Inside EastEnders' Carter family – Hollywood fame, soap exit and hidden tattoos

Many families have come and gone on EastEnders but only a few have made a mark.

One family in particular who have defiantly had their fair share of drama is, of course, the iconic Carter family.

The fiery characters have appeared on the BBC soap since 2013 and have been causing chaos in Walford ever since.

Linda Carter (Kellie Bright) and her beloved husband Mick Carter (Danny Dyer), his mother Shirley Carter (Linda Henry) and Shirley’s sister Tina Carter (Luisa Bradshaw-White) have made waves in Albert Square over the past nine years as well as the rest of the clan.

The family has appeared in a series of high profile storylines including Johnny’s homosexuality, Linda’s rape and Stan’s terminal prostate cancer.

As The Carters are set to find out more information about Tina’s horrific mean, Daily Star takes a look at their life away from EastEnders.

Luisa Bradshaw-White

Luisa Bradshaw-White is famous for her role as Tina Carter, but away from the screen she’s led a fascinating life which includes her loving relationship with her wife, “hellish” battles with her bipolar disorder, and hidden tattoos.

She has been married to her wife Annette Yeo for six years, tying the knot in 2015 when same-sex marriage became legal in the UK.

The couple adopted two girls over 15 years ago – sisters of three and four years old.

Luisa has bravely spoken out about living with bipolar disorder – and this year she published an inspiring essay on the subject to mark Mental Health Awareness week.

“Bipolar took me to a land of hell, that I just couldn’t seem to get back from.

“My highs were so out of control and left me extremely vulnerable and my life was full of fear and anxiety,” Luisa told The Metro.

Luisa recently confessed that she hid some of her tattoos from the TV cameras, but revealed her tasteful ink earlier this year on Instagram.

The actress has got the image of a naked lady meditating underneath a crescent mood, which is etched on the top of her arm inside a shaded triangle.

Speaking of her exit from the soap, Luisa said: “I’m happy with the fact that she can’t come back, so it’s a proper shut door, the final nature of it I needed.”

Annette Bedland

Actor Annette Badland played villain Aunt Babe on EastEnders from 2014 to 2017.

She was last seen when she was thrown out of the Queen Vic by Mick because she served alcohol with breakfast to an undercover detective, landing them a £20,000 fine.

After a fight with sister Sylvie, Babe left her to die by the canal in the rain.

Since exiting the soap, the now 71-year-old signed on to work with The Globe Theatre in London in 2018 in their production of Blanche McIntyre’s The Winter’s Tale and Matt Hartley’s Eyam.

Badland has since appeared in several television roles such as BBC One’s sitcom Not Going Out, ITV2’s Roman sitcom Plebs, CBBC’s The Dumping Ground and BBC One’s comedy Hold the Sunset.

In 2021, she was a nominee at the Screen Actors Guild Award for the Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series for her role in Ted Lasso.

Happily married to husband David Hatton, Annette recently spoke out about death threats she received from angry EastEnders fans over her character’s crooked storylines.

The actress explained that some viewers thought the scripted drama was “real” and they wanted “revenge”. She shared on the Distinct Nostaligia podcast: “People did believe I was Babe, which was shocking.

“Most people loved her and enjoyed the naughtiness of it but towards the end I did have death threats which is very shocking and frightening.”

Samuel Harry Strike

In 2013, Strike was cast in his most famous role to date playing Johnny Carter – the son of Mick and Linda Carter.

But the 27-year-old actor, who was 19 when he began playing Johnny, opted to bow out of the role after a one-year stint, later being replaced by Ted Reilly.

The Essex-born star has since taken on a series of high-profile roles as he continues to break Hollywood and become a movie superstar.

After exiting the soap, Samuel was cast in crime drama film Bonded by Blood 2 and starred in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre prequel Leatherface, alongside Stephen Dorff.

He also starred in Silent Witness in January 2016, and began filming for the Monster Party Movie in 2017. Strike found success on US television almost immediately, having guest roles in popular series Timeless and Mindhunter.

