Sponsored by
Meet West Yorkshire's own Hollyoaks actresses
They're familiar to millions as the feisty McQueen sisters on sexy teen soap Hollyoaks. Now West Yorkshire actresses Jennifer Metcalfe and Claire Cooper are branching out.
To say life has been anything but dull for Claire Cooper and Jennifer Metcalfe over the last few years would be something of an understatement.
* Click here to watch latest YEP news and sport video reports.
As Hollyoaks sirens Jacqui and Mercedes McQueen they've been taken hostage, found themselves at the centre of murder plots and notched up a list of conquests as long as your arm.
* Click here to sign up to free news and sport email alerts from your YEP.
"It's been really exciting ever since we joined," agrees Claire during a brief respite from filming new episodes of the popular teatime soap.
* Click here to follow the YEP on Twitter.
"I feel so fortunate to have been doing this for four years and have enjoyed every minute. The storylines have been brilliant – we never know what's going to happen next."
Claire and co-star Jen were first paired together when they were cast as part of the quarrelsome McQueen clan, who landed in the fictional Cheshire suburb in 2006 and immediately started wreaking havoc.
Away from the set they got on like a house on fire, helped perhaps by the fact that they hail from places 20 minutes apart in West Yorkshire.
Claire, 28, is from Sandal near Wakefield, while 26-year-old Jen was brought up on the Holme Wood estate in Bradford.
"We get on really well," says Jen. "We're like sisters in real life as well as in the show. Although we work with each other every day so I suppose we've got no choice!"
For Jen, who plays man-eater Mercedes, life away from Hollyoaks has been almost as dramatic as it has on screen, with regular appearances in the tabloids and magazine gossip columns.
Everything from her on-off relationship with former Leeds United footballer Jermaine Pennant to recent reports that she has undergone liposuction and will be a contestant on the next series of Strictly Come Dancing have kept her in the headlines.
But while some stars would revel in all that attention, Jen insists she could do without it.
"I'd rather it wasn't like that to be honest," she says. "I'm an actress, not a celebrity and I think when you're in the paper all the time it kind of takes it away from what you're really about.
"If you've got an interesting life, which everyone seems to think I have, people are going to talk about it but my acting always comes first."
As far as those Strictly rumours go, Jen's staying tight-lipped. But having been on the stage since the age of 12, she's well used to being in the spotlight.
She went to the Scala Kids stage school in Bradford and landed small parts in Emmerdale and ITV drama Where The Heart Is before putting her acting career on hold to gain some academic qualifications.
"I did a fitness degree at Bradford College but I realised I was really missing acting so I got an agent and then got Hollyoaks almost straight away," she says.
"I never thought five years ago I'd be here now so God knows where I'll be in another five years.
"I think it's good to aim high but also to appreciate what you've got right now and at the moment Hollyoaks is just amazing. It's bringing
everything to my life that I wanted it to."
Claire feels similarly lucky to get her teeth into the role of feisty, tough-talking Jacqui, an ex-con who's never far from trouble.
"She is such a great character and I have so much fun playing her," she says. "The great thing is that she's so different to what I'm like in real life."
The demands of Hollyoaks mean Claire has moved to Liverpool, where the soap is filmed, but she still makes regular trips back across the Pennines.
"I love Wakefield and was back there last weekend. All my friends and family are there and it's still home, even though I'm over in Liverpool."
Now the girls are embarking on an off-screen adventure that's all their own making.
Together with co-star Leah Hackett, who plays fellow McQueen sister Tina, they have opened an online dress hire boutique called The Closet.
The idea is to allow women all over the UK to hire designer dresses once owned by celebrities to lend a bit of red carpet glam to that special occasion.
For 160, you can wear one of Cheryl Cole's frocks; 120 gets you a Tess Daly number, while it's 110 to follow in the footsteps of 90210 star Jennie Garth.
"Basically the idea came from us having all these amazing dresses," says Jen. "We were all round at Claire's house one night and saying how we had thousands of pounds worth of dresses in our closets from award shows and stuff.
"We thought about selling them but then decided it would be better to hire them out, with a percentage going to charity.
"Some of the celebrity dresses have been donated – Cheryl Cole gave us one that she wore on the front cover of Heat magazine – and others we paid a small fee for."
Despite their hectic filming schedules, the girls say they try to be as hands-on as possible at the Liverpool-based boutique.
So most of the time one, if not all three of them, are there to style the women themselves.
"I think knowing a celebrity has worn the dress you're wearing is pretty exciting," says Claire. "It adds a bit of glamour and luxury to a big night out and the dresses are really nice in their own right.
"They're all one-offs and we've been lucky to get support from people like Cheryl Cole, Tess Daly, Kym Marsh and lots of the girls from Hollyoaks. We've just got one of Katie Price's and it's lovely."
But when it comes to recreating the looks sported by their on-screen characters, the girls are understandably less than keen.
Claire admits she doesn't share Jacqui's taste for thigh-high boots, skin-tight dresses and huge gold earrings.
"No, I'm nothing like her," she laughs, "I'm not a scally in real life. I have a lot of fun playing her but I don't think any of Jacqui's garments will turn up in The Closet anytime soon."
* Visit The Closet at: www.theclosetliverpool
com.
grant.woodward
@ypn.co.uk
Email to a friend
Print this page
Looking for...
Featured advertisers
Jobs
Search for a job
Motors
Search for a car
Property
Search for a house
Weather for Leeds
Thursday 24 May 2012
Today
Cloudy
Temperature: 10 C to 23 C
Wind Speed: 12 mph
Wind direction: North east
Tomorrow
Sunny
Temperature: 9 C to 21 C
Wind Speed: 16 mph
Wind direction: East
