Check out more of our Soaps coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what else is on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Emmerdale's Joe Absolom teases bad boy Ray’s future and mystery link to the village
The actor talks exclusively to Johnathon Hughes about returning to soap 25 years after EastEnders.
The dangerous world of county lines drug dealing has infiltrated the sleepy village of Emmerdale, with newcomer Ray Walters grooming local teenagers into a life of crime. Menacing Ray has been lurking in the shadows for several weeks, but viewers are slowly learning the full extent of his illegal operation and just how nasty he can be. Forcing April Windsor into becoming a drugs mule as she celebrates turning 16 is a pretty clear indication of Ray’s ruthlessness, one of the many unredeeming features that attracted Joe Absolom to the role. “I really liked the concept of coming into the village as a bad guy,” reveals the actor, speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com. “He’s this Fagin-type presence, a lot of my scenes end with me peeling off wads of cash to various young actors, their eyes light up and I drive off in my sleek car. “It’s creepy. Ray’s business model is to find vulnerable teenagers who are impressed with cash and gifts and attention, all they have to do is take a rucksack somewhere and they’ll get 50 quid.” Ray was introduced as an old mate of Mackenzie Boyd, tapped up to sell Lewis Barton’s hefty consignment of medicinal marijuana. It later transpired one of Ray’s young foot soldiers was homeless teen Dylan Penders. When Dylan returned to the village to pursue his romance with April Windsor, who he met while she was living on the streets, Ray followed – and instantly spied an opportunity. “Ray sees Dylan and April share this romantic kiss in the rain. If he can get Dylan on board as part of his workforce he could get April too, then he can use and manipulate them both. “People like Ray in this county lines world trap kids into what they call ‘debt bondage’, buying them expensive trainers and making them take payment for delivering drugs, then telling them the amount they’ve collected isn’t enough so now they owe him – these vulnerable young people are working to pay off a supposed debt. It’s a very dark situation.” There’s more to Ray than meets the eye, and Absolom teases there are hidden elements to the character and a mysterious link to somebody else in the Dales. All will become clear in due course, but for now Ray is ramping up his manipulation of Emmerdale’s youth, pitting Absolom against one of soap’s most gifted young actors, Amelia Flanagan, who recently won Best Young Performer at the British Soap Awards. “I didn’t realise Amelia had been here nearly 12 years, and she’s only 17. You have to be on your game with her, if I leave a gap while I’m thinking about my next line, she’ll tell me what the line is! I can’t get away with anything. And Fred Kettle, who plays Dylan, is great too. I enjoy working with the young guys.” When Absolom was Flanagan’s age, he too was working on a soap, playing Matthew Rose in EastEnders, who first appeared in 1997: a vulnerable teenager intimidated by a grown-up gangster and forced into a hideous crime. Sound familiar? The part of Ray really is a full-circle moment. “I spent the best part of a year with Martin Kemp standing over me and manipulating my character,” recalls Absolom. “Now I’m the older statesman doing the same to these young kids! I saw Martin recently at the British Soap Awards, he said he’d been watching my stuff and reckons I’ve been stealing his moves.” Kemp memorably played sharp-suited bad boy Steve Owen, who murdered his ex-lover Saskia and forced mild-mannered Matthew into helping him bury the body, then tried to frame the teenager. The pair’s dynamic was electric, and Absolom reflects on how the storyline propelled him from jobbing child actor to soap opera sensation. “When I was very young my parents put me and my sister with an agent to make a bit of extra money. I did lots of adverts, then dramas like Silent Witness and Dangerfield. I really liked being on set and would watch how it all worked.” After a few years of intense rivalry with sinister Steve, culminating in a shocking act of revenge, Absolom decided to leave Albert Square in 2000, partly thanks to some advice from one of the country’s leading actors. “I met John Simm at a gig, he said you’ve done well at EastEnders but should think about moving on. So I blame him! I knew I couldn’t stay there forever, and had seen actors who had been on the show for a long time and loved it suddenly have their contracts end. It could be brutal. But I knew it would be difficult to sustain being a jobbing actor.” He needn’t have worried, as life after Walford saw Absolom work consistently in a slew of acclaimed dramas, and in 2004 he started playing a character that would bring him global recognition – likeable Al Large in ITV’s phenomenally successful Doc Martin, opposite Martin Clunes as the grumpy GP of a Cornish coastal town. Absolom was there from beginning to end, when the show bowed out with a Christmas special after 18 years in 2022, and the idyllic location inspired a permanent move to Cornwall, where he still lives with his wife and three children. “We still get Japanese tourists in Port Isaac, where we filmed, looking for the doctor’s house. My brother was on holiday in Croatia with his family, switched on the telly and Doc Martin was there with dubbed Croatian voices! It really has gone around the world, mainly I think because the scenery looked so good. Sometimes we’d do a take and they’d ask us not to start talking because a boat was about to enter the shot behind us. “It’s particularly huge in America where it’s shown on PBS, the public broadcaster. I went to Boston with Ian MacNeice, who played my character’s dad, Bert. He took a bum bag full of his own pictures which made me laugh, but we went to a bar and everybody was like: ‘Hey, it’s Bert!’ They all wanted a picture, we had a great night chatting with everyone about Doc Martin. “It was a bit under-appreciated by the industry here I felt – they were a bit snobby about it and saw it as a cosy, comfortable show where nothing much happens. People who make television don’t necessarily watch it. But it stands up, you can watch it with your kids and your grandkids and it’s very funny, Martin is a genuinely brilliant actor who created a great character.” Coming out of a long-running primetime hit, Absolom could presumably cherry pick what work he does. So what was the appeal of returning to the genre where he started, more than 25 years later? “As an actor you want to work. The idea of doing soap again where you get constant scripts for a few months really appealed to me.” Ray is definitely someone to keep an eye on, as his long-term story is only just beginning, with plenty of curveballs ahead. “We’re going to see all facets of Ray’s character as it goes on, and discover he’s actually a bit sad and lost. He is a different version of himself with different characters, controlling one minute, meek the next. The potential to go quite dark with this was an attractive proposition – I’d rather be a miserable baddie than a happy-go-lucky fella!” Read more: Emmerdale airs cunning cliffhanger for John Sugden over Robert secret in ITVX edition 5 Emmerdale spoilers next week: Robert Sugden and Aaron Dingle reconnect and Charity Dingle suffers a fall Emmerdale confirms last-minute scene following Lioness victory at UEFA Women's Euro 2025 Emmerdale airs menacing twist for Robert Sugden in ITVX edition Emmerdale draws unsuspecting villager into John Sugden plot in ITVX cliffhanger Emmerdale's Natalie J Robb reveals Moira's showdown with Joe Tate sparks Dingle feud Emmerdale star on newcomer Celia: "She's a force to be reckoned with" Emmerdale airs weeknights at 7:30pm on ITV1. Stream on ITVX. Check out more of our Soaps coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more TV recommendations and reviews, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Dexter's Michael C Hall on resurrecting TV's favourite serial killer
Hall chats exclusively about 20 years of playing Dexter Morgan, his career to date, and what to expect as the killer returns.
When it comes to serial killers, Michael C Hall’s Dexter Morgan has had more lives than a cat – and nearly 20 years since we were first introduced to the introspective murderer, he’s still going strong as he returns for Dexter: Resurrection. The slick drama, much like its main character, has had a resurgence in the face of certain death over the past five years. While the original series ending in 2013 was largely panned, 2021’s Dexter: New Blood was considered the finale the show deserved. So big was its success that prequel Dexter: Original Sin aired last year, and the main man himself has had new life breathed into him with Dexter: Resurrection… despite being shot in the chest. Speaking to RadioTimes.com, the irony is not lost on actor Michael C Hall, who laughs as he declares Dexter "a resilient fellow". When we speak, it’s early morning in Mexico City, shortly before the team launched Resurrection’s first trailer at fan event CCXP. Still not entirely awake (and who could blame him), Hall still has the disarming friendliness of his on-screen counterpart. It’s not lost on Hall that Dexter is a character that will be a pinnacle moment in his career. Having first caught public attention in HBO’s director drama Six Feet Under, which ran from 2001 to 2005, he made his debut as the blood spatter analyst and serial killer a year later, in October 2006, this time leading the team rather than being part of the ensemble. Since then, he’s captivated audiences thanks to Dexter’s self-aware inner monologue, told through voice-over as he navigated his own murderous moral code – only killing those that truly deserve to die, and have evaded traditional routes of justice. The series ran for eight seasons. "It would have blown my mind to think that we would do eight seasons," Hall admits. "Let alone return after however many years it was and do another season, let alone be doing it again." Read more: Dexter boss admits sequel Resurrection isn't "necessary" but says it's "welcome" Dexter's Michael C Hall on how character surviving gunshot "became increasingly compelling" So, was he in two minds about bringing the character back yet again? Yes and no, with Hall saying that once the idea to revive Dexter after the events of New Blood was proposed, it became "increasingly compelling" and hard to ignore. "It's been the through line as far as my acting career goes for some time," he adds. "Whether I had returned or not, I think Dexter would remain in the first sentence of anything anybody wrote, if they were to write about what I've done as an actor, and that wouldn't change whether or not we did more. "The idea of him surviving that gunshot and being given some sort of new lease became increasingly compelling once that conversation started and I just surrendered." Hall tells us that Dexter’s resilient nature is one of the main reasons he is lured back into playing the character time and again, and by this point it’s intertwined with his career forever – in some ways, like his own version of Dexter’s Dark Passenger, which drives the character to kill even as he fights against it. "He's remarkably capable and also remarkably limited at the same time, and I enjoy playing someone for whom those things coexist," Hall says. "It's also a sort of family of collaborators that has developed and solidified over the years, and I really enjoy working and collaborating with those people. So that's a part of it, too. You know, it's nice to keep that family together and alive." It’s not just the creative team that keeps the legacy of Dexter alive and well. After all, a TV show with such longevity would not exist without the fans, who have become attached to Dexter and his twisted, often hypocritical, form of justice. The serial killer killer has become not just an iconic character, but a full franchise – with Resurrection following the launch prequel series Original Sin in 2024, plus mini-series New Blood in 2021. "I think there's something about the character and the fascination with him that abides and people continue to lean forward and relish the chance to see him," Hall explains, adding the events of New Blood have a major effect on Dexter’s behaviour as he moves forward, and bring into context feelings not processed from the original series run. "Finding his way through new environments, new relationships… He obviously went into some sort of exile before we rejoined him in Iron Lake, in New Blood, and went through some sort of gauntlet over the course of that season that ended with his, seemingly, being taken out by his son. "I think what ultimately happened, given where we are now, is that it allowed him to do away with something that he'd probably been carrying like a bag of shadows since halfway through the first series proper." Specifically, it was the Trinity Killer arc during Dexter’s fourth season. The murderer, played by John Lithgow, finally met the end of Dexter’s scalpel – but left a parting gift, with Dexter returning home to find his son, Harrison, crying in a pool of blood and wife Rita dead in the bathtub: Trinity’s final victim. The arc has such an effect that Lithgow is set to reprise his role, albeit spiritually, in scenes during Dexter: Resurrection – forming Dexter’s mindset going forward. Hall says: "I think he was traumatised by being, to some degree, bested by Trinity coming home and discovering that his wife had been killed. You know, after killing Trinity with some degree of reverence, to realise that he'd been double-crossed sent him reeling. He was shattered by it. I think only now is he coming out of it and able to put it behind him. "He doesn't forget anything, any of these things, but he's maybe not carrying them with him in the same way, and maybe it was only getting to that threshold where he invited his son to take him out in hindsight, maybe he appreciates his son for having done in a preoccupation that had shackled him for some time. "He obviously still has a life that's, in its way, pretty complicated, but I don't think he's dwelling in the same way on the past." Dexter’s precarious balance between right and wrong is dictated by 'The Code' given to him by his late adoptive father, Harry, and has continued to be a through line throughout any iteration of the franchise. But after so many years in his shoes, has Hall taken away any lessons from playing the killer-with-a-conscience? Hall says yes – though notes it may also be down to age and the gift of hindsight. "I've probably moved toward a place that's less relativistic than it might have been way back when," he explains. "That might just have to do with growing older, but spending time considering and playing a character who has a pretty significant list of givens that he honours, and at this point has plenty of experience with how things can go wrong if you deny those guide posts, it probably encourages me to consider and cultivate my relationship to my own list of givens – that thankfully don't centre around my undeniable need to kill people." So, what does he hope viewers take away from Dexter: Resurrection that they may not have done in the previous series? "Gosh, I don't know," he says. "I think, well, maybe a sense that growth cannot always be about moving forward, but can be about moving back and revisiting something that once was with the sense of personal wisdom that you didn't have before. "I feel like maybe that's what Dexter is up to, and that taking responsibility for your mistakes, or your past, or the things that torment you isn't necessarily about putting yourself through hell, but putting those things down. I think maybe Dexter has finally come to a place where he's able to do that. "I don't know if there's a shortcut to that, I think you have to go through whatever experiences lead you to that being the only choice you can make or the only thing to do." Dexter: Resurrection is now showing on Paramount+ – get a seven day free Paramount+ trial at Amazon Prime Video. Add Dexter: Resurrection to your watchlist on the Radio Times: What to Watch app – download now for daily TV recommendations, features and more. Check out more of our Drama coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Emmerdale's Oliver Farnworth teases killer John's future after wedding week nightmare
The actor talks exclusively to Johnathon Hughes about the accidental killer's past returning to haunt him.
It’s perfectly natural to have the odd anxiety dream in the run-up to your wedding, but Emmerdale’s John Sugden is imagining a series of next-level nightmare scenarios in which the past rears its head to ruin his and Aaron Dingle’s impending nuptials. Jittery John has a lot on his mind, including covering up an accidental murder, poisoning the village water supply and being responsible for putting his ex-lover in a coma – Oliver Farnworth isn’t surprised his alter ego is having sleepless nights. “John is all about control and is terrified of losing it,” begins the actor, speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com. “In his waking thoughts he can compartmentalise and rationalise what he’s done, but in his subconscious he is wracked with guilt.” Viewers get a peek into that mercurial mind in a series of stylised dream sequences playing out across the week. Each episode begins with a different nightmare showing how the wedding could go wrong, relating to John’s various misdemeanours. Utmost in his mind is the potential discovery of Nate Robinson’s corpse – accidentally killed by John eight months ago and dumped in the lake, which now needs dredging due an incident with some slurry orchestrated by Mr Sugden to discredit arch rival Mackenzie Boyd. Everyone thinks Nate did a runner to Scotland, so there’s bound to be questions when the corpse is inevitably fished out of the water. “The discovery of Nate’s body is absolutely terrifying,” continues Farnworth. “Obviously there would have to be a criminal investigation, the consequences of which would be huge. John would be disowned by everyone, go to prison, or get in his van and have to move on somewhere else. He could lose everything.” Alongside Nate’s fate is the threat posed by Aidan Moore, John’s former lover and army colleague he claims he tried to save, and who has been in a coma for the last few years. Aidan is now wide awake, which appears to be bad news for John for reasons we’re not yet clear on. “We’re getting fragments of what really happened to Aidan, who was the love of his life at one point. Now he’s woken up, what will he reveal about John’s past? We know John has visited Aidan while he’s been comatose and confided in him about the things he’s done – what has Aidan retained? Hearing Aidan is awake is the last thing he needs, so what will he do about that? “The big picture is Nate, but the immediacy is the Aidan situation. That could flare up quicker, but both of them are seismic. John genuinely loves Aaron and wants them to get married. He would lay down his life for Aaron, along with his sister Victoria and nephew Harry. He can’t lose them.” The root of John’s issues are his complicated saviour complex, an obsessive desire to be seen as a hero to the point where he deliberately hurts people just so he can experience the glory of saving them. This has led to some unfortunate incidents, including the aforementioned Nate, who paramedic John treated for injuries sustained in a fight, only for the patient to unexpectedly die from a reaction the medication. Among various other ill-advised actions, John has also secretly attacked Dr Liam Cavanagh and intentionally given Jacob Gallagher anaphylactic shock in order to swoop in and save the day. His addiction to the adrenaline rush is getting out of hand. “John wants love and acceptance, the downside is he keeps engineering situations to gain that for himself, but at the expense of other people’s safety. He needs to be needed.” Unlike some killers who have stalked the Dales, such as menacing Meena Jutla, Farnworth insists John takes no pleasure in taking lives or covering his tracks. “I don’t play him as truly evil or getting kicks out of doing harm. John does things from a place of survival and keeping hold of his self-esteem so he can function in society. It’s nice to get some vulnerability in there, which is only shown to the audience but not to those around him. “John can adapt to situations, he puts on a strong persona to get his own way and maintain control. Now he’s built this ego for himself he’d never want to display that vulnerability to his loved ones because it equals weakness. What if they disown him? It’s too late to be honest.” The long-lost Sugden, Emmerdale’s first family, was introduced almost a year ago, the love child of the late Jack Sugden, who never knew a fling in the 1980s led to him having another son. John’s lack of connection with his father explains a lot, as Farnworth explains the backstory that shaped his troubled psyche. “He was probably a quiet, sensitive child who felt disowned and abandoned by his father. He joined the army and didn’t feel lonely any more, being surrounded by comrades and vibing off that testosterone-fuelled environment. More than anything the army gave John acceptance into a family. “When we first saw him he was a lone wolf, committed to this itinerant, transactional life, travelling alone in his van. Coming to Emmerdale has switched his emotions back on.” Fans didn’t know what to make of John’s inscrutable nature early on, and Farnworth was drip-fed details of the long-term arc which has unfolded as a slow-burn saga with increasingly high stakes – although filming footage for a future flashback indicated to the actor what was in store. “We filmed John killing Nate very early on as Jurell (Carter, who played Nate) was leaving, and his character was going to be missing for months before we knew what happened to him. “I’d only been there a few weeks but this was a big pointer of a darker side emerging for John. The writers have really invested in the storyline and woven John into the fabric of the village, which I’m really grateful for. You’ve got to build up to a pay-off. “It’s like creating a painting: you start with a base coat, add certain layers then change a little bit. That’s the nature of the character and how he adapts to his surroundings.” Combining boy next door charisma with an imperceptible edge of something more sinister, Yorkshire-born Farnworth has quickly established himself as an Emmerdale A-lister. He was already a familiar face to soap fans, thanks to his Coronation Stint as doomed Andy Carver. After being seemingly killed off by evil Pat Phelan in 2017, Andy was revealed to be alive several months later in one of Corrie’s most notorious twists of recent years. He eventually came a cropper for real, but the experience made stepping back onto the soap treadmill that bit smoother for Farnworth. “The technical side of Corrie and Emmerdale is very similar, it’s great to have that background. You understand how it all works so you can hit the ground running. I love the intensity, every day you’re stretched, filming in three different locations, getting through pages of dialogue – it’s a mental workout. You’re scrambled but you sleep really well!” Farnworth's screen acting career started in the world of soap back in 2006 while he was still studying, and the role of stalker Will Hackett in Hollyoaks led to him making a life-changing decision. “I actually left drama school a month early to do Hollyoaks,” he reveals. “I’d started auditions and was thrown into working in front of a camera for real. That was a learning curve. I was grateful to learn on the job, I was there for about eight months and had a great time. Will was a dodgy character with an air of mystery, I must have one of those faces!” It's fair to say quitting drama school early worked out well for Farnworth, who has worked steadily on stage and screen over the last 20 years. He’s performed alongside big Hollywood names such as Jeremy Piven in Mr Selfridge, and British telly legends on the Corrie cobbles – who’s had the biggest impact? “There’s been so many different people with their own styles,” he ponders. “The likes of Amanda Abbington in Mr Selfridge, and Suranne Jones who I worked with on stage… I always look up to mature actors with a lot of experience. “Years ago I did a production of Kes with Mike Burnside, one of those absolutely solid, old school, RADA-trained actors who is just brilliant. I remember watching how he worked and conducted himself. We’re still good mates. He’s probably my acting inspiration – he’d love that shout out!” Back to Farnworth’s current role, and the uncertain future John faces beyond this big week. It’s not known whether his and Aaron’s wedding goes ahead, or if any connection is made between John and the body about to be discovered floating in the water. Aidan’s memory, Mackenzie’s suspicions and the rumoured return of Robert Sugden, John’s half-brother and Aaron’s ex who’s been in prison since 2019, are all looming to scupper the ceremony. We’ve had some sensational twists already, what on earth could happen next? “Quite a lot of stress is probably all I can say!” grins Farnworth. “It’s possible things aren’t quite over. John will have to put out some fires. And we might get more angst in his van!” Read more: Emmerdale airs major ultimatum and dark twist in ITVX release 6 Emmerdale spoilers next week: John's panic as his secrets rise to the surface Coronation Street and Emmerdale confirm bumper crossover episode for new 2026 schedule launch Emmerdale's Olivia Bromley teases Dawn's future: "Her days could be numbered" Emmerdale airs huge Joe Tate update as suspects are issued a warning Emmerdale's Mackenzie's 'life's in jeopardy' from villainous John Emmerdale airs Mondays to Fridays at 7:30pm on ITV1. Stream on ITVX. Check out more of our Soaps coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Is this the end for Nicola Mitchell? EastEnders’ Laura Doddington on what’s next after murder bombshell
The star speaks exclusively to Johnathon Hughes about Walford’s menacing matriarch.
