Nicola Wheeler thinks women are held to a higher standard than their male counterparts in the TV industry.
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The 46-year-old actress - who plays Nicola King in 'Emmerdale' - has hit out at the way in which female performers are portrayed on screen, and she hopes change is on the horizon.
She told Digital Spy magazine: "Women, for some reason, cannot age and cannot put on weight.
"When men do that, they tend to be seen as more interesting by the industry and they get the interesting roles … there seems to be an attitude that people don't want to see older women on screen, and I'm not so sure that's true.
"I think it's more to do with the attitudes of people who are making things! Maybe that will change as women take on more producer roles."
Early in her career, the soap star was warned about the lack of opportunities available to her as a young actress and she was advised by her drama school that "there just weren't the roles out there".
She added: "I remember that when I was at drama school, we were taken on in a ratio of 2:1. It would be two males to one female.
"Our drama school wasn't being sexist, they were just adamant that unfortunately that was the ratio of the roles available. We were warned as young actresses that there just weren't the roles out there.
"A lot of plays were centred around men, but there weren't as many female roles in theatre. But I do think that is changing now.”
However, Nicola has heaped praise on the soap world for casting women in leading roles, suggesting the audience play an influential role.
She said: "Soap definitely wasn't afraid to say that females could take the central role. I think they realised their biggest audience was probably females!"
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