“I had to be horrible, I had to say spiteful, vicious things – some of which I’ve had said to me in the past.” <\/p>
David Ames has described what it was like to play Hollyoaks<\/a> villain Carter Shepherd, who was the central figure in the soap\u2019s disturbing gay conversion storyline.<\/p>\n Carter arrived in the village to take over as headteacher of Hollyoaks High school last year, and embarked on a turbulent series of liaisons with John Paul McQueen (James Sutton).<\/p>\n But Carter hated himself for having feelings for men, and used his position of power to bully teen Lucas Hay (Oscar Curtis)<\/a> into rejecting his sexuality.<\/p>\n After kidnapping John Paul and nearly drowning him, Carter was arrested \u2013 and Ames exclusively told RadioTimes.com<\/a> that portraying this sinister character was \u201cdifficult\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cCarter is someone who really struggles with who he is, so as someone who\u2019s very comfortable with who they are, there was a lot for me to unpick there, with regards to his distaste for the LGBTQ+ community, and how he didn\u2019t align himself with all of that,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, there were really heavy moments where I had to be cruel to people; I had to be horrible, I had to say spiteful, vicious things \u2013 some of which I\u2019ve had said to me in the past.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, to be able to get into that mindset, actually, was quite difficult at times, and was heavy.\u201d<\/p>\n Luckily, Ames and his co-stars knew how to unwind from such distressing material whenever they could.<\/p>\n \u201cBut in between scenes and in between takes, myself, James Sutton, Ellie Henry, we would all lighten things, we would make things fun and mock the situation, as opposed to letting it bog us down.\u201d<\/p> \u00a0<\/p>\n Ames was chatting all things Hollyoaks at the RadioTimes.com<\/b><\/span>\u00a0Soap Awards 2024<\/strong>\u00a0sponsored by\u00a0Inspired Villages<\/a>, where his tale was nominated for Best Storyline and he was up for Best Villain.<\/p>\n Asked whether he was glad to be raising awareness of the dangers of gay conversion therapy, the actor said: \u201cAbsolutely, it is something that is still yet to be made illegal in the UK.<\/p>\n \u201cHopefully, with our new government coming in, that will be something that will happen. It is frightening how this kind of thing happens, and so to be able to shine a light on that, and how easily it happens\u2026<\/p>\n \u201cCarter was someone who had experienced conversion therapy himself, and therefore dived into it and practised it himself, and then tried to do it to Lucas,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, you got to see what could happen to Lucas with who Carter was, and how he struggled and how it broke him. So, I think it\u2019s really important to show all sides of that.\u201d<\/p>\n To find help and support in overcoming conversion therapy, visit Ban Conversion Therapy<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n Read more:<\/strong><\/p>\n Check out more of our\u00a0Soaps<\/a>\u00a0coverage or visit our\u00a0TV Guide<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Streaming Guide<\/a>\u00a0to find out what else is on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to\u00a0The Radio Times Podcast<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n “I had to be horrible, I had to say spiteful, vicious things – some of which I’ve had said to me in the past.” <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":0,"template":"","categories":[1,2,5],"acf":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":false,"thumbnail":false,"medium":false,"medium_large":false,"large":false,"1536x1536":false,"2048x2048":false},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"\"I had to be horrible, I had to say spiteful, vicious things - some of which I've had said to me in the past.\"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/55048"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55048"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55048"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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