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