Blackmail, drug-dealing, assault – now we can officially add murder to Nicola Mitchell’s catalogue of crimes following her confession that she was responsible for the death of her son Harry’s girlfriend. EastEnders’ newest bad girl on the block has been forced to finally come clean to husband Teddy about Shireen’s mysterious fate. Viewers have known her sinister secret for a while, but now the truth is out does this mean Nic’s days are numbered and she’ll be swapping her designer wardrobe for a prison tabard? “I panicked this could be the end for the character,” reveals Laura Doddington, speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com about her alter ego’s gruesome backstory being dug up – quite literally. “I only found out she was a killer when I got the script for the scene where she talked to Benji about moving the body. Though I wasn’t massively surprised, I always knew Nicola would be a handful, just not to what extent. It was double-edged as I’m enjoying myself and hope to be around a bit longer! But at the same time what a joy to play – so juicy, so complex.” Nasty Nic has made such an enormous impact on EastEnders it’s safe to assume she’s not going anywhere for a while. The exposure of her killer past is just the start of exploring just how far the menacing matriarch will go to keep her family together, as long as she’s calling the shots of course. Now Teddy is aware of what his wife is covering up he’s holding all the cards, meaning Nicola is not completely in control for a change. In the coming weeks, increasingly intense friction and mistrust could tear the clan apart. “There is that fear Teddy could shop her to the police,” observes Doddington. “But it’s also the fear of losing him and that he won’t love her anymore. In her own toxic way, Nicola loves her boys and will do anything to protect them.” In highly-charged scenes that really tested the mettle of Walford’s latest branch of the Mitchell family tree in terms of plot and performance, horrified Harry confronted his mum over killing the love of his life, something he was accused of when she disappeared four years ago. While lying Nicola swore to her son she only hired the hitman to do the job (as if that makes any more palatable), Harry has disowned both parents, after learning Teddy knew before him and kept quiet. How does Doddington think Nicola will get out of this, and earn Teddy and Harry’s forgiveness? “She will find a way, she’s that kind of woman! We’re seeing a more desperate side rather than that confidence, but she will regroup and refocus. Nicola knows the disaster she has to deal with now but she must pull together and get on with what comes next. It’s going to be a roller-coaster ride.” While Nicola is no angel (she came to Albert Square fresh from a stint in prison for a fight caused by a disagreement over fake tan), making her a murderer puts her in darker, deeper territory. But like antecedents such as Ronnie Mitchell and Janine Butcher, she’s a tough cookie who will do what it takes when threatened. “Nicola has a heart, even if it is a black old twisted one! She is fully led by her emotions and believes she feels things very deeply, but in that way narcissists do. She is very self-driven.” And having killed once, albeit accidentally (or so she claims), could she do it again if it meant protecting her status quo? Doddington’s reply is intriguingly diplomatic: “Anyone who feels deeply and acts on the impulse of their emotions could kill if they were pushed to it.” Make of that what you will… Shireen’s demise isn’t the only bomb that could detonate and destroy Nicola’s world – the reason the poor girl ended up buried beneath a Dartford waste ground was because she’d rumbled the secret that Teddy isn’t Barney’s biological dad, the kid actually being the result of a lusty fling with Zack Hudson. How long before that nugget of info comes spilling out and another son disowns her? “Secrets don’t stay secret in Walford forever!” grins a playful Doddington. “Barney is the son she can manipulate the easiest. He’s her baby, they have a bond. It’s not only finding out Zack is his dad, Harry could easily tell his brother his mum is a killer – Barney is sensitive, she worries what that could do to him, and affect what he thinks of her. “Our writers are extraordinary, whatever happens like any actor I love getting my teeth into complex human stories. Like we saw in Phil and Nigel’s story recently, it doesn’t have to be high drama to be enthralling, nuanced and wonderful to watch. What matters is the characters have layers.” Doddington was clearly born to play Nicola, which she describes as a gift of a part in career spanning over two decades. It’s not actually her first role in EastEnders, back in 2009 she appeared in one episode as a very different type of character. “I played an NCT instructor at a class the Masoods went to when Zainab was pregnant,” she recalls. “I had to teach parents how to breathe! was so nervous, there’s a lot of pressure coming in on a show like this for one day to do one scene and one speech, because it’s so quick. I remember the actors playing the Masoods took the time to run the lines with me and go over the scene, which was so lovely of them. It was great fun and I loved it, but I thought they won’t ever call me in for anything else now!” Thankfully she was wrong. On screen for just six months, it feels like Nicola Mitchell, and Doddington herself, have been part of EastEnders forever. The audience, and the industry, obviously agree, as she is among the nominees for Best Newcomer at this year’s British Soap Awards, which take place on 31st May. “It sounds cheesy but just to be nominated is incredible,” smiles Doddington, genuinely moved by the recognition. “To be in this category at the age of 44 is amazing. I am so grateful to Chris Clenshaw (the soap’s former Executive Producer) for giving me the role – who takes a punt on a jobbing actor that’s been doing it for 22 years, and nobody knows who she is? This will be the first awards I’ve ever been to – and Jane McDonald is going to read my name off a card!” Channelling the pantheon of strong, sassy and downright scary Walford women, gobby Nicola has inspired comparisons to many predecessors, particularly a certain iconic landlady… “People have made that reference between Nicola and Peggy Mitchell,” notes the humble star. “I don’t think Nicola is anything like her, though I suppose they both love their families, wear a red coat and have blonde hair! “Can you imagine if they’d ever met? A clash between those two would have been incredible. They’re not chalk and cheese, more like chalk and chalk! It would’ve been like a long, all-day tennis grand slam final where they’re constantly trying to score points against each other – Djokovic V Federer!” Read more: EastEnders' Lauren Branning goes into labour amid Cindy Beale bombshell EastEnders sets up explosive Nicola Mitchell showdown in early iPlayer cliffhanger Laura Doddington teases potential arrival of Nicola Mitchell's unseen sister Danny Dyer says EastEnders producer "didn't like the Carters" following soap exit EastEnders airs Monday to Thursday at 7:30pm on BBC One and from 6am on BBC iPlayer. Visit our dedicated Soaps page for all the latest news, interviews and spoilers. If you’re looking for more to watch, check out our TV Guide and Streaming Guide.
Coronation Street’s Channique Sterling-Brown on Dee-Dee’s fight for justice and if she regrets giving her baby away
The star speaks exclusively to Johnathon Hughes about what the future holds after her powerful storyline.
Giving birth for the first time was a far from happy occasion for Coronation Street’s Dee-Dee Bailey, as it turned into a traumatic ordeal ending in emergency surgery that left her unable to carry any more children. The storyline has drawn attention to racial injustice in maternity care, with the strong-willed solicitor so stung by her experience she’s on a crusade for accountability. Confronting hospital staff over negligence and unconscious bias may bring closure for Dee-Dee and highlight a wider issue, but it could also make it harder for the character to move on… “Dee-Dee is very conflicted, she doesn’t know if she’s coming or going,” reveals Channique Sterling-Brown, speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com about her alter ego’s plight. “She knows she wants some form of change so this doesn’t happen to anyone else. Confronting what happened is huge, but pursuing the negligence case is a way of avoiding the different trauma of having the baby adopted, which she has put in a box and is definitely not dealing with. “She has spent the last year sacrificing so much for the people around her, and has ended up butchered and lonely. Trying to fix what happened to her in hospital means she doesn’t have to think about the pain of giving baby Laila away.” Dee-Dee’s distressing childbirth last month saw her concerns of being in pain in the lead-up to her due date dismissed, only to later be diagnosed with severe pre-eclampsia and rushed in for an emergency delivery. After suffering a huge haemorrhage, surgeons had to perform a hysterectomy in order to save her life. Feeling mistakes were made that were avoidable, and linked to her ethnicity, Dee-Dee launched an official complaint of gross negligence. In powerful scenes on Friday 18 April, she finally confronted Zoe, the midwife on duty at the time, about the treatment she received. “I think there is a sense of closure for Dee-Dee after that,” Sterling-Brown reflects. “It doesn’t necessarily make it right or that the story is over. I hope the scene makes it clear to the audience why Dee-Dee’s race is relevant in all this. Zoe taking a beat over how she acted and having that understanding with Dee-Dee was really important to show. To have it affirmed she wasn’t going crazy or was gaslit and left to get on with it, Dee-Dee needed that. “Accepting what happened is one thing, to try and do it without a proper apology or acknowledgement of how it was avoidable is a really hard thing to ask of anyone. Dee-Dee hearing Zoe and understanding how it happened makes her realise it’s not a malicious thing, it’s a lack of training and guidance.” The backdrop to Dee-Dee’s nightmare was a typically stretched NHS maternity ward, with stressed staff run ragged doing their best amidst the challenges to time and resource faced on a daily basis. Sterling-Brown candidly admits Corrie were concerned the story would be misinterpreted as being anti-NHS, and is quick to explain why the attitudes her character encountered were portrayed the way they were. “Obviously producers didn’t want the storyline to come across as bashing the NHS because it’s so fundamental. But it’s not about malicious racism, it’s about systemic racism, unconscious bias – these are things that are deeply ingrained into institutions, and that is not an individual malicious problem, but it is a problem we can all take a part in solving.” The statistics are sobering, as evidence in an inquiry into racial injustice in maternity care carried out by human rights charity Birthrights: black women are three times more likely to die in childbirth than white women, and have an increased chance of suffering physical and psychological harm through pregnancy and birth. Birthrights findings also flagged consistent failure to identify medical conditions in hospitals due to skin colour, racial stereotyping and breaches of consent. Despite this, the actress concedes there have still been some negative reactions with regard to the message Corrie is trying to communicate. “No one is suggesting this only happens to black women. However, there is a huge disparity, and hopefully by opening conversations about that we will see an improvement in maternal care for all women. Discussing things that affect more communities will work its way through the system, hopefully. I encourage people to suspend themselves beyond their own reality, and have the perspective and empathy for others. “I’ve also had many women of all colours and creeds sharing their experiences, which has been amazing, and lots of healthcare workers and midwives are thanking us for highlighting something they are very aware of.” “I’m passionate about this subject,” continues Sterling-Brown. “Serena Williams and Beyonce both went public about their traumatic experiences in childbirth. If this can happen to two of the most influential and wealthiest black women in the world, then it’s a massive problem.” Controversy shouldn’t detract from character, as Corrie is committed to telling a long-term story of Dee-Dee’s decision to have her child adopted which is only just beginning. Her unplanned pregnancy was a reminder of the doomed romance with dead ex-lover Joel Deering, who pretended he was the perfect man while he secretly groomed and abused young women. Dee-Dee only agreed to have the baby so it could be a stem cell donor for sickly half-sibling Frankie, the product of teenager Lauren Bolton’s toxic relationship with Joel. With Frankie finding another donor, and Dee-Dee’s brother James’s plan to adopt Laila on ice while his partner recovers from a car crash, Ms Bailey has been left holding a baby she never even wanted. Does Sterling-Brown believe she now regrets giving away the only child she can ever have? “Dee-Dee is a planner and is struggling to come to terms with this situation not going the way it was meant to. So it’s not necessarily regret and wanting her child back, more the regret of not factoring in the consequences of the plan falling apart. She was probably a bit naïve thinking this would be wrapped up in a bow so easily, now the adoption has fallen by the wayside, she must find a way to make good with what’s left. “In other circumstances, I think Dee-Dee would make a great mum. When I found out about the hysterectomy I was sad for her, it was like Joel got the last laugh and took away the last glimmer of hope for her future. That was a brutal choice from the writers, but I get why and where the story leads.” Dee-Dee has been in the eye of the dramatic storm for last 18 months, since Joel’s true colours were revealed ending in a gruesome murder mystery, leading into the current hard-hitting plot. In just under three years the character, and the actress who plays her, have been elevated to leading lady status thanks to the steady stream of difficult plots. But where do we go from here? “In the past, Dee-Dee may have martyred herself a bit too much, but she doesn’t need to do that now. We’re going to see Dee-Dee take stock and try to find herself again. What does she actually want and need from life after what she’s been through? Today I wore bright pink in a scene, and I thought 'it’s been ages since Dee-Dee was in fun, vibrant colours'. I think there are happier times on the horizon.” The women of Weatherfield have rallied around Dee-Dee during her darkest hours, and Sterling-Brown signs off by stressing she is as grateful to her co-stars for their support, as her character is to the fictional female fraternity. “The best thing about being a Corrie woman is the Corrie women,” she smiles. “My top three this last year have been Sair Khan (Alya Nazir), Tina O’Brien (Sarah Barlow) and Sue Devaney (Debbie Webster). “Sue and I talk about the relationship between our characters all the time, Debbie never had kids and is like a mother figure to Dee-Dee, as her own mum isn’t on the scene. They’re both from male-dominated families and have gravitated towards each other. “I love hearing all these women’s different lived experiences, like the scene where Audrey and Maria shared their birth stories with Dee-Dee. That’s what womanhood is about – learning how life shapes you and passing on the knowledge.” For support on Dee-Dee's story, you can visit Birthrights, Motivational Mums Club and FivexMore. Read more: Coronation Street star teases potential return for Daisy Midgeley amid dramatic exit Coronation Street star confirms he's quit after 5 years with final scenes airing in summer Coronation Street cast: who is leaving, returning to and joining the soap 6 Coronation Street spoilers: Carl Webster exit fears amid Abi clash and Debbie faces up to her future Visit our dedicated Coronation Street page for all the latest news, interviews and spoilers. Check out more of our Soaps coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what else is on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
EastEnders' Natalie Cassidy on Sonia's emotional exit and final mystery twist
The soap legend talks exclusively to Johnathon Hughes about growing up in Walford.
It’s already been a year of emotional exits in EastEnders, and we’re about to get another one as Sonia Fowler prepares to depart Walford for good, or at least for now. Natalie Cassidy is leaving the role she has played on and off for 32 years and her beloved alter ego is getting the full soap send-off treatment: heartbreaking decisions that shape the future, tearful farewells, nods to the past, and one final, game-changing bombshell that no one will see coming, as the star reveals in our exclusive interview… “Albert Square is no longer Sonia’s happy place,” she begins. “Bianca doing the true crime podcast about Sonia’s relationship with Reiss really angered her. She’s hurt and frustrated, and the thought of people knowing her business and hanging around outside her front door taking pictures makes her feel unsafe. “There are ghosts around every corner. She’s lost Martin, who meant so much, the dream of being a happy family unit with Reiss and the baby obviously hasn’t happened. She’s also vulnerable after just having a baby. The idea of a fresh start away from Walford becomes appealing to her.” The gruesome story of evil Reiss, who murdered his comatose wife and framed Sonia for it, has made the Square stalwart something of a celebrity. True crime fans are flocking to see where the late villain lived, it’s no wonder Son feels driven out of her own home. But it’s not just obsessed fans wanting to catch a glimpse of the woman engaged to the killer, someone else is lurking in the shadows desperate to speak to Sonia. The identity of the mystery man is under wraps for now, but Cassidy hints he plays an important part in her soap swan song. “This is a real shock for the viewers,” she teases. “Someone we’ve never seen before comes out of the woodwork which is a surprise for Sonia, Bianca and a few other characters. Sometimes in life you wonder, ‘why has the universe brought me that person at this moment?’ That’s where Sonia is. Maybe their arrival is a sign as to what to do next… “Sonia’s last week is wonderful. It’s a real crescendo and a look back on her history which is nice. It did feel very final, though. I left in 2007, popped back a few times then came back permanently in 2014. This time it really was like I was saying goodbye.” Cassidy gave EastEnders producers ample notice of her desire to make her own fresh start. She’s keen to spread her creative wings outside of acting – she’s currently hosting C4 consumer show What’s the Big Deal: Britain’s Best Buys? and podcasts Life with Nat and Off the Telly, with Joanna Page – and wants to spend more time with her family. “My children are a big part of it (Cassidy is mum to Eliza, 14, and Joanie, eight), they’re going to be grown up soon and I just want to be around more. When you work on a soap planning things can be really difficult, you miss a lot of sports days or big occasions. Having a bit more control over when you work is another reason. “Also, characters can get tired and it’s good to rest them for a while. I wouldn’t have the arrogance to say Sonia will be back one day, that’s not my choice, but you never know what’s around the corner. At the moment I’ve just left so I’m not thinking about that. Sonia is a part of everybody’s lives, she still has links to the Square and won’t be forgotten.” That’s an understatement – Sonia was unforgettable from the minute she appeared on screen back in 1993, as part of the formidable, fiery Jackson family. The second youngest child of tiger mum Carol, Sonia was quirky, straight-talking and wise beyond her years, which isn’t too far removed from how Cassidy describes herself at the age she was when she got the part. “I was a bit of an old soul,” she recalls. “My nans were both quite poorly so I spent a lot of time visiting hospitals after school, I’d entertain patients on the geriatric wards, dancing around and singing old Frank Sinatra songs my dad had played around the house. I loved performing and was always up the front whenever there was a school play.” Cassidy’s love of the limelight led her to enrolling at the famous Anna Scher theatre school, based near her north London childhood home. Numerous EastEnders alumni cut their teeth there, including Sonia’s on-screen sister Patsy Palmer (Bianca Jackson), though 10-year-old Cassidy had no idea what her hobby would lead to. “A friend was going to Anna’s and I just went with her one day. It wasn’t on my radar I had to get to drama school or anything, it just happened by chance. Before long I’d moved up to going twice a week and became what they called a YP, a ‘Young Professional’, which meant you were put on the casting card for professional jobs. A few weeks later Tony McHale, the writer who created the Jacksons, saw me in an improv class. “I think they’d already cast Lindsey Coulson as Carol and wanted Sonia to be her mini-me, a little blonde, waif-like girl. They thought I was a funny little thing and went with me instead! All the Jacksons met for the first time at Elstree to have our picture taken together. We hit it off immediately.” Young Cassidy was calm and collected at the prospect of joining one of the biggest TV shows in the country, mainly because she’d never seen it. “We watched Corrie in my house!” she admits. “I only really saw kids shows at that age and wasn’t aware of who was famous. I had no idea Wendy Richard (Pauline Fowler) had been Miss Brahms in Are You Being Served?, I’d never heard of it!” Learning from bona fide legends taught Cassidy professional and personal lessons she continues to live by. "My professionalism and punctuality rippled down from Wendy, who really took me under her wing, and Barbara Windsor (Peggy Mitchell). They were old school pros. Pam St Clement (Pat Evans) and Mike Reid (Frank Butcher) were lovely to me, it was really collaborative. I’d been around adults a lot so wasn’t scared of talking to them. I learnt everything sat on the sofas in the green room with the grown-ups." Sonia would come to have a particularly special bond with Dot Branning, as did Cassidy with the iconic June Brown who played her. A two-hander episode in 2002 between Sonia and Dot remains one of Cassidy’s greatest acting challenges, and brought her and Brown closer. “I was 18, she would’ve probably been in her in late 70s. June would come and stay at my flat to go over the script, we would drink red wine in our pyjamas. I spent so much time with June, we’d often be on the phone for two or three hours. There was an incredible age gap but as actors on the show we’re all equal, regardless of age, gender or anything else. I believe June mixing with the younger cast and opening her arms to them is what kept her young. "June didn’t take life too seriously, but she took her job incredibly seriously. Even if Dot wasn’t the main character in a scene and was just ordering a bacon sandwich in the café, she always thought carefully about how she’d do it. That work ethic is ingrained in me, treat each scene the same and do your best every day." Always authentic and utterly relatable, Cassidy has made Sonia a true icon. Considering she’s never been a larger-than-life or extreme presence on the Square, why does she have such a special place in the nation’s hearts? “I think it’s nostalgia,” Cassidy considers. “People have grown up with her. She’s not nasty or done anything wrong. Sonia is a good egg and very real, we’ve watched her study hard, become a nurse and work her way up. And of course there’s the trumpet! “When Sonia started playing the instrument as a kid I actually had lessons myself, just to learn how to get a noise out of it. They had to stop because I was getting too good and Sonia was meant to be rubbish!” Her self-awareness and streak of self-deprecation saw Cassidy react with admirably good humour to Morgana Robinson’s notorious impression, first unleashed back in 2010. The comedian’s mimicking of Cassidy ‘Just doing this now’ as she undertakes menial, often surreal, household tasks has led to the pair doing sketches together and actually becoming friends. “I love it,” she confesses, clearly happy to be in on the joke. “When I first saw the impression it really cheered me up. If you’re big enough to be impersonated it means people must know who you are. I felt very honoured! “Morgana’s impression, that image from the '90s of me in a peach bridesmaids dress holding the trumpet, Sonia has sort of become a part of our pop culture – it’s brilliant!” Read more: EastEnders' Stacey Slater makes shock fire culprit discovery in iPlayer release EastEnders airs fitting farewell for Martin Fowler in emotional iPlayer release EastEnders cast: Who is joining, leaving and returning to the soap? EastEnders star confirms upcoming exit scenes following dramatic return last year Call the Midwife fans delighted as beloved star makes EastEnders debut EastEnders at 40: Best ever scandals from Pat and Frank to Sharongate EastEnders at 40: Best ever villains from Nick Cotton to Nish Panesar EastEnders at 40: Best ever whodunnits – From who shot Phil to who killed Archie? EastEnders airs Monday to Thursday at 7:30pm on BBC One and from 6am on BBC iPlayer. Visit our dedicated Soaps page for all the latest news, interviews and spoilers. If you’re looking for more to watch, check out our TV Guide and Streaming Guide.
