{"id":14587,"date":"2022-04-29T10:00:42","date_gmt":"2022-04-29T08:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/?p=1634300"},"modified":"2022-04-29T10:23:10","modified_gmt":"2022-04-29T08:23:10","slug":"glynis-barber-on-terrifying-hollyoaks-role-everyone-is-scared-of-norma","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/rss_feed\/glynis-barber-on-terrifying-hollyoaks-role-everyone-is-scared-of-norma\/","title":{"rendered":"Glynis Barber on terrifying Hollyoaks role: \u201cEveryone is scared of Norma\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By Johnathon Hughes\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Friday, 29 April 2022 at 12:00 am<\/p>

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As introductions go, arriving in a hearse and calling yourself \u2018The Undertaker\u2019 is quite the first impression. From the moment Hollyoaks<\/a>\u2019 newest baddie, Norma Crow, steps out of a funeral car clad in black and delivering threats, it\u2019s clear this is a woman not to be messed with.<\/p>\n

In finding the right actor to play the crime boss, the soap has scored a genuine casting coup \u2013 they needed someone with presence, gravitas and a dash of dangerous glamour. In other words, they needed TV legend Glynis Barber\u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cI wasn\u2019t expecting to end up in Hollyoaks,\u201d admits the star, speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com<\/a> about her new role, following stints in rival shows EastEnders<\/a> and Emmerdale<\/a>. \u201cThey\u2019d approached me in the past about other parts, none of which grabbed me enough that I\u2019d want to commit. Then Norma came along, I read the scripts and absolutely loved the character. I\u2019m very pleased I signed up, I\u2019m really enjoying being evil. Being driven around in a hearse isn\u2019t my favourite mode of transport, but if I don\u2019t look behind me I can pretend I\u2019m in an Uber!\u201d<\/p>\n

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Barber found fame as a cop in hit 1980s drama Dempsey and Makepeace, but nasty Norma firmly operates on the other side of the law. The head of a local organised crime network, she is revealed as the big boss of Ethan Williams and Sienna Blake\u2019s money-laundering activities, disguised as a legitimate tanning salon business. Someone has been skimming off her profits so Norma comes to the village to expose the traitor, and regain control of her territory. The place is notoriously full of incorrigible gangsters like Warren Fox and Grace Black, but Barber promises her alter ego is in a different league.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are quite a few bad boys and girls in Hollyoaks who think they\u2019re a big deal but everyone is scared of Norma,\u201d she grins. \u201cShe is quite terrifying and they\u2019re all small fry to her. She runs a huge criminal empire with contacts and informers everywhere: the police, in prisons. Nothing gets past her and she will spot a weakness and exploit it. Norma is very smart and never wings it. Something she says early on is: \u2018Always do your research,\u2019 if you cross her, she\u2019ll find out everything there is to know about you and use it to her advantage.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve yet to see a soft side and I\u2019m not sure there is one. In her business she can\u2019t afford to drop her guard for a second or she\u2019ll be killed. The reasons she chose this path will become apparent and people will be shocked at the decisions she\u2019s made.<\/p>\n

\u201cI understand why a woman of her age in her profession has to be ruthless, when I started acting in my 20s I had to deal with a lot of challenging behaviours which I would not tolerate now. I\u2019m older and have been around the block, and people don\u2019t speak to me as they did when I was in my youth. All women have to toughen up as they get older in order to survive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Survival is something Barber knows a thing or two about. She\u2019s worked consistently since her big break back in 1981 as sultry intergalactic sniper Soolin in sci-fi cult classic Blake\u2019s 7, shortly after she graduated from drama school. \u201cWe\u2019d go to the old BBC rehearsal rooms in Acton which looked like a classroom,\u201d she recalls. \u201cJust like you do in school the cast would be talking and laughing, until the director got angry with a few of us and said: \u2018If you two don\u2019t stop giggling I\u2019m going to give you separate seats in the space ship!\u2019 It was great fun but I probably didn\u2019t take it seriously enough to be honest.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her most famous role was as haughty English rose Harriet Makepeace, one half of a crime-fighting duo with aggressive American Jim Dempsey in the aforementioned Dempsey and Makepeace, an instant hit when it started in 1985. Not only did it change Barber\u2019s career, it also had a big impact on her personal life as Dempsey was played by her future husband, Michael Brandon.<\/p>\n

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