Blast from the Past with Eastenders’ Laila Morse (Mo Harris)
Laila Morse explains why she can’t escape her Eastenders alter ego, and how much she wishes a return was on the cards…
For 16 years, Mo Harris was one of Albert Square’s most beloved residents. She was the backbone of the scandalloving Slaters, the queen of knock-off goods and Fat Elvis’ number one girl. However, when her brother-inlaw Charlie passed away in January 2016, devastated Mo headed off to Spain – and we haven’t seen her since.
“I had no idea that would be the end of it,” shares 72-year-old Laila. “Really and truly, I never left! I think I’m with Kat and Alfie in Spain right now, helping them with their kids. But there was no party or anything like that when I left – and that’s after 16 years in the show!”
It certainly felt wrong that a character with Big Mo’s longevity didn’t get a proper send-off, if the intention was that she would never return.
Fans of the Slaters have a lot of questions regarding Mo, and the fate of her granddaughter Kat and husband Alfie, which appeared bleak at the end of spin off-series Redwater.
“It looked like Kat and Alfie were dead, didn’t it? But were they?” muses Laila. “They could come back to life! I hope they bring us all back – I loved working on Eastenders.”
Laila is keeping busy with a new campaign to encourage smokers to kick the habit for the month of October. Stats show that if smokers quit for 28 days, they are five times more likely to never smoke again. Alongside Corrie’s Kym Marsh, ex-smoker Laila is sharing her story about giving up to inspire others.
“When I was young, everyone smoked, it was fashionable and that’s why I started,” she explains. “I smoked for 50 years, but three years ago my doctor told me my cholesterol was so high that I was on the borderline of having a heart attack or a stroke. I left his surgery, binned my cigarettes and went to buy an electronic cigarette. After two weeks I ditched that too, and I’ve never been tempted since.
That was three years ago.”
Throwing her support behind this campaign is important to Laila. She hopes that her fame as Big Mo might encourage some people to join her, as she knows her former alter ego remains a favourite with fans around the world.
“It doesn’t matter where I go, people say, ‘Why aren’t you in it? When are you coming back? We miss you!’. It happens every day,” says Laila, who is the sister of Hollywood film star Gary Oldman. “I’ve been in LA thinking, ‘No one will know me here’ and someone suddenly shouts, ‘Oi, Mo!’.”
The fans at large aren’t the only people who demand a Mo return – her former co-stars are also keen to have Laila back.
“Jake Wood [Max] tells me he’d like me to return, and Lorraine Stanley [Karen] has said the same thing,” the star tells us. “I love Karen – what a funny character. If I went back Mo could land up being her mate. We could get up to all sorts!”
We’d love to see Karen and Big Mo join forces in Walford, so the campaign to get her back on the Square starts here. However, whatever the future of her character is, Laila made forever friends during her time in Eastenders.
“The best thing about our Slater lot is that it doesn’t matter if we’ve seen each other a month ago or a year ago, it always feels like it was yesterday,” she grins. “That’s the way it is with true friends!”