Hans Zimmer: 'I'm not a composer at all – I just make stuff up!'
The German musician speaks to RadioTimes.com about his new concert film, whether he'll reunite with Christopher Nolan and the joy of working on Dune.
Over the last four decades, few – if any – people have contributed more to the world of film music than Hans Zimmer. The German has won two Oscars (from 12 nominations), worked with many of cinema's finest directors including Christopher Nolan and Denis Villeneuve, and provided scores for everything from Thelma & Louise and The Lion King to Gladiator and Pirates of the Caribbean. It's certainly not a bad CV. Given that wealth of iconic music, it's no surprise that Zimmer's live tours – which he has been taking on the road alongside a band and orchestra since 2016 – have proven a major success. And now, that tour is set to become more accessible than ever thanks to a new film that brings one of his grand shows to cinema screens, alongside interviews with a number of key collaborators including Nolan, Villeneuve, Billie Eilish, Pharrell Williams and Johnny Marr. Filmed over several nights at various locations in Dubai – "just around the corner" from where Villeneuve was shooting Dune – the film includes performances of a number of his most celebrated works. And speaking exclusively to RadioTimes,com, the composer reveals why now was the right time to get the show on film. "I felt that the band was about as good as they would ever get during this show, and I wanted to capture that for posterity," he explains. "[And] the other thing I thought was that we [have to] drag our show around, in 15 articulated lorries and 13 buses, so we can't go everywhere, but the film could go everywhere. "We are very expensive as a live show for tickets, but I think cinema tickets can be cheaper – so people could see it." View oEmbed on the source website As is revealed in a conversation with Marr towards the beginning of the documentary, Zimmer has done something of a 180 regarding live shows over the years. Where once he was a man resistant to the idea of life on the road, he is now someone who enjoys nothing more than the thrill of these live performances. This view changed pretty early on into his touring life, when he and his band performed a landmark live set at Coachella in 2017. "We were supposed to go on at eight o'clock at night," he says. "I hear in my ears the lighting crew going, 'We can't get the lights to work.' And I'm saying to the road manager, 'I'm going on at eight o'clock lights or no lights.' "I look out and it's a complete shambles. I mean, just fabulous, mankind at its most disorganised! And I thought, wow, this is really funny and fun, I can handle this. "And so I went out, no lights for the first, I don't know, 30 seconds, and they thought that was art. And then the lights came on. They thought that was art too! And I survived, no lights." That night also gave him an indication as to quite how deeply the live performances resonated with audiences. Prior to the show, he hadn't been especially keen for any music from The Lion King to be part of the set – it was just "a children's movie", he thought – but he was fortunately persuaded otherwise by band member Nile Marr (Johnny's son). "He said, 'Get over yourself, Zimmer, that's the music of my youth, we're doing Lion King,'" Zimmer explains. "So we [did] Lion King, and 80,000 people just start weeping. So that was quite surprising. We hit on something, and it really seems to work." Sponsored by Vue Save up to 30% on the latest releases at Vue in 2025 Are you a movie lover who always wants to be up to date with the latest releases? Then you're in luck, as RadioTimes.com readers can enjoy new films at Vue Cinemas for less. Customers will receive up to 30% off films with Vue Pass, as long as they have a RadioTimes.com account. It's a great time for new releases, with films such as Wicked, Nosferatu, The Brutalist and Moana 2 taking UK cinemas by storm. Head to your nearest Vue to catch these movies and more for up to 30% less if you're signed up as a RadioTimes.com member. Save up to 30% with Vue Pass From watching the film, it appears that – tears or no tears – the audience reception is just as enthusiastic for many of his other works. So, which is the piece of music that tends to get the best response of all from the crowd? "I can tell you exactly," he says without a moment's hesitation. "I finish the show, as you see in the movie... with Time from Inception. And you get to the bit at the end where it's just me on the piano, and I play really quietly. And I know I got them if I don't hear a peep out of them, if I hear total silence. "And that's usually what happens, people are really into that moment. And not just respectful, but they're emotionally having an experience. That's great." Zimmer is showing no signs of letting up when it comes to touring, and already has multiple dates lined up across Asia, Australia and Europe throughout 2025. But he explains that he and his band are currently working on a brand new set – with the film being seen as the "way of finishing that period" which came before. The new set won't come into effect until autumn, and he's still figuring out exactly what it will look like, but he teases that audiences can expect it to be a little more electronic. "I love Kraftwerk," he says. "I mean, I come from two weeks of piano lessons and hanging out with the guys in Tangerine Dream and producing The Damned and working with Trevor Horn and being in the first video on MTV (Video Killed the Radio Star, by The Buggles). "I mean, I'm not a classical composer," he adds. "I'm not a classical film composer. I'm not a composer at all, actually. I just make stuff up!" Hang on, so what's the difference between being a composer and just being someone who makes stuff up? "The huge advantage I have making stuff up is I'm always open to what's coming towards me," he answers. "I'm always open to the director, I'm always open to the story. "It's always the same process: I go out for dinner with the director and don't really read the script, and I say, 'Tell me the story,' because then I know what's important to him. And you can tell from the tone as well, how the scenes should play. So that's one different way that I handle the whole thing." He adds that in most cases he also spends an "enormous amount" of time making demos and sketching things out before a director has even started shooting anything. He pinpoints his work on Inception, on which he was writing music at the same time Christopher Nolan was filming without actually seeing any of the footage himself. "When he finished shooting, I said, 'Send the movie over,' and he said, 'Oh, not really, it's been going really well like this, let's just carry on!'" Zimmer explains. "And so I didn't see the movie until I'd finished writing it, and he put all the music in. But we both knew what movie we wanted to make. And I'm not saying I wanted to make exactly Chris's movie and he didn't want to make a movie that was exactly fitting my music. But two different things would add up." It's clear that he and Nolan had an especially great collaboration going, and he further illustrates this with an example from Interstellar, mentioning that there was a "monumental piece" in the film that he had been in the middle of writing when Nolan had stepped into the room one day. "And actually, that's where the piece stops," he says. "Because we started talking, and I said, 'I don't know where it goes, but I think it's right for this film.' He said, 'Yeah I feel the same way. Don't know where it goes, but it's right for this film.' "[So he sent] it to Lee [Smith], our editor, who instantly took it, back synced it from where the rockets blast off. And it does that whole father leaving his daughter behind scene brilliantly, it hits every emotion at all the right times. And that is completely by chance, and it's completely not by chance. It's completely that Chris and I feel time in in a very similar way." Despite this clearly close bond, the last couple of Nolan films – Tenet and the Oscar-winning Oppenheimer – have seen Swedish composer Ludwig Göransson take over scoring duties after Zimmer turned down the opportunity to work on the former so he could focus on Dune. So what are the chances of the pair re-teaming again in the future? "I never say no to these things," is Zimmer's response. "And I mean, as you can see in the film, we're good friends. But right now, I'm having a lot of fun doing something completely different with Denis Villeneuve... and I can only really invent for one, you know. I do multitask, but it's not very good!" Clearly, that aforementioned work with Villeneuve – which started with Blade Runner 2049 before leading into the Dune films – has been especially fulfilling for Zimmer. More than anything, it has given him the chance to really lean into experimentation by crafting a variety of completely new musical instruments that he felt more acutely captured a sense of wonder perfect for the sci-fi genre. "When I was young, and I was watching science fiction movies – which I loved – the first thing that would happen... was usually the LSO (London Symphony Orchestra) would start playing, right from the beginning," he says. "And you go, 'Really? This is a science fiction movie set in the future, and it's still just orchestral music like any other movie?' And that's why, when I said to Denis, you know, I'd love to build my own instruments. I would love to go and invent things, and keep one thing absolutely, purely human, which is the female voice." He continues: "And then the other thing was Denis had shot the bagpipe guy when they arrived on Arrakis, and I forgot to tell him that the sound you hear isn't the bagpipes, but it's my extraordinary guitarist, Guthrie Govan. "And we're in New York, and we're doing this question and answer thing after the screening, and somebody asked me about the bagpipe and I'm going, well, actually, it's not bagpipes, it's Guthrie Govan, and Denis goes, 'What, my beautiful bagpipes are not my beautiful bagpipes?' "This goes on for a while, and then back to the chat with the audience. And he stops. He goes, 'Are there any other secrets you need to tell me? Any other confessions?' I couldn't think of any, but I'm sure there are!" With Dune, it helped that, like Villeneuve, Zimmer had been a huge fan of the books since he was a teenager, and had even avoided watching the previous adaptation by the late David Lynch as he "knew that wasn't the movie I wanted to make in my head". And so, when the Canadian director asked him if he wanted to become involved, he became a little "over excited", in his own words. "What happened was that in our heads, spiritually, we became those teenagers again," he says "But we had made movies, so we knew how to make a movie. We knew how to do the work. So the spirit was that of a teenager. The work was that of a knowledgeable craftsman." Of course, next up is Dune: Messiah – the third film in the series, which Zimmer says is "starting any day now". As fans of the books will know, the novel has a rather different tone to the epic tome on which the first two movies were based – and Zimmer concedes that writing the music for this one is " a different task". "I'm not really going to talk about it right now, because there's still too many holes," he adds. "You've got to lay out the theoretical ideas, and you have to be careful about that, because if you talk about it too much, you don't want to do them anymore, I've talked them to death!" Anyway, back to the concert film. Zimmer hopes that as wide an audience as possible will go and see Diamonds in the Desert, with his stated ambition being that the film can "shake [cinemagoers] out of basically a dull life". "I mean, not everybody has a dull life," he immediately clarifies. "But I think I want us to be... like when I was a kid, when the circus came to town, it was a big thing. It was frivolous, it was dangerous, it was a little absurd. It was all of those things. "It just marked some time away from homework and school and everything they were telling us. And the absurdity was the great thing. And I think that's sort of pretty much what I'm doing. We are the circus coming to town now." He adds that he has noticed "over and over again" while performing his sets that the music really seems to bring people toegther. "And I think that we live in dreadful times," he says. "Let's face it, things are not what they should be. So I think music is actually quite important, because there's a sense of togetherness and a sense of joy that comes when we do these things. "I look at our audience, and this is not an exaggeration, there's a grandma sitting there next to a punk with spiky hair, next to two little children, and it goes on like this. I mean, we are much more wide in our audience than other people." He concludes: "I want to make a movie of this chaos that we create, and I hope people go and see it, because I promise you, nobody else will be as chaotic as us. I have goats in this movie. I have the beauty of Zendaya and goats!" Hans Zimmer & Friends: Diamond in the Desert is released in cinemas on Wednesday 19th March 2025. Check out more of our Film coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Neighbours' Rebekah Elmaloglou on 40th anniversary "mayhem" and how she wants Terese's story to end
The star speaks exclusively to Johnathon Hughes about the bittersweet celebrations for the Aussie soap.
Celebrations for Neighbours’ 40th anniversary risked being somewhat marred by news of the Australian soap being axed – again. Last month, Amazon announced it would not be renewing the show it saved from the grave in 2022 when 5 pulled the plug. The Amazon era means Neighbours has at least lived to see its ruby jubilee before it ends in December, but with storylines planned months in advance, before the imminent axing, the soap had already lined up a spectacular week of drama to mark the milestone for fans to enjoy including a fire, a wedding, and the bombshell that original character Paul Robinson had fathered yet another secret love child, jeopardising his relationship with soul mate Terese Willis… "That pesky baby!" laughs Rebekah Elmaloglou, aka Terese, speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com about all things Erinsborough. "Paul’s ex Chelsea shows up with this child almost a year after she left town, which causes absolute mayhem. Is Terese threatened? Absolutely. She doesn’t like Chelsea one bit." As soap tradition dictates, there is a question mark over the baby boy’s paternity. During her relationship with Paul, gold-digging minx Chelsea seduced computer nerd Jeffrey Swain behind her lover’s back to shut down a blackmail plot her over her secret scheming. Eventually, a DNA test confirms Paul is the daddy, which Elmaloglou reveals makes Terese even more uptight and angry than usual (if that’s possible). "It’s a crazy situation. Terese gets very territorial as Chelsea causes havoc for her and Paul. Chelsea wheedles her way back into Paul’s life by using the baby, Terese can see straight through that woman!" It’s the latest of numerous bumps in the road for Erinsborough power couple Terese and Paul, who have been on and off pretty much since Elmaloglou’s alter ego arrived in 2013. Terese came in as part of a new branch of the beloved Willis clan, whose history on Ramsay Street dates back to the early 1990s. Even though Terese was married to Brad, there was always a spark with co-worker Paul as they butted heads over the running of the iconic Lassiter's Hotel. The couple’s mutual attraction led to a roller coaster romance which was recently revived, although who knows how long for. Ball-breaking business boss Terese has become a firm fan favourite, with Elmaloglou’s powerhouse performance guiding the character through heartbreak, grief, cancer and alcoholism, always ensuring she emerges from each setback even tougher. The actress was already a familiar face to soap fans when she was cast, having got her big break as troubled teen Sophie Simpson on rival drama Home and Away back in 1990 at the age of 15. Even before that, Elmaloglou had notched up an impressive raft of credits as a child actor in Australian film and TV, including an appearance in 1985 blockbuster Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome alongside Mel Gibson and Tina Turner. "When I went into Home and Away a lot of the kids were very green, it was their first big job," she recalls. "Although I’d been acting throughout my childhood working on soaps is very different. "It’s a unique way of acting and actually quite difficult. You need a fine balance between drama and comedy and everything in between, and have to be able to flip constantly and make it realistic and relatable. It’s like jumping on a treadmill that’s on 12 and you have to keep running! "At first it’s quite scary but you get used to it. I love it and much prefer the pace and switching quickly between drama and the comedic. You have the opportunity to go big a lot of the time. "I remember the older Home and Away cast really took me under their wing, especially Emily Symons (Marilyn Chambers), who my very first scene was with, and Ray Meagher (Alf Stewart), who is such a consummate professional. "I also learnt a lot from Terence Donovan, who played Sophie’s dad, even then he was a big name veteran Australian actor. He was amazing, years later we worked together on Neighbours where he was Terese’s father-in-law, Doug Willis. Terry is Jason Donovan’s dad, and Jason’s daughter Jemma was also in Neighbours (as Harlow Robinson). I have a strong connection to the Donovans!" As the aforementioned Jason can attest to, soap brings an intense level of stardom some struggle with, but Elmaloglou admits to being at ease at the attention from the public which has been part of her life from an early age. "In Australia I probably get recognised more for my Kellogg's sultana bran commercials I did when I was a kid than I do for Neighbours! That’s also partly because Australia doesn’t embrace the show as much as it used to. Sometimes I feel we don’t get the recognition we deserve from the Australian media, which is disappointing. So when we come to the UK it’s great because the fans are amazing." Along with other members of the cast, past and present, Elmaloglou felt the love from Neighbours’ devoted British fans first-hand during last month’s 40th-anniversary tour. The live show, in which the cast were interviewed live on stage and shared memories of their Ramsay Street experience, was a huge hit and cemented the special relationship between Neighbours and its UK audience as it reaches the big four-oh. Unfortunately, Elmaloglou came down to earth with a bump as she received the news the show was being axed just hours after her plane landed Down Under after the tour. "It’s just so sad and disappointing for the UK fans. After the success of the tour, which was so special, the decision really doesn’t make sense. To be honest, I don’t really know the ins and outs or understanding behind it. We’re dealing with a large corporation, it’s business, it’s money." Neighbours has previously swerved the axe: it was picked up by Australia’s Channel 10 when original network Seven dropped it after its first year in 1985. When the BBC stopped showing it in 2008 after over 20 years, the loyal UK fan base fretted they’d be denied their daily dose of Oz drama, until Channel 5 stepped in and gave it a home until 2022. Fan power saved it before; whether it can do it again remains to be seen. The show will remain on Prime Video until the end of 2025, so there’s still a way to go – and Elmaloglou is hoping this means yet more trauma for Terese. "I love her," she smiles. "She is such a lot of fun with so many different angles and things going on, it’s been constantly fun. I wouldn’t have stayed this long if the writers didn’t love creating stories for her. I feel blessed with this character." If this really is the end of the line (or should that be cul-de-sac?), Elmaloglou is already thinking about life after Neighbours. With her half-British heritage on her mother’s side (Dame Judi Dench is actually her cousin, would you believe), she is eyeing up possible work on these shores… "Personally, for myself and my family, I’ve got to move forward. Last time I had to sell my house in Melbourne where Neighbours is filmed, move to a different state and we all had to get on with her lives, as we do now. I’m actually in the process of getting a UK agent." And what about tough cookie Terese, has the star thought about her swan song? "As you can imagine, we’re all coming up with fabulous ideas for our characters to be the main storyline of the next finale! I’d definitely like to see Terese and Paul in a really good place. "The producers are sitting on it at the moment, I’m not sure if they’ve even properly planned anything yet, but there are some full-on amazing suggestions being thrown around. "It’s heartbreaking to think it’s ending, but whatever happens, Neighbours will always be remembered as iconic!" Read more: Neighbours star teases Terese and Paul's future and 40th anniversary cast comebacks Neighbours spoilers reveal Anne Charleston return - but there's a twist Neighbours is available to stream on Amazon Prime Video. Check out more of our Soaps coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Paddy McGuinness on Tempting Fortune: "It took me back to doing Top Gear"
McGuinness is back hosting a new season of the Channel 4 reality series.
