Deena Payne asked 'Emmerdale' bosses not to employ Tony Audenshaw as her on-screen husband.
Tony Audenshaw
The 66-year-old actress played Viv Hope on the ITV soap from 1993 to 2011, and she advised the show's producers against hiring the star to play her hubby Bob Hope, because she thought Tony was "really creepy" during the audition process.
She said: "The truth being there were six people auditioning for Bob and the producer came up to me and said, 'Look, did you have any feelings about any of them?'
"And I said, 'Look, just not number six because he was really creepy.'
"And that was Tony. Anyway, bless him, not that anyone told him and he got the job.
“And in retrospect he was so right. He used to backcomb his hair like Viv did. They were two peas in a pod, they really were."
Deena admitted she was "a bit hurt" by her Dales exit, in which Viv was killed off in an explosion, alongside Terry Woods (Billy Hartman), after a fire at the Post Office.
Speaking on 'Soap From the Box', she added: "That was a bit of a funny thing, my death.
"I wasn’t furious, I was a bit hurt I think because having ridden so many waves and really enjoyed it.
"I was a bit taken aback when I got the script. I was waiting for a storyline to work up and I’d got pantomime because I knew I was going.
"I just went up and asked if I was in anything that week because I’m starting pantomime and she said, 'Oh you’ve gone, you’re not in it.'
"And the script I had got - I didn’t even cry out for help. I just died."
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