Former EastEnders actress Tanya Franks – known to millions as the soap’s Rainie Cross – may have reportedly found love with Dame Barbara Windsor’s widower, Scott Mitchell, but it’s her first ever role in a musical that’s giving her butterflies as she prepares to strip on stage.
Tanya heads the cast in a new UK tour of the critically acclaimed Calendar Girls The Musical. She is playing Annie Clarke, who has just lost her husband to leukaemia and who spearheads the idea to strip off for a calendar.
Emily Atack’s aunt and Coronation Street star, Amy Robbins, is also in the show. “We met at a photoshoot to photograph the poster,” says Tanya. “And it was one of those moments where you say, ‘Hello we are going to be working together’ and then find yourselves standing together in your underwear!
It was definitely a baptism of fire to meet each other! “I think we’ll all make friends very quickly and say, ‘I am trusting you with my complete modesty.’ It’s a responsibility for us all but this is such a new foray for me.
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