Paddy McGuinness is dusting off his hosting shoes for a brand new season of Tempting Fortune. After a successful first season, viewers can prepare themselves for yet another filled with dramatic twists and turns, conflict and, of course, a whole lot of temptation. It's in the name, after all. This time, the series has moved from South Africa and is set in Langkawi in Malaysia, as 12 strangers give up all of their luxuries in the ultimate test of willpower. As they take on a gruelling 18-day trek, they are faced with temptation after temptation that knocks off money from the whopping £300,000 cash prize. So, where does Paddy McGuinness come into all of this? As host, McGuinness guides the contestants along each checkpoint, offering a major temptation along the way. "I'd try to be a team player as much as I can but I think in somewhere like Langkawi, you're just uncomfortable," McGuinness tells RadioTimes.com. "There's one temptation where there's a full swimming pool, cool water refreshments, fruit, cold drinks. "That'd be another one where I think after a couple of days of trekking through the jungle, it would be very tempting to go skinny dipping in that." It's been almost two years since Tempting Fortune was first on Channel 4, with just six episodes filled with with secrecy, backstabbing and betrayal, and with it being so highly lauded, viewers will be keen to see if season 2 matches up. "We went to a different part of the world this time," McGuinness explained. "The first series was in South Africa, which brought its own challenges for the people taking part. And rather than the next lot of people sort of thinking they know what to expect, it's totally flipped it on its head and filmed in Langkawi. "So it was a different set of difficulties and things for them to adapt to there, as well. So I think after the first series went on and everyone really got on board, especially on social media, talking about the different people and what they'd do if they're in that situation – this second lot, it just goes up a level!" Now in season 2, McGuinness is more involved as he gets to interact with the contestants more than before, casting an eye over whether or not they will succumb to the temptations. Nowadays, every single channel has a reality TV show. Millions were glued to The Traitors, and plenty have loved the likes of The Mole and The Trust: A Game of Greed. While each differ with their own edge, comparisons are inevitably drawn, but for McGuinness, there is something that sets apart Tempting Fortune from the rest. "I think the first series we did, we did before The Traitors had been on," he told RadioTimes.com. "You can find similarities in all kinds of different shows, but that's what people like. Certain things work and certain things don't work, but I think with Tempting Fortune, it's more about real-life decisions we've all made." He continued: "We're not talking about bloody life and death decisions, but we're talking things like after Christmas and you feel a bit peckish, and you're trying to get in shape in January like everyone else does. You go, 'Shall I have that biscuit?' It's all those normal things in life that come out on this show." McGuinness is no stranger to presenting, with the TV star seen recently on screens in Top Gear before the BBC rested the series for the foreseeable future. Interestingly, it's Top Gear that McGuinness likens the most to Tempting Fortune, even though the shows couldn't be further apart in their formats. "I've got to learn everything on this one, I can't just read it," McGuinness told RadioTimes.com. "I know it's not the same show, but Tempting Fortune, when I was filming, it took me back to doing Top Gear, because you're in your office shirt, and your trousers that are made for the jungle, and you've got your boots on, you're a bit sweaty. So it was that sort of mindset." But having presented the likes of Take Me Out, A Question of Sport and a flurry of others, McGuinness feels as though he can "slot into work on any show". He explained: "I've done shiny floor entertainment shows, I've done adventure shows like this, I've done quiz shows, I've done pretty much everything. "I think the show that was more similar to Tempting Fortune with the filming schedule was probably Top Gear." Having hosted a wealth of TV shows and now a reality one, is Paddy McGuinness a fan himself? Well, not at the moment he tells us. "Weirdly, I'm one of them people who still hasn't seen The Traitors," he admitted. "I know exactly what it is and I know what it's about but I've never seen a single episode, and I must watch it because I want to but it's a bit like when everyone was talking about things like Breaking Bad or Game of Thrones and you feel as though you're far beyond the curve." McGuinness continued: "It's just getting into it. I used to like watching Big Brother back in the day. I love Big Brother. I think Big Brother, in the first few seasons, that was the ultimate purest form of reality TV. That just changed the TV landscape. "So I think back in the day, that was the best sort of reality TV I used to enjoy because I'd never seen it before. But things like Love Island, stuff like that – it's not for any reason, I just don't really bother with it." Read more Big RT Interviews: Andrew Garfield: "I needed to recalibrate, reassess and refill my own cup" Michelle Yeoh is in her villain era: 'There's a dark side in us all' But he'll certainly be tuning into Tempting Fortune as it airs tonight on Channel 4, with plenty of fans waiting in anticipation to see if it lives up to the entertainment season 1 provided. While there are weeks to go before the end is in sight and season 3 is yet to be announced, McGuinness still has a few ideas as to where it could go next. "I think you could go totally different, and do it somewhere the exact opposite of where we've been, like Norway or something," McGuinness said. "But I think there's something about the sunshine on telly and doing arduous things that just looks good and it puts different people in a certain mindset. So I don't know where it'd be next, and you know what, it really works in Langkawi. "Let's do another one here with just different challenges and everything else. Who knows?" Tempting Fortune begins at 9pm on Sunday 16th March on Channel 4. Check out more of our Entertainment coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what else is on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Jack Quaid on Companion: 'Humans usually make the wrong choice with technology'
Quaid discusses his new movie Companion, playing a villain and his public service announcement to Billy Joel.
With Valentine’s Day around the corner, you might want to think twice about taking your loved ones to see the dark and twisted love story Companion. From the mind of Drew Hancock, the film centres around a couple, Iris (Sophie Thatcher) and Josh (Jack Quaid), as their seemingly perfect weekend turns bloody and violent when life-changing secrets are revealed. Quaid was instantly drawn to the project, explaining in an exclusive interview with RadioTimes.com that became "obsessed" with the script and was excited about the opportunity of portraying the antagonist, Josh. "It’s one of the best scripts that I have ever read. It really set a new bar for me in terms of what a good script means," he said. "I read it and I became obsessed with the story. If I want to be a part of something, a good bar for me is, would I be a fan of this if I wasn’t involved? This was true for The Boys and it’s definitely true for [Companion]." Throughout his career, Quaid has proven himself as a versatile actor who can play anyone from nice guys like Hughie Campbell in The Boys and Brad Boimler in Star Trek: Lower Decks to twisted characters such as Richie Kirsch in Scream. The actor showcases both qualities with his performance in Companion, as the "ideal boyfriend" turns villainous and deceptive. "Josh is complicated," he said. "When you play a villain of any kind, you don’t want to be moustache-twirly in any way, you want to make sure he feels like a real person. "From his perspective, everything is going wrong, and he views himself as a romantic, but he’s delusional. It was really cool to step into the role of a villain who really believes that they are the hero of their own story." He added that the ideal preparation for the character was to watch a lot of John Cusack movies from the '80s, because "that’s who I think Josh thinks he is". "[He's] definitely one of the most insecure characters that I’ve played in my whole life," he continued. The movie is a sci-fi thriller set in a near future where people can buy robots that are indistinguishable from humans as companions. The premise is so eerie and unsettling because, while it’s a future that’s slightly out of reach, the dangers of AI and technology – which are currently at the forefront of much debate – mean it's something that’s on the horizon and seemingly inevitable. “The scariest part [of the movie] is how timely it feels and how close we are to this being a reality," Quaid explained. "I like doing things that have a tinge of social commentary, and this is no exception. Another reason why the script is so well done is that it feels like a future that is in the next couple months or days." He added: "Technology in and of itself is neither a good nor a bad thing inherently. The message of the movie, for me, is that it’s not about the technology but about what we as humans choose to do with it. We usually make the wrong choice, and Josh definitely does." Starring alongside Quaid in the film is Sophie Thatcher, who is quickly gaining a reputation as one of the most in-demand scream queens in Hollywood thanks to scene-stealing performances in Heretic and Yellowjackets. And the secret to what makes Thatcher so captivating in the horror genre is obvious to her co-star. "It’s because she’s an incredible actress," he said. "Horror lets you use the entire spectrum of emotion and she can access that, which is unbelievable. Horror and her go hand-in-hand, and she’s crushing it." The movie started filming in summer 2023, but as a result of the SAG-AFTRA strikes, it had to be temporarily halted. Filming resumed in winter after the strike was resolved, and this had its benefits – as Drew Hancock was given more time to focus on his vision for the movie. "I think it made our movie better, weirdly enough," Quaid said. "During the strike, Drew was able to look at what we had shot. When we came back, Drew and other people who worked on the movie were essentially able to see the first half of the movie – because we shot in sequence. "It made them realise the kind of movie that they were making even more and made the tone of the movie even sharper so they knew exactly what they wanted by the time we came back.” However, this time away did have certain drawbacks, especially when it came to filming scenes in a forest in upstate New York. "Probably the hardest part of shooting outside was when we came back as we had already established summer clothing, so if we had to shoot outside again we had to wear T-shirts," Quaid said. "It was very cold, but I got the lower end of the spectrum as Sophie and Lukas [Gage] had to shoot outside at night in the pouring rain. So thankfully I was spared from the worst of it. But now I’m shooting outside in Toronto, and oh boy, it is cold!" Following the release of Companion, Quaid will be back on the big screen again in March with Novocaine – a thrill-a-minute action movie from directors Dan Berk and Robert Olsen. The film follows Nathan Caine, an everyman who must turn his inability to feel pain into an unexpected advantage when the girl of his dreams gets kidnapped. <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/3/2024/07/the-boys-hughie-campbell-starlight-6d624ff.jpg" width="3000" height="2000" alt="Hughie Campbell and Annie January in The Boys stood opposite each other and talking. They are standing in a room with artwork on the wall behind them." title="Jack Quaid as Hughie Campbell and Erin Moriarty as Annie January aka Starlight in The Boys" /> Meanwhile, earlier this month, Quaid experienced the "greatest moment of his life" when music icon Billy Joel reposted a scene from The Boys. "It took him five years but he posted the scene where we mention him in the very first episode of The Boys and I lost my mind," said Quaid. "I believe he’s coming to Toronto on 15th March. I want to be there front row, if I can, unless my publicist tells me I can’t because I have things to do. I want to see him live because I still haven’t, and I was such a massive fan before Hughie." Quaid ended the interview with a public service announcement directly to Joel. "Mr Joel, please, I love you so much. Please just come and be on the show, we only have more season and we are shooting it right now. Just come, you can just walk by a scene and Hughie notices you. Mr Joel, please and thank you." Companion is now showing in UK cinemas. If you're looking for something to watch tonight, check out our TV Guide and Streaming Guide or visit our Film hub for all the latest news. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Michelle Yeoh is in her villain era: 'There's a dark side in us all'
The Oscar winner is taking on a run of "deliciously wicked" roles - and she's relishing it.
"Thank you, Jon M Chu - every time you think of someone wicked, you think of Michelle Yeoh!" As she reflects on her recent run of "deliciously wicked" roles, Oscar winner Michelle Yeoh jokes about being in her villain era following her highly acclaimed outing as Madame Morrible in the film adaptation of Wicked. While her career was thriving well before her Best Actress gong in 2023, ever since she's been unstoppable. Recently, that's culminated in a series of gloriously villainous roles, with her return to Star Trek as Philippa Georgiou being perhaps the most long-awaited of them all. Following on from Star Trek: Discovery, Paramount Plus's new film Section 31 follows Yeoh's Emperor Georgiou as she teams up with a secret division of Starfleet tasked with protecting the United Federation of Planets. But can she be trusted? Clearly, Yeoh had an absolute blast returning to the character, glamming up in red carpet-worthy costumes, dripping with diamonds and sarcasm alike, and giving looks that could (and sometimes do) kill in the action-packed romp. Somehow, despite her chilling backstory, Philippa Georgiou is a villain you just can't hate, and that's all down to the complexity that Yeoh brings to her villains and anti-heroes. "I think that's why it's interesting and important to have those kind of roles, because you can't just always be the good guy," Yeoh points out. "What is good and bad? There can't be light without darkness. It can't be just one tone. So, as a storyteller, as an actor, it's very important to be able to explore that side of it - just don't go into method acting with those kind of characters! "It shines a light on the complexities of these people. It doesn't mean that you have to be those people, you can recognise that's the kind of path they have chosen, and you have a choice as someone that watches the movies. I hope it opens your eyes and inspires you to be mindful of how you can be sucked into that dark side." She adds of Georgiou: "There's always a little dark side and a little evil in all of us that comes out, and I think with the hair and makeup, the nails... she's always taking liberty with the way she talks, the way she walks, and how she looks at you. "As an actor, to have the opportunity to explore that, without being a caricature, without being too much - it's like, how do you keep it contained in such a way where people look and go, 'I wouldn't mind dressing up like that for a change, because she seems deliciously wicked?'" Section 31 has been a long time coming, for the creatives, for the fans, and for Yeoh. It was first announced as a series in 2019, but was delayed due to the pandemic and then reworked as a film before finally coming to screens in January 2025. "When we were filming Star Trek: Discovery season 1, I'd go to Alex [Kurtzman] and say, 'We have to do a spin-off, it's a no-brainer!'" Yeoh recalls. "And so, between the two of us and Tunde [Section 31 director Olatunde Osunsanmi], we waited. We really worked on it. We never gave up. We never lost sight of it. I always knew I would make time for Star Trek, and I would always make time for Philippa Georgiou." At the time of our interview, we're days away from the 2025 Oscar nominations being announced, with many predicting that Yeoh's co-star Cynthia Erivo will be nominated, following in Yeoh's footsteps in the Best Actress category. Of course, in 2023, Yeoh won for her mesmerising performance in Everything Everywhere All at Once. While reflecting on how the accolade has changed her life, Yeoh can't help but contemplate how it's also changed the industry at large, after she became first Asian woman to win the category, and the first Malaysian person to win an Academy Award ever. "I think my voice is a little bit louder right now," she explains. "And it's important to keep pushing and keep that door open, not just for myself, but for everyone that looks like me. It's not easy. Luckily, for me, even after Everything Everywhere All at Once, I was filming Wicked, so I was already very blessed, I was on a certain path. "But it's brought the attention to many storytellers, especially people at the top, to go, 'Why is she the first one in so many years? Is there something that we are not getting out there?' It is a challenge to keep finding stories, to keep finding the storytellers that want to include the diversity that we so desperately need to have." Yeoh adds: "It's changed my life, it will continue to change my life, and it's changed the perception and the lives of many others, because it's inspired them to believe that it can be done. "And now, with Shōgun, with Pachinko, [there's] the ability for the audience to accept and embrace cultures that are not their own, but to enjoy and love them as well. I think it's so important." "When I was doing the Oscar campaign, I was filming Wicked, and I remember bringing the Oscar back to the set," she remembers. "[If you] define the phrase jumping for joy, that would be Jon M Chu. I was so afraid that he would jump off the stage, because it was when they had a huge song and dance number. And I remember coming back and being celebrated because it made such a big difference. "For Jon, to be able to see that happening for me, to feel the love from the set. And I remember going up to Cynthia and going, 'You're next, girl,' and to Ariana. So we hope it will go that way." As for her experience playing Madame Morrible? "Well, I have already come to terms with the fact that Madame Morrible truly is the Wicked Witch! "Madame Morrible is so fixated on her own ambitions and on her own dreams that she's pushed aside, and she doesn't care anymore, because in her mind, 'This is how I make Oz great.' This is how Madame Morrible is going to change the lives of her people, the Munchkins. "She doesn't care if other people will be hurt along the way. It is a terrifying notion." Yeoh already boasts an incredible cinematic legacy, with plenty of her roles sticking in the cultural consciousness - Yu Shu Lien in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon to Wai Lin in Tomorrow Never Dies to Eleanor in Crazy Rich Asians to Evelyn Quan Wang in Everything Everywhere All at Once. "I always look forward to something different and challenging," she explains of the roles she takes on. "But I always knew that Emperor Georgiou was a character I really, really wanted to explore and expand on, and I think in Section 31 we did just that." Although, there was one other time that Yeoh considered reprising a role, when she was asked to bring her James Bond character Wai Lin back for Die Another Day. "I was asked, one time, to come back to do a cameo," she recalls when asked about rumours that circulated. "Unfortunately, I was producing my own movie. Sometimes life throws tough choices at you!" Next, aside from the global phenomenon that is Wicked, Yeoh is set to join the little known franchises of Blade Runner and Avatar (not to mention that she's been cast, very aptly, her LGBTQ+ fan base might tell you, in upcoming action thriller The Mother). As for how she approaches joining these huge franchises, she explains: "It's a great sense of responsibility you feel. Then you go, 'No, there are so many people looking after this, I'm just gonna go in and enjoy myself.' "And I think this, for me, is the best attitude, because I do my best work when I'm not crazy stressed out. I am a perfectionist, but I cannot be over-stressed. "What's the point of doing it if you're not having fun with your passion? So I'm very blessed. We're still filming Blade Runner, I'm still going back for Avatar. There are more adventures to be had." Star Trek: Section 31 arrives on Paramount Plus on Friday 24th January 2025. Check out more of our Sci-Fi coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Andrew Garfield: "I needed to recalibrate, reassess and refill my own cup"
Garfield chats exclusively to RadioTimes.com about his role in We Live in Time and why he needed to take a short career break.
