Former ‘Emmerdale’ veteran Deena Payne has admitted that she’d have liked her character, Viv Hope, to have had made a more dramatic exit.
The soap star made her last appearance as the iconic Viv in 2011, with her final episode seeing the character drink a little too much wine before falling asleep on the sofa.
Viv subsequently died, having not been able to escape a fire that broke out while she slept.
Her funeral was then held off-screen, and speaking on ‘Loose Women’, Deena conceded that she’d have preferred her character’s last moments to have gone a little differently.
After labelling the exit a “damp squib”, she explained to the panel: “There was a little bit too much wine and all of a sudden, I was burnt to death. But there we are.”
Stacey Solomon then asked if Deena would have liked a “bigger, more dramatic ending”, to which she replied: “It would have been nice but I think it was… erm...
“When you’ve worked [in a soap] and you’ve ridden the waves for say 18 years, it’s quite nice to actually be remembered for your exit… Which I will be, because I didn’t even shout ‘help’.”
When quizzed on what she would have liked, Deena said: “A nice build-up to something, like John [Middleton, who played Ashley Thomas] had. Something topical.”
Deena isn’t the first star to admit feeling displeased by her on-screen departure.
Former ‘EastEnders’ actor Danny-Boy Hatchard recently revealed similar sentiments, claiming he felt the soap’s producer “brushed off” his character’s mental health issues.
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