STAR REVEALS
ACTRESS Karen Blick looks back fondly on a winning streak of comic Emmerdale performances – as her plotlines take a darker turn.
The 44-year-old star looks so at home in the soap but she only landed the dream role after two decades of struggling to make it in showbiz, with bit parts and theatre work.
She had given up hope of being a wellknown actress and had done a teaching course by the time she got a four-week stint playing Lydia Hart in 2016.
She said: “There were many times I’d considered giving it up. I even trained as a teacher and did a PGCE in 2008.”
Producers of the ITV soap set round a farming community in the Yorkshire Dales were so blown away by her skills they wrote her in full-time.
She has since won a legion of fans as the ditzy girlfriend of stalwart Sam Dingle, played by James Hooton, 46.
One of the highlights of her time on the show came just last week when Lydia and Sam took off their clothes and streaked through the rolling countryside.
Their hilarious antics – to fulfil a dying wish of Lisa Dingle – had the viewers and colleagues in hysterics.
But now Karen is facing her toughest challenge yet, as a grim new storyline reveals Lydia has lied about her identity and hidden a terrible secret.
She is really Jenny Finn who, as a 15-year-old, delivered her own stillborn baby and buried the body in the grounds of the orphanage where she lived.
Karen said: “When I first heard about the storyline I thought, ‘ What a fantastic opportunity for an actor – amazing’.
“Then the panic set in. I realised I had to do this justice, because the subject matter is so sensitive.
There were times I felt like giving up. It’s a real dream KAREN BLICK ON HER ROLE IN EMMERDALE
JOKING
“It has been so beautifully written. When you read a script and start crying, then you know it hits the spot and you want to do it justice.”
Karen spoke of her joy and pride at becoming part of the Emmerdale cast in an exclusive interview with the Sunday Mirror.
She said: “It was an absolute dream come true. It was wonderful. I’m a Yorkshire-based actress and I’ve got a fantastic role in a Yorkshire-based soap.
“I’d been a jobbing actress for 23 years and had landed some decent roles, but it was hard.
“When Emmerdale came along, I was lecturing undergraduate acting students at my old college in Halifax.”
Karen has navigated funny and sad storylines with equal aplomb but even she was taken aback by the streaking.
She said: “When they first revealed Lydia and Sam were going to streak, I thought the producers were joking.
“We were hugely up for a laugh, so we said we’d do it. Then we found out we had four weeks to prepare, so I stopped eating puddings in
the canteen and biscuits on the tea breaks.”
The pair then stripped down for the scene but managed to cover their modesty with scraps of underwear and an A-Z road atlas.
Karen said: “James had far less on, bless him, he