Andrew Garfield is on what you might call a restorative journey. When we meet on a balmy afternoon, the Hollywood actor is attending the Red Sea International Film Festival in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Yesterday, he was on the red carpet posing with Bollywood star Shraddha Kapoor, whom he’d just met at the festival, and he seems overwhelmed by this historical Middle Eastern city. “It’s a very magical place,” he says. “We were having dinner under the stars last night on a rooftop in the old town. I feel very welcomed here.” Shortly before that, Garfield was in North Africa, serving on the jury of the Marrakesh International Film Festival in Morocco. “I was watching two films every day with these amazing filmmakers as part of the jury,” he explains. Among them, Challengers director Luca Guadagnino, who served as jury president; Ali Abbasi, the Iranian filmmaker behind recent Donald Trump film The Apprentice; and India’s Zoya Akhtar. “That was really inspiring, and a reminder of how many stories there are to be told.” Garfield, 41, is back himself with a story to tell, the heartbreaking romantic drama We Live in Time. He plays Tobias, a divorcee who falls for a chef, Almut, played by Florence Pugh. “It’s a story about loss,” says Garfield, “It’s a story about the cost of loving someone and the courage to move towards a life of fullness and meaning, even if it’s a simple life, and it’s a very beautiful love story between two very simple, ordinary people. It feels like a very universal love story for everyone.” The film comes directed by John Crowley, who previously collaborated with Garfield on Boy A, the harrowing 2007 drama that saw the actor claim a television BAFTA for his role as a troubled youngster sent to prison for a violent crime. The two projects couldn’t be more different; Boy A is stark and jarring; We Live in Time is warm and heartfelt. Ever since it received its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival, it’s been gaining fans in love with its frank honesty. “I think what really attracted me about Tobias is that he doesn’t start with his emotions on his sleeve,” says Garfield. “[He] thinks that if he’s just a good boy, and he doesn’t feel too much, and if he just kind of gets on with things, keeps his head down, he will be rewarded in some way. But then [Almut] crashes into him literally, and his world explodes, his consciousness explodes, as does his heart, to the point where he’s watching her crack eggs and he’s overwhelmed by a sense of falling in love.” Of course, true love rarely runs smoothly as We Live in Time shows. While it comes with a fractured narrative that doesn’t reveal its secrets easily, in its midst is a terrific turn from Florence Pugh, the British actress seen in everything from Dune: Part Two to Oppenheimer. “Florence is such a natural talent, such a naturally gifted actor, that you wind her up and you let her go,” says Garfield. “And I’m so lucky that she is that way, because I love nothing more than working with an actor that I can really tune into; it makes the job so much more pleasurable.” Is We Live in Time a reaction to a dearth of romantic dramas in cinemas these days? “I don’t know,” Garfield says, after a thoughtful pause. “I am not sure. I think maybe retrospectively, but that definitely wasn’t part of my thinking going in. But I think it makes sense that right now, there is a lack of love in cinema. There’s a lack of love in culture in lots of ways, particularly. I don’t know if it’s the same over here, but in western culture, there’s a lack of heartfelt sincerity and real connection. I think there’s a lot of division and a lot of disconnection obviously.” He takes a breath, his mind on a roll now. “It’s much easier to find that [disconnection] and lots of anger and rage and sometimes righteous and other times not. So I do feel like maybe... because we’ve had a great success with the film in America and other territories, which was very pleasantly surprising, and I do think it probably speaks to what you’re talking about, which is a kind of universal, eternal yearning for connection, for love, for the reminder of the beauty of being alive and our interconnectedness.” Born in Los Angeles – his father hailed from California, his mother from Essex – Garfield is that intriguing mix of American optimism and British reserve. Brought over to England when he was three, he grew up in Surrey, where he gravitated towards acting, eventually enrolling at London’s Central School of Speech and Drama. After graduating in 2004, it wasn’t long before he was gracing the stage for the National and batting Daleks in a couple of Doctor Who episodes. Read more Big RT Interviews: Mark Gatiss on Doctor Who, Sherlock and how Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without any ghosts Wallace & Gromit creator on bringing characters back for iconic Christmas Day return His major breakthrough came in 2007 when he starred as a disillusioned student in Robert Redford’s Lions for Lambs. Since then, he’s evolved into a genuine heavyweight. But in a career that’s seen him play a Jesuit priest (Silence), Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin (The Social Network) and a conscientious objector (Hacksaw Ridge), Garfield has rarely been cast in romances. Was it something he was looking for? “I wasn’t looking for anything,” he shrugs. “I was looking to sit down and look out a window. And I did. I found that for a year or so.” The last time Garfield was on screen, it was as his iteration of Peter Parker and his superhero alter-ego in 2021’s Spider-Man: No Way Home, the highly entertaining romp that brought Garfield back to the role he played twice before, alongside other Spidey actors Tobey Maguire and current web-slinger Tom Holland. “I wasn’t against working,” he continues, “but I was definitely not in a huge rush to get back to work after Angels in America, tick, tick... BOOM!, the Spider-Man film, Under the Banner of Heaven. And losing my mother.” Garfield’s mother Lynn died in 2019 of pancreatic cancer, back when the actor was filming evangelist biopic The Eyes of Tammy Faye. It came in the midst of an intense run of work that began with his Tony-winning performance on Broadway in the 2017-18 production of Tony Kushner’s seminal AIDS drama Angels in America and continued into musical tick, tick... BOOM! and TV drama Under the Banner of Heaven, which gained Garfield an Emmy nomination for his detective investigating a murder in the Mormon community. Is it any wonder all he wanted to do was stare out of a window? “Everything felt like it was changing, and I wanted to be present for that change,” he says. “And I think I was exhausted in a way that was energy well spent, but I definitely felt like I needed to recalibrate, reassess and refill my own cup so that I could re-engage with work in a revitalised way.” When Garfield received the script for We Live in Time, it was enough to stir him from his period of reflection. “It came along, and it felt as easy when I read it as... 'Oh, yeah, I can imagine just stepping into the next room and sculpting this with some people.' It felt quite soothing, actually. A lovely healing kind of process.” Did the experience give him a renewed energy for acting? “You know what? It’s funny. As soon as I got on set, my energy was renewed. I was, ‘Oh, yeah, I love this. I love this so much.’ I think the time off has given me a renewed energy for storytelling and for acting. Just waiting. Sometimes you have to just do nothing and trust that the energy will come back rather than force it. I don’t like to goose myself into anything. I feel like it’s kind of antithetical to a true creativity. And I’m lucky enough where I get to live like that. So I’m feeling much more inspired.” Garfield recently completed work on the campus-set thriller After the Hunt, opposite Julia Roberts. It’s directed by his fellow Marrakech juror Guadagnino, the director who previously shot Timothée Chalamet to fame in Call Me by Your Name. “He’s someone who just loves to create from his own soul, and he’s not concerned with anything else,” says Garfield of the filmmaker. “He’s so prolific. So I find that very inspiring.” While Garfield isn’t averse to the superhero universe that has so filled cinemas these past two decades, it’s clear he wants to continue seeking out auteur directors. He cites his friend Brady Corbet, whose “masterpiece” The Brutalist is a major awards contender this year. “I think ultimately, I’m looking to make things that feel very personal, but that can take on any shape or size, any medium. I’m not as concerned about the way or the how, I’m concerned about the feeling. I watched something like Brady’s work, and I’m like, ‘Yeah, that’s the feeling.’ No matter the outcome, that’s the feeling.” We Live in Time is now showing in UK cinemas. Check out more of our Film coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Mark Gatiss on Doctor Who, Sherlock and how Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without any ghosts
The iconic writer and actor chats all things spooky and festive as A Ghost Story for Christmas returns.
For Mark Gatiss, Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without any ghosts. It's no secret that the British writer and actor, known for his work on Doctor Who, Sherlock, Wolf Hall and more, knows that the festive season is also the best time for just a touch of spookiness and sadness - which is why he was the perfect man to resurrect the BBC's Ghost Story for Christmas, TV adaptations of iconic short stories which first began airing in the 1970s. This year, for his seventh Ghost Story, he's adapting E Nesbit's Man-Size in Marble for the tale Woman of Stone, which is airing on BBC Two on Christmas Eve. But keeping the supernatural tradition alive hasn't been easy. "The first [Ghost Story] came about because the BBC asked to do a documentary about MR James, and it was the busiest year I've ever had," Gatiss exclusively tells RadioTimes.com. "I wrote two episodes of Doctor Who and An Adventure in Space and Time and I was doing a play. It was crazy. I said there's nothing I'd like more but I haven't got the time, and they kept asking. Eventually, I said I'll do it on one condition, which is that I can make an adaptation of one of his stories. "We actually siphoned as much money away from the documentary as possible to the drama, and it's extraordinary. We had a whole week to do it, we had a steam train, we shot it in Manchester. It was a big success, and I obviously wanted to carry on." However, he adds: "The problem is the half-hour play slot doesn't really exist anymore. It is a '70s slot. It's gone. So trying to get the money to do a half-hour of non-anthology television is very hard. "I kept asking and persisting, and eventually Cassian Harrison, who was controller of BBC Four, said, 'Can you do it for X amount?' I won't say how much it was, because it wasn't very much. "The Dead Room [was done] in three days with a cast of three in 2018, and it's kind of been reestablished since then, apart from Covid. It's been a very interesting journey, to keep that tradition alive and to keep it moving forward." <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/3/2024/12/Ghost-Story-use-7da7b12.jpg" width="4284" height="2856" alt="Éanna Hardwicke as Jack, Phoebe Horn as Laura, Mawaan Rizwan as Dr Zubin in A Ghost Story for Christmas: Woman of Stone stood in period attire looking into camera" title="Éanna Hardwicke as Jack, Phoebe Horn as Laura, Mawaan Rizwan as Dr Zubin in A Ghost Story for Christmas: Woman of Stone" /> Last year, Gatiss admitted he feared that Lot No. 249, the 2023 instalment of A Ghost Story for Christmas, could be the last one. Explaining that now, he says: "I took a chance last year - I decided to go public and say, 'This might be the last one.' "I thought, I'm just going to tell everyone how difficult it is. It's not for want of trying or anyone's will, it's just hard. Budgets are shrinking everywhere, the broadcasting environment is very fractured and strange... but amazingly, after last year's success, they just said yes this year. So I'm hoping the future [of A Ghost Story for Christmas] is very rosy." Man-Size in Marble, which is adapted in Woman of Stone, follows a couple who move into a cottage built on the ruins of an old house and discover a local legend about evil knights whose life-size effigies walk again on All Saints' Eve. But there's a lot that lies below the surface in the story. "It was the first ghost story I ever read, and I thought, 'I can do something quite interesting with this, about domestic violence,'" Gatiss explains of the original story. "I think that's what it's about - her husband is extremely controlling in the story, and I thought there are things I can tease out of it... I'm very keen to try and preserve as much of the original as possible - the reason we're doing it is because they're very good stories, but also I have great respect for the authors." Gatiss has a long history with Man-Size in Marble. Not only was it the first ghost story he ever read, he also referenced it in Doctor Who story Empress of Mars, one of the nine episodes he's written. "Talking about my early moments of terror, they're all Doctor Who, really - and long may it continue," he says of the show. Gatiss's first episode, The Unquiet Dead (aptly, somewhat of a ghost story set at Christmas - although aired in April, before Doctor Who Christmas specials had been established in the modern era), is turning 20, with the writer reflecting: "It's petrifying - time, as the Doctor might say, is petrifying. "I don't know where it goes. It's 20 years since The Unquiet Dead was shot, so that's 21 years since it was announced that Doctor Who is coming back. The idea of an entire era of the modern show being almost as long as the original run is ridiculous. "But that's how it goes - and it's very exciting to think it's still going strong and an entirely new generation has grown up in that way, lots of spotty kids saying, 'It's not as good as my Doctor Who,' by which they mean Matt Smith, and stuff that feels like it was five minutes ago is actually ancient history." While Gatiss once contributed Doctor Who scripts semi-regularly throughout Russell T Davies's first era of the show and for Steven Moffat's run, it's been seven years since he last wrote for the show. Asked whether he'd be keen to return, he says: "No one’s asked me! I had a wonderful run, I did nine stories and An Adventure in Space and Time, which is a culmination of everything I love about Doctor Who. "But the last thing I did was I was in Peter Capaldi’s last story [Twice Upon a Time], a regeneration story, with David Bradley, the actor I cast as the First Doctor, and I was playing the Brigadier’s grandfather. And I remember thinking, 'This is maybe where I should step off, because it’s not going to get any better than this.'" Stepping back from Doctor Who has had its positives for Gatiss, though: "I genuinely just watch the show like a viewer again, and I really like that because it is different. When you work on something you love, it changes your relationship with it, inevitably. So it's very exciting just to see what happens." This Christmas, he's looking forward to watching Joy to the World, the special written by his long-time collaborator and former Doctor Who showrunner Steven Moffat. "I don't know much about this special," he admits. "Steven sent me it a while ago, but I think it changed quite a bit. I'm just looking forward to watching it - later on on Christmas Day, because otherwise I will genuinely be transformed into an eight-year-old version of me sitting this close to the television shouting at my family and somewhere in the background, the ghost of my mother saying, 'Shh, his programme's on!'" And, besides A Ghost Story for Christmas, there's a lot to come from Gatiss soon, including detective series Bookish. "I'm writing a second series at the moment, and you realise how often you have to make the detective clever just by people saying it to him! Then you knock out all the bits in between that make him not clever, that's how Sherlock Holmes used to do it. I'm very excited about it," he says. Naturally, when Gatiss brings up detectives, it's impossible not to ask about a potential return for our favourite one, Sherlock. Season 4 aired in 2017, and ever since, there have been rumours and hints that we could one day see more. "Steven and I wanted to do a film, but Martin [Freeman] and Benedict [Cumberbatch] are obviously very busy, always, and we haven't managed to do it," he explains. "We always said if we had a good idea, we'd do a film. We had a very good idea during lockdown, we had Zooms with both of them, but that's as far as we got. It is a good idea - it'd be really good to do a Sherlock film. That's where we are, I'm afraid." But for now, Gatiss is keen to keep moving forward - something that's represented in his attitude towards A Ghost Story for Christmas hopefully continuing for years to come. "It's not just an exercise in nostalgia. There's a reason it feels right on Christmas Eve - there's lots of candles, it looks very beautiful, and there's something about it which presses a button for us all. Equally, it's exciting to try and change things up a bit." Mark Gatiss's Ghost Story Woman of Stone airs on BBC Two and iPlayer on BBC Two and iPlayer on Christmas Eve at 10:15pm. Check out more of our Fantasy coverage or visit our TV Guide to see what's on tonight. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Wallace & Gromit creator on bringing characters back for iconic Christmas Day return
"It's an iconic place to be with our characters."
Wallace and Gromit are back for another exciting adventure this Christmas Day, and for longtime fans of the best friend duo, they'll be pleased to know one of the most revered villains is making a comeback too. In Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl, the pair are faced with an enemy they haven't come across in years... Feathers McGraw. Fans across the nation rejoiced when it was announced Feathers would be coming back, and he's on a mission, with a vengeance - you guessed it - most foul. RadioTimes.com sits down with creator Nick Park and director Merlin Crossingham to discuss all things about the wacky inventor and his best pal. "They've never gone away for us," says Nick Park, who first introduced the world to Wallace & Gromit back in 1989 in A Grand Day Out. "We've just been away from the bigger screen for quite a while. The key thing is we're always waiting for a bigger format, we're always waiting for that idea that really lands and really grabs you by the scruff of the neck and demands to be made." And that was certainly the case when it came to Vengeance Most Fowl. Fans last saw Wallace and Gromit back in 2008 in A Matter of Loaf and Death, but as for Feathers, he hasn't been sniffing around since 1993 in The Wrong Trousers. So why, after 30 years, is now the right time to bring back Feathers? Initially, the new Wallace & Gromit adventure was pitched as a 30-minute story in which Wallace "just invented a smart gnome and all the antics that would follow", but Park felt something was "lacking". He told RadioTimes.com: "It was lacking in terms of it needed some sense of menace, it needed real motivation, and there was Feathers on the shelf with his beady eyes - the perfect gift. That's what the story needed." Vengeance Most Fowl sees Gromit's concerns grow as Wallace becomes overdependent on his inventions, and while it seems that Gromit may be slightly overthinking, his worries are soon justified when Wallace invents a smart gnome that develops an evil mind of its own. But who or what could be the cause? Well, Park and Crossingham are sure to keep their lips sealed, but there is certainly excitement abuzz with the feature-length film having a spot on BBC One's Christmas Day schedule. "We've always felt [that] the BBC is the home of Wallace & Gromit," said Park, with Crossingham adding, "We're just delighted this can fill that spot." Park elaborated further: "We don't aim at a particular demographic. It's something that children and adults can watch at the same time and laugh together. So it's got that sense of everyone coming together on Christmas Day and watching, which is great. "It's an iconic place to be with our characters." Of course, it isn't just Feathers who will be making a comeback to the screen after a number of years, either, with Peter Kay returning as Chief Inspector (formerly PC) Mackintosh. With additions to the cast in Reece Shearsmith as Norbot and Lauren Patel as PC Mukherjee, Park and Crossingham wouldn't have it any other way. "We did audition a small number, [but] we sort of knew pretty much from just the auditions," said Park. Crossingham added: "And now we have them, I can't imagine it being any of the others." With this new story with Wallace & Gromit, Crossingham and all those at Aardman wanted to ensure "the stories and the ideas appeal to everybody". He told RadioTimes.com: "Specifically talking about Wallace & Gromit, we want everyone to be able to watch it." While acknowledging Crossingham's point, Park added that deep down, Wallace and Gromit's adventures are being made for themselves. He explained: "We're not making them out there, we're making them for ourselves and it's the child within ourselves, which I think is still alive, that's an important part of this." And while over the years Wallace's inventions have become more outlandish the more he makes, and in turn he and Gromit find themselves in bigger trouble each time, it's important that they remain true to how they were originally created. Park told RadioTimes.com: "It's very important to Wallace & Gromit that it still has the original charm and the handmade quality, the thumbprints, as part of the humour and the DNA of it, really. But we do embrace the technology as well." While this new instalment features the introduction of out of control technology, Park describes it as a "theme within a theme", as there is so much more to Norbot that just being a piece of tech that Wallace has made. Crossingham added: "He [Norbot] is the wedge between Wallace and Gromit in this story about their relationship, and technology being a wedge between them." With there "absolutely" being more facets to the story than what meets the eye, viewers will have to stay tuned on Christmas Day to see how the adventures of Wallace and Gromit unfold. Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl will air on BBC One and BBC iPlayer this Christmas Day at 6:10pm. Check out more of our Film coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Your Monster's Melissa Barrera on trusting her Scream team, 'mortifying' shoots and wanting to become the villain
"I would love to be an epic Disney villain type. Just iconic. Just evil."
She's been stabbed by Ghostface, haunted by a dead serial killer, attacked by a vampire ballerina - but what really scares Melissa Barrera, star of new horror/romcom (horromcom?) Your Monster, is something far more relatable: meeting new people. After collaborating with the directing duo collectively known as Radio Silence, Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, for several years on two Scream movies and this year’s Abigail, the 34-year-old has got used to being rather comfortable both in front of and behind the camera. And Barrera, who is quickly becoming a major player in the horror game through those Radio Silence films and now Your Monster, admits that stepping outside of that comfort zone on new projects is pretty daunting. While few of us have stared down sharp knives, teeth or claws, most can at least relate to that. "It's always scary [to enter a new set]. I've been working with the same people for the last three years, basically with the same group of people. "And now I'm shooting this show in Toronto for Peacock, and I realised when I got there, I was like, 'Oh, I don't know anybody.' And I immediately got mortified, because I'm so not used to that anymore. "I'm used to showing up and knowing everybody, and so it was like, wow. I mean, it's fun, because you get to know different people and get to make different relationships. But it's scary, you know, because you never know if you're going to get along well or work well together. "It's a coin toss. And you hope that you do and then everything flows, but you never really know." View oEmbed on the source website Luckily for Barrera, that coin toss worked out well with Your Monster, a passion project of writer-director Caroline Lindy, which sees main character Lucy develop a somewhat unorthodox relationship with the monster in her wardrobe (Tommy Dewey), all while recovering from cancer and trying to break through on Broadway. Hefty stuff. Befitting of such a wild concept, the fun new film blends elements of horror, comedy and musicals into one neat package – a package that was so perfect for Barrera that any hints of social anxiety were quickly put to the back of her mind. "When I got the script, it was like I conjured it up out of all of the things that I love, and then it showed up in my inbox. And so I was just like, 'Is someone pranking me? What is going on?' Because this is exactly what I would love to do." Luckily, this level of excitement continued through the shoot itself. "I think it's probably the most fun that I've ever had on a movie set. I was just laughing all day," Barrera reveals. "And, you know, when you have so much… because it was a very ambitious shoot to do in 20 days, I think you normally feel a lot more stress because there’s so much that you have to do each day. "But it didn't feel that way. It just felt easy and we flowed. And, you know, everyone was so funny, we just laughed all day. It was really fun." The Mexican actor largely credits that to rising star Lindy, who ensured that the vibe on set matched the playful tone of the story playing out on screen. "I saw what a great captain Caroline was. She's so good and so sensitive, and she's an actor herself, so she knows how to talk to actors and how to work with them and how to give us space, and how to also push the right buttons to get you to where you need to get. "And so it was a beautiful, very wonderful place to work." For all that Barrera is known for tales of murder and mayhem, with the star admitting she is drawn to "pain and suffering" as an actor, this focus on fun is something she tries to find in every project – and it’s a key reason for that continued collaboration with Radio Silence, who, like Lindy, make the workplace feel less like, well, work. "I feel like finding friends that you can collaborate with, that you have a shorthand with, that you trust, where they trust you, and you get to, like, go on different adventures together, that's the goal. "I remember growing up watching Adam Sandler work with the same people over and over and over again. And I was like, 'Oh, that must be so cool. He just works with his friends. I want that.' "And I feel like I have a little bit of that with Matt and Tyler now that we've done three films together." Unfortunately, following fallout over her social media posts on the conflict in Palestine, Barrera will not return for Scream 7, and nor will Radio Silence – who walked away from the franchise before the star’s departure – but that hasn’t stopped the actor from wanting to work with the pair again, perhaps this time dishing out a little of that "pain and suffering" to others – including, maybe, Samara Weaving in the upcoming Ready or Not 2. "I think it would definitely be fun to hop in with them for, like, maybe a few days and do something with them," she teases. "I don't know a lot of specifics about where they're taking the movie, but I think it's… it has lots of villains, right? "Like, the first one, everyone was a villain, except for [Weaving’s character Grace]. I would love that." After so many films as the tortured hero, Melissa 'The Villain' Barrera could soon become more of a thing, if she has anything to do with it. And that ambition doesn’t solely apply to the horror genre, with Barrera wanting to wage war on some more wholesome characters than just Grace Le Domas. "I would love to be an epic Disney villain type. Just iconic. Just evil," she smiles. "I love it when villains are just villains. Because I feel like nowadays, everyone wants to justify their backstory of why they became that way, and I like it when there’s no reason – they're just mean. I would love that." Elsa and Moana better watch their backs – after years of torment from Ghostface, Barrera is out for blood herself. Social anxiety be damned. Your Monster is in UK and Ireland cinemas now. If you're looking for something to watch tonight, check out our TV Guide and Streaming Guide or visit our Film hub for all the latest news. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Jimmy Akingbola on Sorry, I Didn't Know: "Black history is everyone’s history"
"We've only just scratched the surface."
