INTIMATE SCENES BANNED
EMMERDALE has taken up pole dancing to get the show back filming. Bosses have strict health and safety rules for the cast and crew to make sure they do not break socialdistancing rules. And one sees them tackle “choreography” which uses a two-metre pole so they stay far enough apart. Jane laughed: “We physically bring it out on the set and hold it between actors to make sure they are the correct distance!”
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FANS will be left with a nail-biting cliffhanger in Friday’s final Emmerdale episode before the soap airs its lockdown specials. Andrea Tate (Anna Nightingale) will go missing after husband Jamie’s (Alexander Lincoln) affair with Belle Dingle (Eden Taylordraper) is made public during the Woolpack quiz night.
But fans will have to wait three weeks to find out what happens.
The regular action from the village is halted from next week as the soap airs six lockdown specials they have created to avoid the show going off air.
Over the next three weeks fans will see how characters including Mandy Dingle
(Lisa Riley, right) cope in lockdown during six stand-alone episodes.
Producer Laura Shaw said:
“We’ve got a whole load of scenes we filmed before lockdown and then some scenes we’re working on that we’ll be shooting next.
“On Friday we end on a cliffhanger, then we go into our three weeks of lockdown episodes. When we come back we pick up continuously from that cliffhanger.”
EMMERDALE characters will swap sizzling sex for saucy stares as the soap’s boss has banned intimate scenes from the show.
Executive producer Jane Hudson says her team have shelved plans for characters to embark on new steamy affairs so they don’t break socialdistancing rules during the pandemic.
And it’s not just love scenes – fans won’t be seeing any big bust-ups as physical fighting has been given the red card too.
The move comes as Emmerdale will screen six special lockdown episodes over the next three weeks to show what much-loved characters, including Cain Dingle and Nicola King (Jeff Hordley and Nicola Wheeler) have been up to during the crisis.
When the action returns later in the summer, things will look very different when it comes to love and war.
Jane said: “We’ll have lots of looks of intent, lots of edging towards the stairs and arriving back in scenes as shirts are tucked back in.
“The scenes where we would normally have a fight, instead there will be lots of looks of menace, things being picked up in a menacing way as they walk forward.
“We’re finding ways to do it but I think it’s fair to say that some stories we may hold back on because we really did want to do a big steamy affair or a big fight.
“But we’ve got a storyline coming up which we shoot very soon which we are too far down the line to change, we’re committed to it. So it’s going to be a challenge how we make it work, but we will because that’s our job, to come up with ways of telling stories. “We’ll make it work but intimate scenes will be our most challenging area, that’s for sure.” Emmerdale was the first soap to get back up and running since the country went into lockdown and while the team is working round the clock to film new material, Jane says she can’t rule out coming off air in the future if there is a second virus spike. She said: “As much as we hope we won’t have a break in transmission, and that’s what we’re working towards, the message we’re saying to all our crew and cast is safety comes first.”