Emmerdale actor Joshua Richards said he was moved to tears as he prepared for a storyline which sees his character become a victim of modern slavery.<\/p>\n
Richards, who plays Bear in the ITV soap, said the storyline, which is currently being aired, was \u201cnot like playing a role in a play where you repeat the same role night after night\u201d.<\/p>\n
He went on: \u201cThis is an ongoing, developing role. And so every time you pick up the script, you think \u2018it\u2019s moved on again.\u2029They have gone to another level, we\u2019ve gone deeper\u2019.<\/p>\n
Modern slavery is alive and well, and it’s horrifying. I think it was very brave for them to bring this subject forward<\/p>\n
Joshua Richards<\/p>\n
\u201cAt times, I just sat home with my wife and just burst into tears and said \u2018where do we go next?\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd as an actor, you don\u2019t really have the opportunity that often to get that deep. So it\u2019s been very important to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
The New Year\u2019s Day episode will see Celia (played by Jaye Griffiths) take great delight in telling Ray (played by Joe Absolom) that Bear is dead.<\/p>\n
Richards, who has appeared in Hollywood films including Troy and King Arthur: Excalibur Rising, said the soap\u2019s writers and producers had done an \u201coutstanding\u201d job in telling the \u201charrowing\u201d story.<\/p>\n
He added: \u201cModern slavery is alive and well, and it\u2019s horrifying. I think it was very brave for them to bring this subject forward and I\u2019m intensely proud of what we, as a team, have done.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a huge collaboration and this is a subject that most of the time is brushed under the carpet. But they brought it to the forefront of our minds.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m very proud to be a part of it.\u201d<\/p>\n
The soap\u2019s producers worked with the Salvation Army on the storyline, and Richards said he found it \u201cvery humbling\u201d to talk to some survivors as part of his preparation.<\/p>\n
He added: \u201cI found it very illuminating. These people who have been exploited, who are not gullible people. They are people who are bright, intelligent and have compassion, were shown a little kindness by unscrupulous people, and then exploited for that.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of people say, well, I\u2019d never be scammed, for instance, online.\u2029But so many people are and they are intelligent and bright. And that is what we\u2019ve got to be aware of in this modern day society. That there are people out there who can show you a bit of kindness, and then they will exploit you for it, and it does happen, and it\u2019s happening now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Richards said he has received plenty of feedback from viewers on Ray and Celia\u2019s characters, adding: \u201cThey can\u2019t wait for them to get their comeuppance.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Emmerdale actor Joshua Richards said he was moved to tears as he prepared for a storyline which sees…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":220122,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[93,61,60,282],"class_list":{"0":"post-220121","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-ie","10":"tag-ireland","11":"tag-tv"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220121","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=220121"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220121\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/220122"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=220121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=220121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=220121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}