Sorry, I Didn't Know has broken barriers and made history like no quiz show has done before. The series, which first launched in 2020, has become ITV's longest-running show from a production company led by black creatives, with Jimmy Akingbola at the helm as host. Launching off the back of the Black Lives Matter protests four years ago, the series has gone from strength to strength, taking the comedians taking part and audiences tuning in on an eye-opening tour of Black history. But it's important to know, this show isn't simply a "Black show", with host Jimmy Akingbola wanting it to be clear that it should be seen "as a show on its own". In an exclusive interview with RadioTimes.com, Akingbola explained further: "This is a comedic entertainment show about history and Black history, but it's watched by everyone. "We feel very proud and yet we also feel we've only just scratched the surface. There are so many more heroes, inventors, iconic legends that are being treated as hidden figures and we want to dismiss that." The new season features an an array of guest panellists that many will know and love from their illustrious careers, whether it be in television or through their comedy work and beyond. Just some of the panellists this season include Adjoa Andoh, Nina Wadia, Munya Chawawa and Richard Blackwood to name a few, with Akingbola beaming with pride over the talent who step through the studio doors. "I say we have the new school but there's also a lot of talent that have been in the business for many years that should have their own shows," he explained. "I'm talking [about] people like Eddie Nestor, Curtis Walker, Adjoa Andoh." Akingbola makes the interesting point that if Netflix weren't around, would Andoh "be getting her flowers in the UK" as she should have been prior to joining the cast of Bridgerton? He continued: "I feel like our show is definitely banging the drum loud in this area, about honouring and trying to trip the dial. We've always as a production company [have] always wanted to be game changers and disruptors and do things in a different way. "And again, I have to give props and thanks to ITV because they let us make Sorry, I Didn't Know in the way that we wanted to make it. We are unapologetically making this in our way. And I think you can tell that with the jokes, humour, music, [and] when you look at our crew sets, I feel like there needs to be more shows being made like ours 100 per cent." There have been plenty of shows banging the drum for Black voices in the last few years and beyond, with Dreaming Whilst Black and Mr Loverman more recently on BBC One, but there is still a lot more work to be done. Akingbola told RadioTimes.com that "the foot [has] slightly [come] off the pedal" in the UK. "I think [there's] still more that can be done in terms of what is on our screens, who are telling the stories, who is behind the camera and in front of the camera," he said. "It's unfortunate really because I feel like we should be further along, but I think with this journey, it's just going to take a while and we have to celebrate the wins." He added: "The wins are Sorry, I Didn't Know, Dreaming Whilst Black. Not to forget Michaela Cole's moments and stuff like that. But also we need to be like, 'What's the next thing coming through and what does that look like?'" Read more: Layton Williams on Cabaret, Strictly Come Dancing and representation in the arts Emmerdale's Eden Taylor-Draper on Belle's breakdown and when abusive Tom will get his comeuppance While making history with season 5 for Sorry, I Didn't Know, there is still plenty more that Akingbola wants to see come from the series – including a Christmas special! "It's a show for everyone, Black history is everybody's history, no matter where you are in the world," Akingbola told RadioTimes.com. He continued: "So when we made it and we looked up how many seasons there have been of Have I Got News For You, we were like, 'We want all those seasons!' So, I am very excited about coming back for season six [and this one]. "This season, Chizzy [Akudolu] hosted an episode, breaking up the format in some ways which we were inspired by these shows like QI and Have I Got News For You." "I'm also excited about possibly Christmas specials and stuff like that and we've not touched the surface in terms of showing more historical heroes across our seasons," he said. "But also we've not touched the size of anything in terms of having other guests. There are so many other guests that want to be on the show." From the likes of Rio Ferdinand and Lewis Hamilton, to Stormzy and John Boyega, Akingbola has a very long list and for him, "we need to have at least 20 seasons by ITV to do that". Akingbola will be reuniting with Akudolu and Eddie Kadi this season, with the host likening it to to "hanging out with your bestie" rather than work. "It's so great to see those two being seen as the comedic geniuses that they are," he told RadioTimes.com. He continued: "I think in some ways Sorry, I Didn't Know is a great launchpad for established artists that are probably not getting their flowers like they should. "Since then, you've seen Judi Love go off and do what's she's doing. Chizzy went off to do Strictly and Eddie [did] Strictly last year, now he's doing his tour. And we've had Babatunde [Aléshé]. "So I feel like working with them two is a dream come true, but it also highlights that we are given a platform for them to show the UK [and] the world what they do." Sorry, I Didn't Know airs on ITV1 and ITVX on Sundays nights. Check out more of our Entertainment coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what else is on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
James Norton on bursting into tears reading Joy script and Happy Valley memories
The versatile actor plays eccentric scientist Robert Edwards in the new Netflix film about the invention of IVF.
You know you're dealing with a versatile actor when they appear equally at home playing one of the most chilling TV villains of the last decade and starring as an eccentric real-life visionary responsible for one of the most meaningful scientific breakthroughs of the 20th century. And versatile is certainly a word that applies to James Norton. A year and a half after his performance as Tommy Lee Royce in the final season of Happy Valley terrified and captivated the nation – and with an acclaimed theatre turn in the devastating A Little Life and key role in Bob Marley biopic One Love in between – he's now starring in Joy, a Netflix original movie penned by Jack Thorne and Rachel Mason. Norton plays Robert Edwards, one of three scientists who teamed up in the 1960s and '70s to invent the process of in vitro fertilisation (IVF), in the face of much opposition from the press, Church and even other scientists. Thorne and Mason – and director Ben Taylor – are themselves beneficiaries of the vital work that Edwards, Patrick Steptoe (Bill Nighy) and Jean Purdy (Thomasin McKenzie) achieved, so it's a film incredibly dear to those who made it. And speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com, Norton reveals he was so moved by the script that he delayed a summer holiday to star in it. "It was sort of early in a summer where I was coming off the back of a job, and it was a long and very, very stressful play," he explains. Everyone he spoke with had told him he was clearly in need of a break, but as soon as the script landed on his desk, he knew the "delicious" combination of writers, director and cast mates was going to be too good to turn down, even if he admits to a couple of early doubts regarding just how entertaining the story might be on screen. "I read the tagline, I think, 'This is about these scientists who discovered IVF... it's got to be pretty boring.' Like, how are you going to find a drama in that? There's no conflict, there's no kind of antagonist," he says. "[Then] obviously, I read it [and] burst into tears many times. It was such a moving read, Jack and Rachel both have been through the IVF journey, as has Ben... so much personal experience, so much warmth and heart in the script. So then it was like, 'OK, put my summer holiday on hold for a second.'" Norton himself says many people in his life have been through IVF, such that he now knows "many little people, babies and toddlers" born of the procedure. But he was relatively unaware of the origin story behind the scientific breakthrough and the opposition its innovators faced at the time, and quickly became convinced of the importance of giving them the credit they deserve. The personal experience of Thorne, Mason and Taylor also ensured that the experience of making the film was an especially profound one, and made the stakes that little bit higher for everyone involved. "People were coming to work, going home and tucking up these babies that wouldn't be with us otherwise, you know, the world would be devoid of that love," he says. "And then you multiply that by 12 million [an estimated 12 million children have been born of IVF]. "Ben is currently shooting in Albuquerque and he was telling me how hard it is to be away from his kids. That man is full of love for his children. Jack and Rachel love Eliot so much. And a world without that love is just mad. And so it really did bring home how, on the tiny, micro level, important this science is. It's just astounding how much joy this particular piece of scientific progress has brought." The film's title is taken from the middle name given to Louise Brown – the very first IVF baby – but it sounds like it was also an accurate description of the process of making the movie. Norton struck up an especially great relationship with co-stars Nighy and McKenzie, with the trio forging a friendship that seems to go beyond the usual bond formed by actors on a project. "It was really lovely," he smiles. "Bill Nighy... he's like the nation's cosy grandfather, isn't he? I mean, he'd probably hate me saying that, but he's like, well, a kind of cool uncle... like, he's a national treasure. "And he'd also definitely hate me saying that, but he's just a lovely, lovely man, and is full of anecdotes and wise words, but also like sparkle and wit and just a complete pleasure to hang out with in the green room. "And you know, I'd had a tough summer, and I thought I needed a rest. And actually, I think what I needed to do was hang out with Bill Nighy! And then Thomasin McKenzie is just such a wonderful actress, and now a dear, dear friend. We had a lot of fun. I just remember feeling it was a very happy set and Bill, Thomasin and I have stayed friends. "We've got a WhatsApp group called the fallopians. We go for dinner a lot. We've remained friends. Sometimes on a film set, you fall in love with each other, and then you sort of say goodbye, 'We'll stay in touch.' You never do. Bill, Thomasin and I do stay in touch, and we are going to dinner. And it's a testament to how much we did replicate the camaraderie and closeness of those three on screen." View oEmbed on the source website Although now heralded as important visionaries, Edwards, Steptoe and Purdy all faced backlash for pursuing their goal in spite of the growing fear-mongering from the press – with the latter even jeopardising her relationship with her fiercely religious mother. But as the visible face of the group, the one tasked with making media appearances to explain their work, Edwards arguably had to deal with the fallout of their project in the most public way. Norton is full of admiration for all three, calling them "trailblazers" and "disruptors" who "we owe so much to". And he was especially in awe of the ways in which they made such major personal sacrifices to ensure that their project would be a success, something that he's not sure he'd have managed personally. "I'm a people pleaser, and the idea of kind of going into the world and going into society knowing that you're going to displease most people is incredibly brave," he says. "And yet it was so important, and he knew how important it was. "What's really interesting for me as well about Bob was that he had five daughters, so it wasn't like he had any experience of the infertility journey at all. He was actually the opposite. He had been blessed with these five incredible, healthy children. But I think that's really what his engine was as well. He knew the joy that those kids had brought him, and he knew that everyone, if they wanted, children, should have the right to that opportunity. "But in terms of the pushback, not only did it take incredible amounts of time, energy, sacrifice, time away from his family, at the detriment of his relationships with his kids and his wife. It also took – for all three of them – it took this kind of insane determination, [and] they had to displease the people they loved and upset the people they loved, like Jean's mother. "And that's an even bigger sacrifice, really. That's remarkable that they were able to see how important this was, and that was the cost they were willing to pay." One of the most enjoyable aspects of the role was digging into the man beyond the science, with Edwards portrayed as an affable but slightly odd character (one scene sees Purdy affectionately calling him a "very strange man"). Norton heard all sorts of fun anecdotes while he was preparing to play him – some of which he says "were actually inappropriate, because they were so eccentric" – but the thing that came across most was just how much people were drawn to him. "He was just loved, like, he really was loved, and the people who worked with him fed off his enthusiasm and his energy," he explains. "He wrote a book with Patrick called A Matter of Life and Patrick's contributions are really dry and kind of, you know, quite specific science. "Bob's are like... just so sort of flamboyant, and you can feel this Labrador energy bouncing off the page in a complete antithetical tone to Patrick. So that was quite helpful [for] finding a voice for me!" One other thing that came across from the research was how determined Edwards had been to see Purdy – whose work on the project had often been overlooked – given proper recognition. A post-script in the film explains how he campaigned tirelessly for her name to be included on a plaque outside Kershaw's Hospital, where the bulk of their work had been carried out, with this wish finally coming true in 2015, two years after his death and three decades after Purdy's. Given that determination, does he reckon Edwards would have been happy to see the release of a film which very much puts Purdy at the centre of the story? "I hope so," he says. "I mean, we wouldn't be making this... obviously, we wouldn't be making this film if Bob, Patrick and Jean hadn't done what they did in the 1960s and '70s in terms of IVF. [But] I wonder if we would be making it at all if it hadn't been for Bob's campaign to get Jean recognised, because that was actually the way in that the film needed, the story needed. "There have been various attempts to make this film, to tell this story, and I think the reason it hasn't quite worked to date is because people assume you have to come from the point of view of the scientists and Bob and Patrick, who are the known names. "And actually, the genius stroke is to come at it rightfully from Jean Purdy and the women in the Ovum Club [a group of women who served as early test subjects in IVF trials], really the celebration of their sacrifice. So, I mean, Bob would be very happy that Jean was honoured, for sure. Whether he would be or is happy with my portrayal of him, who knows? I hope so. I did my best to get to the heart of his warmth and goodness." Read more Big RT Interviews: Himesh Patel on Greedy People, The Franchise and 'trilogy jokes' with Lily James Tanya Reynolds on Timestalker, the "fantastic" Alice Lowe and life after Sex Education As mentioned above, Norton has had a great deal of variety in his film and TV projects – other highlights of which include a long-running part in Grantchester, a leading turn in the BBC's 2016 version of War & Peace, and a supporting role in Greta Gerwig's beloved Oscar-nominated adaptation of Little Women. It's therefore no surprise that he's got a number of very different projects in the pipeline. Very soon he'll be seen in new ITV drama Playing Nice, while beyond that he's got two very different historical dramas on the way: King and Conquerer, and House of Guinness. The former dramatises the Battle of Hastings and its build-up and sees him star as Harold of Wessex opposite Nikolaj Coster-Waldau's William the Conqueror. It's an especially personal project for Norton given he's also on board as a producer, and he describes the process of taking it on from the concept stage as "a real journey". "I've been developing it for about six, seven years, and it's been percolating," he explains. "We've been having meetings. We've been talking to directors, writers. You know, it's been a long, long journey." He continues that Mike Johnson, the lead writer of the series, had brought the idea to him and a couple of other producers seven years ago. "And to have gone from that one meeting with one sheet of A4 [as a] pitch, to then being on the mountain in Iceland with the Saxon army facing off the Norman army... And that's another story which, bizarrely, has never been told on film – we've never seen a Battle of Hastings drama!" House of Guinness, on the other hand, sees him team up with Peaky Blinders boss Steven Knight to tell a story about the moment in the 19th century that the beloved stout brand started to become such an international phenomenon. Norton teases that Knight is "at his best" with the show, and promises a "really fun" series. "It's got beer. It's got this eccentric family. We've got these Steven Knight characters all kind of jostling and playing, fighting, f**king. It's just, like, really exciting!" he says. That's the future, but what about the past? Now that he's had a bit of distance from the electrifying reaction to the Happy Valley finale, I wonder how he looks back on his time on the show and the ecstatic response it provoked from both punters and critics. Did he see it coming? Norton speaks incredibly passionately about those memories, and says that it was clear from the outset that they were "making something really special" with the closing scene. "I remember that day, the whole studio were, like, really quiet," he recalls. "Usually it's quite noisy, and there's gossip and there's banging and clattering. And that day felt like we were in a church, because everyone knew that we had come to this moment where these two characters had this face-off, and everyone had read the script. There wasn't any false endings, those were all rumours. "We knew what was going to happen. The fire brigade were there because, you know, the burning, so everyone was just charged. And then Sarah [Lancashire] comes in, one of the greatest actresses living, giving one of her greatest performances. And I just remember sitting there going, 'F**k me. It does not get better than this. This is amazing!'" Bringing things back to the present, and the release of Joy, Norton hopes that, above all else, the film makes people give appropriate respect to Edwards, Steptoe, Purdy and anyone else who is willing to be disliked for the greater good. "Lots of people have nudged us into a conversation around the current climate around these conversations," he adds. "And I think for me, the biggest takeaway from this film is the cost that it had on not just Bob and Patrick, but particularly Jean – she died at 39 and she didn't have children of her own. "She dedicated her life to this. She died in Bourne Hall. They put a room aside for her, and she died surrounded by mothers or women who had gone through the IVF process, surrounding her – that was her family. "She gave everything to this, but also the women who were in the Ovum Club, those women who didn't get children and who went through multiple rounds, put their bodies through that... the huge cost paid by these people for the future generations. "And then we live in a time when that is now being threatened, and we see how fragile that is. And this film, for me, the biggest thing was we must protect that progress at all costs, because it is fragile and it is invaluable. So the fact that we have fought for choice, we must protect." Joy is now showing in select UK cinemas and will be released on Netflix on Friday 22nd November 2024 – sign up from £4.99 a month. Netflix is also available on Sky Glass and Virgin Media Stream. Check out more of our Film coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
EastEnders' Louisa Lytton on Ruby's baby lie and what the future holds for her and Martin
The star talks exclusively to Johnathon Hughes about her 20 year history in Walford.
