Sarah's ready to go five nights a week

WHEN Sarah Baxendale joined the cast of Hollyoaks as resident bad girl, Ellie Hunter, she was prepared for some attention-grabbing plotlines.

But the Salford actress never dreamed her character would end up marrying a serial killer.

"I didn't have a clue. I knew my character always got good storylines, but I never believed it would go to this extreme."

Viewers watched last month as Ellie's husband, Toby, played by Henry Luxemburg, finally told her he was the murderer who has been terrorising the fictional Chester suburb for the past year.

Since then, his stunned wife has been torn between love for her husband and her horror at what he's done.

The soap begins broadcasting five nights a week from tonight and the story is due to come to a dramatic conclusion in a late-night special on Wednesday.

Sarah found filming the climatic scenes a gruelling experience, but is thrilled with the end results. She admits: "It's been draining, but a good draining - it feels worth it.

"We've been doing quite a bit of physical work, which I really enjoy, doing my own stunts and things like that."

Smaller and more delicate looking in person than she appears on screen, it's hard to imagine the petite Sarah in action-woman mode, but it seems the actress enjoys confounding people's expectations.

"I've never liked playing the flower fairy parts," she confesses.

"I know I could look like a typical short, blue-eyed blonde girl, but inside I'm not a stereotypical personality and I love to play roles with real fire and risk.

"I'd rather play the feisty maid than the princess."

Before landing the role of Ellie in January last year, Sarah, 24, studied drama at London's Rose Bruford College and took small parts in Fat Friends and My Beautiful Son, which starred Julie Walters.

She also auditioned for the part of an imprisoned porn star in Bad Girls. While she wasn't successful in landing that role, her stint in Hollyoaks has given her plenty of opportunities to behave badly on screen.

Recalling some of her favourite moments from the soap, she says: "When Ellie was working at the club, I got some great storylines - I had to pole dance and that was really funny."

Calendar

While Ellie may be happy to pole-dance, it seems Sarah isn't quite as much of an exhibitionist, despite recently donning a skimpy outfit for next year's Hollyoaks Babes Calendar.

"I was a bit shocked when I first saw the photos," she laughs.

"I was scared of myself - I wanted to put a coat around me and cover myself up. I didn't mind doing it, though. I'm not a really self-conscious person."

As the calendar proves, Hollyoaks boasts one of the best looking casts on British TV, but Sarah says working on the soap isn't always as glamorous as it might seem.

"Everyone gets the impression that we're all mad and crazy party girls who are out all the time, but we'd get in trouble if we were - the bosses would know.

"We do try to socialise, though, as a lot of people are away from their families and their old friends, so it does push you together and make you closer, especially as we're all living in the same area.

"I live on my own, although I am in a relationship with someone. We've both decided not to tell too many people about it, for whatever reason. I'm not thinking about marriage or anything like that, and I've no time for children yet - I'm too much of a kid myself."

She can't be too specific about her future plans, for fear of giving away too much of the Hollyoaks storyline, but says when she first heard about the current plot, she feared her days on the soap were numbered.

"I thought: 'Oh God, I'm going to be his final victim." But who knows?

"I just love acting. It's what I've wanted to do all my life and I want to try each different field. Everything I've not done, I want to do."