Deceit and manipulation come easily to a character like Ruby Allen, the daughter of a ruthless gangster who’s developed a steely survival instinct having had to fend for herself for most of her life. But lying to her ex-husband that she put the baby he never knew they had up for adoption, when in actual fact the little boy is fighting for his life in hospital, is next level even for the merciless Ms Allen. As Ruby’s return to EastEnders after a three year-absence continues to deliver a deluge of twists, what does actress Louisa Lytton make of her alter ego’s dishonesty? "There were probably loads of reasons in Ruby’s head as to why she lied to Martin," she considers, speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com about reprising the role she first played almost 20 years ago. "She didn’t even tell him she gave birth, which is obviously not the right thing to do – unless you live in a soap! Ruby spent her whole life pretty much on her own after losing her mum, her sister and her dad at a young age. All of her relationships have failed. She ended up pregnant and isolated in prison, and having a child has become her sole purpose. "Reintroducing Martin into her life could’ve upset her own applecart. Being a mum is what she’s wanted all along but Martin didn’t believe her when she told him about the pregnancy when she got sent to jail three years ago. He forgot about her so she feels totally within her right to move forward without him." As for pretending Mr Fowler’s long-lost offspring had been given away, Lytton defends that particular fib and insists it wasn’t as calculated as it seems. "That was quite an off-the-cuff decision, I don’t think she planned to say it. Ruby wasn’t even planning on seeing Martin at all, she only came to Walford to find the birth certificate that Sharon and Phil had stolen as proof her child existed. Faced with all these questions she came up with the adoption lie so she can get back to her son. "Now we know he’s seriously ill in hospital, Ruby lied to protect her son believing that Martin wanted nothing to do with him. I don’t think she wants to face what’s happened to her child and why he’s in hospital in the first place." This latest development puts Ruby’s much-anticipated comeback story on an entirely different, and unexpected, trajectory. While she’s not exactly softened, dealing with her son’s fragile health means we’re dealing with a more emotionally mature Ruby from when we last saw her. "Having a child has changed her," explains Lytton. "She’s not the same person people are expecting her to be. I feel like we needed to show Ruby as a well-rounded person, she has heart and compassion and is actually quite a tragic character. When so many sad things happen to somebody it makes you do crazy things and make bad decisions. Ruby being a mum brings a different aspect, ultimately she is still a lost little girl and all she’s striving for is to be loved." Ruby was introduced back in 2005 as a shy, sensitive schoolgirl who rejected the criminal lifestyle of her dangerous dad, the notorious Johnny Allen, and became best mates with a teenage Stacey Slater. Her father’s felonies, which had inadvertently caused the deaths of her mum and sister, finally caught up with him and he died in prison in 2006, with grieving Ruby leaving shortly after having fallen out with Stacey – setting something of a pattern for the future. No one was more surprised than Lytton when EastEnders brought Ruby back in 2018, 12 years after she was written out. The mild-mannered teen had grown up into a hard-as-nails businesswoman, and Lytton stayed until 2021 when she went on maternity leave (she has a three-old daughter, Aura, with husband Ben Bhanvra). She hoped to return again at some point, although she didn’t quite know when. "I knew there was a huge return storyline ready and waiting with Ruby being pregnant with Martin’s baby," she recalls. "But there was never really a discussion as to when it would happen. I left with a kind of 'see you on the other side' attitude. I had a baby, did some theatre and a few other smaller projects, and when EastEnders got in touch I didn’t hesitate. I felt ready to be back full-time. "There’s no better time to go back to doing something you’re familiar with then when you have a little one. You know the job and the character, you know how the schedules work. It’s comfortable and you feel more prepared. EastEnders is a very special place, it’s lovely to be here and working with people like Lacey Turner (Stacey Slater) again – I did my very first scene with her in 2005, now we’re still here and both mums!" Lytton is clearly delighted to be back and genuinely grateful for the unique opportunity to revisit a character she has played, on and off, for over half her life. "It’s funny, people presume I’ve been in EastEnders for about 20 years straight, but when you add up the amount of actual screen time it’s not been that long because I’ve come in and out. "I went into this world to be a jobbing actor, play different roles and have different experiences, whether it be film, theatre, TV, travelling. With EastEnders I’ve been able to do other things around my stints here, it’s lovely to still be associated with it and come back. It’s been so long it’s like playing a new version of the character every time I’ve come back – Ruby has gone from a girl, to a grown-up to a parent." Before streaming changed the TV landscape, EastEnders was still attracting tens of millions of viewers with each terrestrial showing when Lytton joined the cast all those years ago at the tender age of 15. How did it feel to be suddenly thrust into the spotlight? "I had watched it my whole life, suddenly there I was on Albert Square working with the likes of Steve McFadden (Phil Mitchell), who I’m still in awe of today! It was a whirlwind but I loved every second of it. "Billy Murray (who played Johnny) was brilliant, he really took me under his wing and helped me out. He’d meet up with me and my parents at weekends and go down to Victoria Park in east London, Billy would help me run my lines, he was amazing. I asked our producer if we could bring Johnny Allen back but unfortunately he died on screen, which is a shame. I’m holding out hope it could still happen though!" Lytton went straight from the Square to Strictly Come Dancing in 2006, making the quarter-finals of the fourth series with professional partner Vincent Simone. She is one of the most fondly-remembered contestants and remains the youngest celebrity to ever take part. "My dream is they do a Strictly All Stars one day and I can go back! I’d definitely do it again, in fact I’d do it every year if I could. I watch the show with my little girl now and it brings tears to my eyes when I think I was literally a child when I was on it. Now I try to explain to Aura that mummy did that – she looks at me like she can’t believe what I’m saying!" While Lytton dreams of getting back on the Strictly dance floor one day, for the moment her focus is very much on Ruby’s return to Walford. With so much drama in her first few episodes, the mind boggles as to what’s in store once she’s got her feet under the table. Will Ruby let her defences down and allow Martin to be a dad to their boy? "We’ll see Ruby is not as proud and stubborn as she once was. In time, she’ll realise Martin is a good person and could be an amazing dad, hopefully she’ll understand it’s about what’s good for her son now and not just about what’s good for her any more. As independent as she is, Ruby desperately needs a support network. The only person other than Martin she has to talk to is Stacey, which shows how alone she is." Like many strong female friendships that have come before in EastEnders (Lytton confesses to being a big fan of Tiffany and Bianca in their 1990s heyday), Ruby and Stacey have had their ups and downs – both have framed the other for crimes they didn’t commit for a start – but remain inextricably linked. There’s so much water under the bridge, but does Lytton hold out hope the pair can be mates again? "It’s very sad, in another life they would’ve been like sisters. Deep down, Ruby wants Stacey to be her rock but she’s messed things up between them so many times because of her self-sabotage and jealousy. Even when they fall out, Ruby still tries to find a way to have Stacey in her life. It’s very strange. She would probably give up being with Martin or any man to have a friendship with Stacey again. "Lacey and I always joke we’d love Ruby and Stacey to end up like Pat and Peggy one day – frenemies who love each other but hate each other at the same time!" Read more: EastEnders casts Peep Show legend as drag queen Drew Peacock for Elaine shock EastEnders teases Ruby Allen's return in fiery showdown with Martin and Sharon EastEnders airs sweet Kat and Alfie kiss in early iPlayer release EastEnders airs shock killer discovery in early BBC iPlayer release EastEnders airs game-changing development for The Six in sinister BBC iPlayer release EastEnders airs Monday to Thursday at 7:30pm on BBC One and from 6am on BBC iPlayer. Visit our dedicated EastEnders page for all the latest news, interviews and spoilers. If you’re looking for more to watch, check out our TV Guide and Streaming Guide.
Emmerdale's Eden Taylor-Draper on Belle's breakdown and when abusive Tom will get his comeuppance
The star talks exclusively to Johnathon Hughes about her two decades in the Dales.
This article contains discussion of domestic abuse, including coercive control, that some readers may find upsetting. As if she wasn’t already having a tough year, the loss of her beloved father pushes beleaguered Belle King over the edge this week, into another psychological breakdown. It’s no wonder the Emmerdale favourite is struggling with her ongoing mental health issues, considering the ordeal she’s suffered at the hands of her abusive husband, Tom. After months of coercive control, sinister gas-lighting and physical aggression, Belle has finally escaped her miserable marriage. Sadly, as Eden Taylor-Draper tells us, that doesn’t necessarily mean the end of her alter ego’s problems. "Everything she’s going through with Tom is hard enough, but Zak was such a big part of her life," says the star, speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com. "Also, she thought she’d kept her abuse private from her dad, [so] when she finds out he knew about it, that’s what really tips her into the breakdown. Her hallucinations and voices are all centred on Zak, she wants to get to him and find some comfort. "A similar situation happened when her mum Lisa passed away, so Zak’s death is really triggering for her, and is what ends up making her spiral. Moments like losing a parent can shape you forever." There are traumatic scenes in store as the full extent of Belle’s breakdown becomes heartbreakingly apparent to her family. As vulnerable Belle reaches rock bottom, and Taylor-Draper continues to deliver the performance of a lifetime, the close-knit Dingle clan realise this is a problem they can’t solve among themselves. The saga of Tom’s creepy coercion has been a slow burn for the soap, building from a cute courtship and fairy tale wedding before evolving into micro-manipulations and full-blown violence. It’s one of Emmerdale’s most engaging and talked-about stories in recent memory. "Everyone here wanted to get this story right," Taylor-Draper continues. "From the reaction we’ve had, and with the help of the charities we’ve consulted, I think we have portrayed a very accurate telling of this kind of experience, although each case is so different. "Belle is known for being strong, but you can be the strongest person ever yet this can still happen to you. I was shocked by the statistics of how many people end up in abusive relationships and that it can take years to escape, or they may never get out. "Tom using tech abuse has also been eye-opening, installing hidden cameras in the house, tracking her phone and being able to see every message – it’s horrific, but it goes on." By necessity, the plot has been, and will continue to be, distressing to watch, but the difficult subject matter has been handled truthfully, and has kept the audience on their toes with unguessable twists (who saw that axe being plunged into Tom’s back? Not him...) and innovative storytelling. Among several format-busting tricks, including flashbacks, fantasy sequences and retelling the same scene from different perspectives, Taylor-Draper cites one particular instalment as her biggest test throughout the hard-hitting storyline. "The episode where Belle played out different scenarios in her mind about her potential futures was one of my favourites, and was definitely the most challenging," she shares. "We showed what might happen if she stayed with Tom, and there was a scene where she imagined being pregnant and covered in bruises – that was awful, yet so powerful. And when Belle was hospitalised and heavily medicated and had to be pinned down on the bed, that was a lot." That may sound like an understatement, but Taylor-Draper is unfazed by the high-pressured demands of soap acting, having started almost 20 years ago, when she had just turned eight. As with contemporaries such as Jack P Shepherd (Coronation Street’s David Platt) and Natalie Cassidy (EastEnders’ Sonia Fowler), soap fans have watched Taylor-Draper grow up on screen from a very young age. It’s her unique connection with the audience that has helped make Belle’s torment all the more upsetting to watch. Tinkerbelle Lisa Dingle, as she was christened, was born in a pigsty on Christmas Day 1998, memorably to a mother who had no idea she was even pregnant. By 2005, producers wanted to give Belle more screen time and recast the role, and Taylor-Draper arrived with bags of star quality and confidence to tackle the first big plot the character had to herself, in which she fell down a mineshaft on her seventh birthday. It was quite the entrance. "My parents said I was so full of beans as a kid they sent me to any kind of club so I could get all my energy out," she reflects. "I did a drama club at our local church and was in a production of Oliver Twist. There happened to be an agent in the audience who suggested I go for the Emmerdale audition, and that was it. "I remember filming in the Woolpack on my first day and thinking Mark Charnock (Marlon Dingle) was the BFG, literally the tallest man I’d ever seen in my life! Jane Cox (Lisa Dingle) had to cry in the scene and she burst into tears on cue and I was so confused, I asked if she was OK. She replied, 'I’m fine, I’m just acting!' and I couldn’t get my head around it! "I enjoyed those first few years, but it probably wasn’t until I was 11 or 12 when I realised how much I loved acting and wanted to do it forever. "I was blessed to be a Dingle and grow up with the most talented, well-mannered and kindest people. I particularly looked up to Steve Halliwell (the late actor who played Zak). He taught me to graft, and that no one is, or should be, treated differently than anybody else. "You show up, you work hard and you’re nice to everyone. If you’re tired you still have to be up and at work for seven in the morning, there’s no slacking. As a child, it built me into a healthy routine, and I think it shaped me in terms of the kind of person I want to be and how to treat people. "If fans wanted to talk to me, I’d always try and be polite. I learnt from Steve and the other cast members that without the fans, we wouldn’t have a show. "My family are amazing and so normal, which kept me grounded. Growing up, I never felt different to my siblings, who weren’t in the public eye, and suppose I can’t compare my childhood to anything else as it was all I knew." Belle went from being Zak and Lisa’s cute, cheeky child to a troubled teenager battling some serious demons. After accidentally causing the death of school friend Gemma, Belle couldn’t cope, and was eventually diagnosed with schizophrenia at the age of 16. It was the start of what became a defining story arc. "I was excited and ready for the challenge when I got that story, if a little nervous," recalls Taylor-Draper. "So many people were on hand to help guide me through it. I’m pleased we are still exploring it today and it wasn’t forgotten about, as that wouldn’t have been realistic. "As with the abuse plot, I’m passionate about work that hopefully makes a difference. To be given that kind of opportunity at such a young age was an honour." Taylor-Draper takes the responsibility of representing survivors of abuse extremely seriously, and reassures us that Belle’s fighting spirit can’t be crushed that easily, and that justice will – eventually – prevail, as she teases the upcoming climax of the storyline. "Since Belle admitted the abuse to Charity, which felt so special to film as I’m very close to Emma Atkins (aka Charity), I’ve had a lot of messages from people saying they’ve now been able to reach out and seek help in their own situation. I’m proud of that. The audience are finding strength as Belle becomes braver. "Baddies get their comeuppance, and the producers always had an end point in mind to show people you can get out of these kind of relationships. Obviously, it’s not going to be straightforward, and there’s still a journey to go on, but that will only make the end more rewarding." We can’t finish without asking if Belle will be reunited with Piper, her adorable dog who Tom pretended she’d killed to make her feel guilty, but actually rehomed behind her back. If Tom’s days are numbered, surely Piper can come out of hiding? "I really hope we haven’t seen the last of Piper," smiles Taylor-Draper. "Her real name is Minnie and I love her so much, as do the audience. Although, she upstages me in every single scene – when Tom trapped Belle in the holiday cottage, Piper stole the entire episode! "But if I have to share the limelight with anyone, I’m happy to be in her shadow. She deserves it!" Read more: Emmerdale reveals huge Dingle bombshell in early ITVX episode Emmerdale airs huge return for legacy Dingle character in early ITV episode Emmerdale spoilers: Tina Dingle makes big Vinny threat to terrified Mandy 5 Emmerdale spoilers next week: Danger for Billy and Nicola threatens evil Tom Emmerdale announces Zak Dingle's death in early ITVX streaming episode Emmerdale airs Monday to Friday at 7:30pm on ITV1. Stream on ITVX. Check out more of our Soaps coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Tanya Reynolds on Timestalker, the "fantastic" Alice Lowe and life after Sex Education
"Just the mention of Alice's name, I was like, 'I'll do anything she tells me to.' I am such a big fan of hers."
There’s no doubt among anyone who watched Sex Education that Tanya Reynolds has a natural magic about her. Starting out in series such as Delicious, Outlander and Death in Paradise, Reynolds has played some of the quirkiest, sweetest characters around, which is true of her latest role, too, in Alice Lowe’s dazzlingly delightful romcom Timestalker. Its quality speaks for itself, as Reynolds didn’t even read a line of the script before signing up for the role of Meg. Instead, she was instantly sold on the project as it had Lowe’s name attached to it as the director, writer and lead actor too. "My agent emailed me and said that Alice Lowe had sent me a letter along with the script asking me to do it," she explains, "and honestly, just the mention of Alice's name, I was like, 'I'll do anything she tells me to.' I am such a big fan of hers. "I think she's brilliant. I have so much faith in her as a filmmaker. Then I read the script and within, I don't know, four pages, I was just like, 'This is great,' and it just got better and better." The film follows Lowe as Agnes, an "incurable romantic", as she stalks her crush Alex (Aneurin Barnard) through time from Scotland in the 1600s up until New York in the 1980s. Every century, she’s reincarnated as a slightly more deluded version of herself, with her friends in tow, before her own stalker, George (Nick Frost), murders her in every lifetime. View oEmbed on the source website And so, the toxic cycle repeats itself, where everyone is in love with the wrong person and pursuing them to an unhealthy end, that is until Agnes changes the narrative… or so she thinks. At the centre of this pink-pastel dark comedy, underneath the beheadings and meta analogy of an artist’s obsession with their own art, is sweet Meg ("I love Meg, bless her"), a heartbreakingly loyal companion to Agnes who gradually evolves from a stranger to a maid to her best friend in each reincarnation. Speaking about the various iterations of Meg, Reynolds said: "It’s such a fun challenge. In most things, you're looking at how your character evolves over the arc of the story and in whatever time and situation you're in. "But for this, because it was so many different time periods, it was like, 'How does this character evolve? What is this character's arc?' and trying to give her that arc over literally centuries. "Alice described her as the heart of the film because she's expressing the one true love of the film, because she loves Agnes so much, and she's completely loyal to her." While Agnes is focused on pursuing this heterosexual romance relationship with Alex, a man who at best gives her terrible small talk and at worst ignores she exists, she seems to overlook the value of her one platonic love in every lifetime - Meg. Something we might all be guilty of from time to time. "I feel this more and more as I'm getting older that we're taught this narrative to penguin up and find another person, and that we won't be lonely if we have a romantic partner. We're always on this thread of searching for romantic love," Reynolds adds. "But there's so much to be said for platonic love, for friendships, and maybe the loves of your life more often than not can be your friends." Meg is on hand in every life - dildo in hand - to help Agnes satisfy her every need, however misguided her quest. And part of the joy of this film is that the time travel opens up a wealth of aesthetics with each new era. "I think we spent the most time in the '80s, which was great, as there were so many different looks," she reflects. "Meg evolved throughout the '80s as she’s been finding herself, she found women’s liberation and she’s seeing a therapist, probably discovering a lot about her sexuality. "It was fun as she starts in New York with a little bowl cut and then gets a bit cooler. But I loved the futuristic era, which you don't see much of in the film, but that was so fun just snogging Alice and then doing a little dance." The one and only dance routine in Timestalker, where the whole cast form an in sync troop as they head out to fight their opponents outside (as you do), is one of the best oddball additions of the film. "We were just in this underground thing, I don't even know what it was, somewhere in Cardiff," Reynolds explains. "We were learning this dance routine in these boiler suits, and I felt so cool. I felt like this is the closest I'm going to get to being in a boy band." Reynolds and I took a moment to agree that every film should end with a rehearsed dance routine: "It was just the perfect end. I remember talking to Alice about it and she was like, 'Well, everyone loves to leave the cinema to something like that.' You leave with a bit of a skip in your step if you just watched a random dance number. I think it's genius." It’s clear that the cast and crew poured their heart into Timestalker, which Reynolds says is not only testament to Lowe as a director but the special nature of working on an independent film. "She’s such a fantastic director and every single member of the crew and the cast were there because they really believed in the script and really believed in Alice, and you really felt that every day on set," she says. "It's so hard to get independent films made. It took Alice seven years to get this made, which is actually really heartbreaking considering how good it is, and that’s why I really want people to go and see this and support independent films. "It’s a space where creatives like Alice, who has control as a writer, director and actor, have space for absolute creativity and exploration." Timestalker is one of Reynolds many successes, after she sky-rocketed to fame as Lily Iglehart in Netflix’s award-winning series Sex Education. "I just feel so lucky, really," Reynolds says looking back on her time on the show. "She was such a gift. I love roles like her, [but they] just don't come around all that often. She was so special. "I knew when I was auditioning - they hadn't sent any scripts or anything - I just had this one scene, or maybe two scenes, of Lily, and I just knew from those scenes, I have to play this character. She's so funny. "It's been so long since we started, since the first season, and I'm still pinching myself that I got to do that. It's really rare. Those roles, they're rare. I just feel really lucky." After being on a successful original series, there can be a daunting feeling of 'what’s next?'. Reynolds felt the chapter came to a natural end after three "wonderful" years as everyone’s favourite fan of alien erotica. "I played her for three years, and they were wonderful and I loved getting to explore her and grow with her," Reynolds said. "It felt like my storyline in the third season really felt quite final for me, for Lily. I was quite happy to leave her there. I was about to turn 30 and it felt right to go into my 30s and onto pastures new." Since then, Reynolds has taken on a plethora of roles, from an adaptation of Jane Austen’s Emma to the Oliver Twist spin-off Dodger and, most recently, Netflix's The Decameron. "I love doing period stuff," she shares. "I know a lot of the time the costumes are very uncomfortable, but I actually love that. I love feeling like total escapism into an era. "I love anything period - anything that isn’t right now. I haven't done anything in the '20s or '30s or anything like that; I would love that. I want to do them all!" Reynolds' next adventure is one she’s immensely excited for. Returning to the stage after her storming success in A Mirror earlier this year, where she was even nominated for a Laurence Olivier Award, the actress has joined the star-studded cast of Chekhov’s The Seagull alongside Cate Blanchett, Tom Burke, Emma Corrin and Jason Watkins. "I'm so excited," Reynolds gushes about the play set to run for six weeks in February next year, "I actually didn't know the play before I auditioned, and then I read it for the audition, and I completely fell in love with Marsha. "I was like, 'Oh, I am Marsha. I must play her!' I really felt like this was something I had to do. I had to get it. I am so happy that it's happened and that I'm doing it. "I can't believe it. I get to meet Cate! I'm really terrified, and I know it's not been long, but I’m still itching to get back on stage again." After that, Reynolds isn’t sure what’s next, but she's happy to take "every script as it comes". "I love stories and projects like Timestalker that are just totally original and come from really exciting collaborative and creative processes. I’ve always got my eyes open to anything, really." One thing is for certain, though, if Lowe comes calling again, Reynolds is there: "Yes, please Alice! 100 per cent." Timestalker is showing in cinemas now. If you're looking for something to watch tonight, check out our TV Guide and Streaming Guide or visit our Film hub for all the latest news. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Emmerdale's Natalie J Robb on Moira's brain tumour battle and the return of Ross Barton
The star talks exclusively to Johnathon Hughes about the dramatic future ahead.
She’s survived devastating grief, endless dramas, numerous burning barns and marriage to Cain Dingle – now Emmerdale’s Moira Dingle is facing her greatest challenge yet after being diagnosed with a brain tumour. The fierce farmer is one of the strongest women in soap, and has literally killed to protect her loved ones. For a character we thought had done it all, this storyline is a genuine curveball – and is giving Natalie J Robb a chance to show sides of her tough-talking alter ego that have never been explored. "Moira is scared," begins the actress, speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com. "You start to see a vulnerability and a fear she is losing her identity. Everyone is worried about her and she feels quite smothered, but she’s just in denial. This is the start of a long journey for Moira, and the family." The creeping sense all was not well with the matriarch of Butler’s farm has built over a number of weeks, as Moira’s behaviour became progressively strange. Sudden, angry outbursts, forgetfulness and paranoia led to an initial assumption of what was happening, which ultimately revealed something more sinister. "A lot of the symptoms mirror menopause, and in real life a lot of women don’t get diagnosed until later because of that," explains Robb. "She was in a daze, as if she was in a daydream, and had no idea she was actually having what’s called absence seizures, where you zone out." The symptoms worsened to the point where Moira began convulsing, and was finally diagnosed with a non-cancerous brain tumour called a meningioma. Now Mrs Dingle is wrestling with the difficult decision as to whether to have surgery to remove the tumour, or manage it in different ways. Either way carries an element of risk, heightening the emotional stakes as the family attempt to come to terms with the bombshell. "The comments on social media have been overwhelming," shares Robb. "People have who’ve had the surgery or are waiting for it, or had loved ones go through this and lose them – the fans are sharing really personal things and thanking Emmerdale for raising awareness on brain tumours. "Continuing drama is such a powerful platform and has an impact on people’s lives. It’s escapism, but if the audience can identify with it, then it makes them feel less alone in the world." Robb has impressively thrown herself into such an all-consuming story, and is eager to highlight the importance of research in tackling such a sensitive topic. "If it’s something medical, I think you have to do research in order to make it truthful. I was concerned about acting out the seizures as I really needed to get that right. I talked to doctors and neurologists who explained how the body goes rigid during a convulsion, it’s exhausting and affects you for days because it takes so much out of you physically. "Anything to do with your health is a different kind of challenge, so I was ready to get my teeth into it so I knew what I was talking about." As the lioness lynchpin of her chaotic clan, Moira is anxious at the thought of the tumour forcing her to change her lifestyle. This week, a lapse of concentration caused by her condition causes havoc at the farm and puts her livestock in danger, leading to the suggestion she may have to give up a job that means so much to her. "She snaps at her son Matty and brother Mackenzie when they mention that, until things start to go wrong at the farm and she realises she could be a danger. Moira fears losing her independence; the job is a big part of her, and if she doesn’t have that she doesn’t know who she is any more. "This is the worry about the surgery – she might not come back completely normal after it, and could lose her identity and independence." The tumour is yet another obstacle for Moira and Cain to surmount. Their passionate, volatile partnership has made them one of Emmerdale’s most enduringly popular pairings. They’ve weathered many threats to their union, and Robb is confident they can navigate through this next twist, despite Cain disagreeing with his wife about not having the tumour removed just yet. "At the end of the day, they love each other, which is what keeps them going. It’s going to be a test, but they’ll hold each other up at different times, and it will be a tribute to the two of them if they can get through it. "Cain will hit rock bottom, but will have to find the strength to support Moira. The beauty with them is they know each other so well. Just as we saw with Moira’s daughter Holly and her drug addiction, it’s not just one person on this roller coaster ride – it’s very much about how this affects the whole family." If anyone can take viewers on such an unpredictable, upsetting journey, it’s the ever-watchable Robb, a naturally powerful performer who imbues Moira with strength and grit to make her a flawed, relatable heroine. She’s bounced back from numerous wrongdoings and terrible decisions, from ill-advised affairs to murdering serial killer sister-in-law Emma, and still earns our sympathy. Robb knows how to connect with audiences, having practically grown up on screen. After making her screen debut aged nine opposite Tom Conti in a docudrama about Scottish designer Charles Rennie Mackintosh, at 13 she won the Young Entertainer of the Year competition on BBC One’s Saturday morning kids’ show Going Live!. "I did impersonations of soap characters, would you believe!" she recalls. "It was daunting for this quiet little thing in a lilac tracksuit and a blue cap, so cringe! I was very shy as a child, so I think becoming different characters was a way of expressing myself." The exposure won her a regular role in Scottish soap Take the High Road, which she did throughout her teens alongside schooling. "That’s where I learnt about multi-camera acting. It was a good training ground where I picked up lots of tricks of the trade, and the crew were lovely and took me under their wing. I always say the crew are your first audience." A string of appearances in high-profile dramas including EastEnders, London’s Burning, Doctors and The Bill followed, and by the time Robb joined Emmerdale in 2009 as part of the first wave of the Barton family, she’d carved out an impressive, consistent career. She’s been there ever since, but claims it was never the plan to stay for over 15 years. "It just doesn’t feel like that long," she reflects. "There was never a plan, other than when I started I thought, 'If I end up being here for a while, I’d better buy a house and get on the property ladder!' "I live in the present and don’t overthink things when it comes to jobs. It’s such a tough industry, and I consider myself very lucky to be doing what I set out to do, and am grateful for the material they’ve given me. I’m constantly challenged and pushed, and this is what I love – I don’t know what else I’d do. I couldn’t work in an office!" It's safe to say Moira’s current predicament will keep Robb busy in the coming months, and there’s more on the horizon unrelated to her health crisis – namely the return of her wayward nephew, Ross, played by returning fan favourite Michael Parr. "I love Mikey... he’ll kill me for calling him that! We’ve kept in touch over the six years since he left, and I’m thrilled he’s back. I enjoy the continuity of seeing those familiar faces again. He looks exactly the same and hasn’t aged a bit, how dare he!" Robb won’t be drawn on whether bad boy Ross will be a help or a hindrance to his Auntie Moira in her hour of need, considering their complicated history. "Well, Moira did kill his mother, remember! Ross is back with a bang, of course, and is going to cause some trouble, like he always does." With her battle against the tumour just beginning, Moira is going to need all the support she can get as she weighs up her options and looks to an uncertain future. "I’ve been speaking to the producers and there’s going to be quite a few explosive moments," teases Robb. "Although not in the literal sense just after the last barn fire! Let’s just say there a few surprises along the way…" Emmerdale is working closely with Brains Trust and The Brain Tumour Charity on Moira's storyline, and anyone affected can call Brains Trust's 24/7 Helpline on 01983 292 405. Read more: 4 Emmerdale spoilers next week: Arthur causes double drama and Aaron's scheme backfires Emmerdale spoilers: Will turns nasty after dramatic split - but Kim gains upper hand Emmerdale confirms return of iconic Barton after 6 years Emmerdale's Isabel Hodgins teases Victoria's big John Sugden discovery Emmerdale airs Monday to Friday at 7:30pm on ITV1. Stream on ITVX. Check out more of our Soaps coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Wolfs' Amy Ryan on comedy-dramas, Pitt and Clooney and working with "insanely funny" Steve Carell
Ryan stars in Jon Watts's first film post-Marvel Cinematic Universe – alongside George Clooney and Brad Pitt.
What gets you out of bed in the morning? The thought of that first overpriced coffee of the day? The chance to catch up with friends? The buzz you get from a nice sunrise jog? (Yeah, me neither.) Well, for Amy Ryan, it’s work. Well, the right work, at least. "I feel like, 32 years in, when that alarm clock goes off at 5:30 in the morning to go to a job, one of the first criteria for me is that it has to be fun." Luckily for the New Yorker, fun is the name of the game in Jon Watts's first post-Marvel big-screen outing, Wolfs, which follows Hollywood up-and-comers George Clooney and Brad Pitt as a couple of 'fixers' who take on a crime that's slightly more complex than they anticipated. Sure, Ryan's role in the movie, as a powerful politician who calls for help when her sexual conquest ends up seemingly dead in her hotel room, may not seem "fun" on the surface. But even among the drama, Pitt, Clooney and Ryan find comedic beats from the moment they share the screen together - and that chemistry came easy for the trio. "They have such a beautiful rhythm," Ryan says of the movie's A-list odd couple. "You can't deny that friendship that's there, that history. "And they leave room for each other. It doesn't feel – even though their characters are competitive – the two actors on set don't appear to be competitive, you know, trying to win the scene from one another. "Maybe they were, and I just didn't see it... But, you know, there was support for each other, which extended to me too. It very much felt like [we were] a trio in that scene." While only present in the opening stages of the movie, which plays out as much as a play as it does an extended big-screen sequence, Ryan’s Margaret leaves her mark. There's a mystery to her that sets the tone for the film from the off. While Margaret insists that she "doesn't do this sort of thing" (i.e. one-night stands with young conquests, and presumably getting mixed up in the criminal underworld), the audience gets a sense of her power and importance in this universe. And this complexity naturally appealed to a risk-taking performer like Ryan. View oEmbed on the source website "It's fantastic to play a woman who is not defined by her role as mother, girlfriend, ex-wife, you know? Here's a very powerful, formidable woman in a very stressful, slightly comical situation. "And I love that it was this launch pad that almost felt like a one-act play. In the script, it's around 35 pages of, 'Oh my gosh, this is unusual and fun.' And it proved to be that way in the making of it." "Unusual and fun" could be the tagline for Wolfs, which jumps from one chaotic situation to another across its runtime. Whether it’s 'Margaret's Man' (Clooney) showing off his slightly unorthodox cleaning techniques or 'Pam's Man' (Pitt) consistently pranking his unwitting partner-in-hiding-crime, there is rarely a dull moment. And all of this comes from the mind of Watts, who used his MCU clout to secure funding for what has been a passion project of his for a long time. That passion, at least for Ryan, came through every day on set. "Working with him was just a great experience," she explains. "I love his sense of humour. He's wonderfully absurd. "And I really like his first film, Cop Car. I love how compact and tightly-woven that is, and how he uses moving pictures to tell a story, kind of old-fashioned in that sense. "He was very hands-on. He would do a lot of takes, and he would quickly assemble the scene. He'd go back to his monitor, and he'd kind of edit things together. Then he's like, 'Oh, I need another shot of this and that.' "So you really felt part of it, the whole process from start to end." No clearer is Watts's "wonderfully absurd" humour than through the character arc of Austin Abrams's 'Kid'. We won't spoil what happens here – partly for your enjoyment, partly because it almost defies description – but anyone who has seen the film knows you can't really talk about it without mentioning Abrams's tighty-whities-wearing deadbeat. While the Kid doesn't feature too much in Ryan's opening sequence, outside of lying sprawled out on the floor, covered in blood (all of these scenes were shot with Abrams himself, Ryan confirms), the 56-year-old enjoyed having the up-and-comer on set, including for a very enjoyable closing credits scene. "Austin was a really extraordinary team player. It's always an unusual thing, you know, to meet someone – but especially when they're in their underwear," she laughs. "But within our first 10 minutes, Austin and I quickly found a really good friend we have in common, and somehow that drops your shoulders, like, 'OK, I feel like I know you already.' "It just felt very easy and playful, and I like how our scenes kind of fell into a little bit of the theatre of the absurd, as opposed to this tale of, you know, this hot seductress." Thinking of it, "unusual and fun", "wonderfully absurd", "theatre of the absurd" – these terms could all describe chunks of Ryan's award-laden, constantly-varied, decades-spanning career. After all, many across the globe will know Ryan best for her time on The Office – which still draws in millions of viewers on streaming platforms around the world – and Only Murders in the Building – for which she picked up a SAG Awards nomination alongside the show's stellar ensemble. In the former, Ryan played Holly Flax, who enjoys a typically deranged will-they-won't-they (spoilers, they will – and it will tug on the heartstrings) with Steve Carell's Michael Scott across four manic seasons. Working with one of the planet's finest improvisers naturally proved a challenge at times. "No matter how many episodes I did with Steve Carell, it was very hard to keep a straight face with him," she explains. "He's just insanely funny. Thankfully there were always two cameras, so one camera would just go off silently when I started to laugh. "I'd be holding my breath, laughing, and you'd see my shaking shoulders on the other side of it." Ten years after leaving one star-studded comedic series, Ryan joined another, signing onto Steve Martin and Martin Short's Only Murders in 2021 as Jan, the foil of Martin's Charles Haden-Savage. It's a role that keeps on giving for Ryan – she surprisingly rocks up in season 4 – and one that promises to keep on giving for audiences, too, who continue to be engrossed by her increasingly crazed character. What can we expect next? "I like to think, you know, she'll appear now and again, riding up the elevator," she teases. (If you’ve watched early episodes of season 4, you’ll know.) "As long as that show goes on... It's such a joy to be around that cast and those writers. "Steve Martin, Martin Short, they have had these very long careers, very successful careers, and then they both happen to have very long friendships that go with it, and it makes sense why they want to work together. "I like to think Jan is like every smart New Yorker – you never give up your apartment, under any circumstances. You hold on to that. So I hope that continues." Only Murders, Wolfs, even The Office – all of these projects seamlessly blend comedy and drama. As much as Ryan thrives in outright dramatic roles (see: an Oscar nomination for Gone Baby Gone), she often chooses projects and parts that flit between lightness and depth, bringing several layers to the screen – and that’s a deliberate choice. "I remember reading that Jane Fonda once said that when you play a two-dimensional character, it actually hurts your body to put your three-dimensional self into a two-dimensional character. "So no matter what the script is, it's always yes, of course, if they are more human and more complex... we humans are more nuanced, full of contradictions. "I can find comedy in human folly. You know, human mistake and human ambition, whatever it is. Life is funny." Will Ryan's next project tread similar lines? Well, in truth, even she doesn't know. There's nothing official on the agenda at the moment. Acting-wise, at least. In the immediate future, there's something more important than performing on screen to deal with – playing her part in a national election. "I'm looking forward to casting my vote," she smiles. "I'm putting my energies into that right now." Working on fun projects and shaping the future of your country – it turns out there are two reasons to get up early in the morning. Wolfs is now streaming on Apple TV+ – sign up to Apple TV+ now. Check out more of our Film coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
Neighbours' Ryan Moloney on Toadie's emotional exit and why the character had to be axed
The Aussie soap icon talks exclusively to Johnathon Hughes about saying goodbye to Ramsay Street.
It’s the end of an era on Ramsay Street this week, as Toadie Rebecchi leaves Neighbours after 29 years today (Wednesday 25th September). The character has grown up on screen from a tearaway teenager to a responsible middle-aged dad, and made actor Ryan Moloney one of the Australian soap’s most identifiable faces. After such a long stint, you’d assume Moloney himself chose to move on, but surprisingly the decision came from the producers. It’s hard to imagine Neighbours without the inimitable Toadfish, but the actor admits this was a long time coming, and probably should’ve happened a while ago. "I’ve wanted to leave a number of times over the years, but if someone keeps offering you this amazing job, it’s hard to turn it down," explains Moloney, speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com. "The producers decided they didn’t want to renew my next 12-month contract, and the biggest gift they could give me is to take that decision out of my hands, so I thank them. I’d always thought 'what if?' when it came to contract time, whereas now it’s a case of 'what now?', and it’s really exciting." Toadie’s consistent popularity presumably meant Moloney was never bored in terms of getting his fair share of storylines over the last three decades: multiple failed marriages, heartbreaking bereavements, lost loves coming back from the dead, not to mention more light-hearted material such as a Full Monty-style striptease and a love of wrestling. So, what inspired the moments where he considered quitting prior to this year? "It was various reasons of either wanting to do something else, the adventure of life and needing new experiences. Other times it was about feeling valued and wanting to be paid more. I’ve come really close to leaving, and now it’s a reality I’m super excited and can’t wait." Toadie’s exit storyline has been unusually dark and deep for Neighbours, which is synonymous with sunshine and optimism. The happy-go-lucky joker has suffered a mental health crisis as numerous past tragedies have finally taken their psychological toll, leading to a breakdown that forced him to reevaluate his life, end his marriage fourth wife Terese and leave Erinsborough and its painful memories behind. We’ve dug deeper into what makes Toadie tick than ever before, which Moloney has relished. "Knowing I was leaving, we had a chance to tell a story I think is of value that highlights mental health issues," he enthuses. "If we don’t start seeing things like this on TV and give them a platform to be discussed, then we can’t fix them. They keep getting demonised and pushed away. I appreciated that opportunity. "In soaps, all these terrible things happen to a character and magically they just get over it – with Toadie, we’re acknowledging that’s not the case, and everything’s been bubbling away underneath. Maybe for the first time we’re actually being honest." Moloney makes a salient point, but while he’s pleased Toadie was chosen to show the psychological impact of a lifetime of heightened soap tragedy, played out in a distressing moment of psychosis while stranded in the outback, he confesses a frustration it wasn’t pushed further. "I think we could’ve done it better," he says, candidly. "Perhaps we avoided really showing what happened. When I watched some of it I knew there was a lot that was cut out, and I was disappointed in that aspect. But the time frames in soap are just silly in terms of telling a lot of story in a very short period of time. "In order to make Toadie’s storylines resonate with the audience over so many years, I’ve had to make them real for me. I’ve taken myself to many dark places within these last six months, there wasn’t a lot of smiling! "I am quite glad now we can wrap it all up and put it to bed. I have a tattoo with the Omega sign on it which people think symbolises is the end of something, but the meaning is actually completion and there being nothing more to add – that’s Toadie and Neighbours. We’re done there." Only in front of the camera, as Moloney is remaining with the show in a different capacity. Like other former colleagues including Kate Kendall (who played Lauren Turner) and Scott Major (aka Lucas Fitzgerald), he’s hopping behind the scenes to become a director. "I’ve started training and I’m absolutely loving it," he beams. "In my first meeting I felt this is where I need to be. I’m looking forward to telling multiple layers of stories and being collaborative, using everything from the script to props, staging, sound, and giving the performers a platform to shape the emotions." It feels a natural progression for someone practically raised on the set of a fast-paced continuing drama, where you soak up every aspect of TV production to the point where it becomes second nature. Moloney was 15 when he started playing Jarrod 'Toadfish' Rebecchi in 1995, although he’d briefly appeared as a different character called Cyborg the year before (clearly he’s attracted to unusual names). Like many future Erinsborough icons who start young on the soap, he learnt from the legends. "I particularly remember watching Jackie Woodburne (Susan Kennedy) and Ian Smith (Harold Bishop) work. They were such skilful performers and could do a range of styles. To be able to hold an audience in silence and with just a look, to take the viewer where you want – that’s what I watched. Also the way they carried themselves on set and their professionalism meant they earned a level of respect." Cheeky class clown Toadie, with his unforgettable 1990s mullet haircut, was an immediate hit with viewers, which Moloney puts down to him being one of life’s lovable losers. "Characters need to have a true core, and he is the underdog you want to see win. That’s how everyone feels about themselves in a way, they’re mirrored in watching Toadie get the win, only to lose again. That’s always been an important trait for him. "And I’ve always wanted to make being on this fun journey entertaining for the audience, and for me, and flip expectations whenever you can." While soap fans sob as Toadie leaves Erinsborough’s cosy cul-de-sac for a fresh start with the rest of the Rebecchi clan in Colac, Moloney is winding up his one-man show, which has been touring the UK over the last month. Toad on the Road is a nostalgic look back at his Neighbours highlights, in which the actor shares stories, spills secrets and bares his soul about life as a beloved soap star. "The idea was pitched to me last November from the team who did the Neighbours Celebration Tour in 2023. I knew I’d be leaving the show by then, so I thought I’m free, why not? "We wanted it to be entertaining but also representative of me and my views, discussing topics like mental health and ADHD that actually matter on more than just a surface level. "It was also about understanding why we make TV in certain ways, what’s the process and structures behind it? "Through vision and soundscapes we built stories to bring TV to the stage. It’s been a really cool and beautiful experience, especially in terms of interacting with a live audience, which is what I grew up doing in comedic theatre as a kid. If this is the last time people see me perform, I’m glad this is what I’m leaving them with." Moloney is thoughtful, creative and curious, and his genuine excitement for the future and passion for storytelling reveal there’s much more to him than his famous alter ego. It's been revealed Toadie will be back for guest stints - and the actor has a clear vision for how this would look. "If he came back, I’d like him to have a bit more resolution over his life. Toadie was pushed to this snap and had to make himself better by way of some hard choices. It would be good to show him come through the darkness and get back to him being that fun-loving character. "I actually think it would be cool to see him in a prequel as a kid before he came to Erinsborough, rocking around Colac on his dirt bike in the early 1990s, his mum shouting at him as he rode off. That would be awesome!" We’ve had Young Sheldon, why not Young Toadie? Anything’s possible… Read more: Neighbours confirms Toadie Rebecchi return beyond exit scenes Neighbours boss explains decision to axe iconic Toadie Rebecchi Neighbours' Ryan Moloney on Toadie's exit: 'We took the character to the limits' Neighbours confirms surprise exit for Toadie Rebecchi – with a happy twist! Neighbours boss plans Lyn Scully tribute after Janet Andrewartha's death Neighbours continues on Amazon Freevee every Monday to Thursday from 7am. Check out more of our Soaps coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on.