He’s also starred in the horror-thriller movie Monster Party, and sci-fi series Timeless, Mindhunter, and Nightflyers.

More recently, Strike appeared in the first episode of 2019’s Chernobyl, and in 2020 he formed part of the core cast of the American TV series When the Street Lights Go On.

Not much is known about the actor’s personal life, though ironically he briefly dated Love Island star Dani Dyer, who is the daughter of his co-star and on-screen dad, Danny Dyer.

The star also treats fans to some of his photography work on his Instagram account

Danny-Boy Hatchard

Former EastEnders star Danny-Boy Hatchard played Lee Carter in the BBC soap.

Viewers saw Lee unsuccessfully try to kill himself, organise a brutal raid on his own family home and hit his wife Whitney.

Since leaving the show, Danny recently made headlines after opening up about his suicide attempt at the age of 19.

The actor, now 30, was a student when he felt like he “didn’t want to live anymore”.

Danny made the revelation on Twitter, saying: “I remember checking the easiest and most painless ways I could take my life.

“I felt so socially out of my depth that I didn’t want to be alive anymore.”

Danny’s EastEnders character ran away from his mental health problems after a suicide attempt on the soap.

In 2020, he joined the cast of the Our Girl as Private Rhett Charlton alongside his former EastEnders co-star Amy-Leigh Hickman. He later joined four-part BBC1 drama Ridley Road.

Danny recently showed his support for Sheffield Children’s Hospital when he played in a charity football match alongside X Factor winner James Arthur, star of Love Island 2021 Jake Cornish, and Tom Malone from Gogglebox.

Since the coronavirus pandemic Danny-Boy, who lives with his beloved French bulldog, expressed his thoughts on not being able to work due to the restrictions, but after travel measures lifted was able to jet off on holiday to Milan and Cyprus for a break.

Kellie Bright

Kellie is known for her role as Linda Carter on the BBC soap who she has been playing since 2013 opposite on-screen husband Danny Dyer, who plays Mick Carter.

Away from her iconic role, Kellie is a devoted mum to her three boys with husband Paul Stocker. The star recently gave birth to Rudy Joy, who joins big brothers Freddie and Gene Harlyn.

Speaking of her big family, she told OK!: “I know it’s not for everyone and there’s millions of women my age thinking, ‘God I wouldn’t want to go back to that for anything.’ But for me, I just never had that feeling of being done with having children. But now, 100%, I feel this is it and the family is complete.”

Kellie recently spoke out at her frustration at the sexism she faced when she announced she was pregnant at the age of 44.

She said: “First of all, if I was a man having my third child at 44, no one would bat an eyelid.

“Don’t forget my husband is much younger than me,” Kellie added, noting that she and husband Paul had “fertility struggles we didn’t expect”.

The now 45-year-old has seen acting success outside of Walford starring in Bad Girls and BBC radio programme The Archers.

Other TV credits include Holby City, Casualty, The Catherine Tate Show and Vera.

Fans may also remember her from her appearance on the 2015 season of Strictly Come Dancing where she made it all the way to the final with professional partner Kevin Clifton.

Linda Marlowe

Known for her role as Sylvie on the hit soap from 2014 to 2017, Linda Marlowe has led an extraordinary life including four marriages, releasing a hit punk record and surviving a short stint as a drug runner.

Born in Sydney, Australia, fans may not know that Linda was a member of the anti-men punk group The Sadista Sisters in 1975.

“I became a rock chick. We formed an anti-men punk group called The Sadista Sisters. We broke up after one album and three-and-a-half years,” she revealed to the Daily Express.

Including a tumultuous love life, the star also revealed she was once paid £200 to smuggle drugs in her earlier years.

“I was at a party and this guy said he’d pay me if I took a stash of marijuana to Washington DC,” she recalls.

“I had school fees to pay so I agreed.

“In the event, I had nine kilos of hash strapped to me. I wasn’t caught, though.”

Professionally, Linda recently portrayed a 100-year-old circus performer in No Fear!, her one-woman show at east London’s historic Hoxton Hall in September. The show portrays a ‘daring old woman’ on the flying trapeze – a skill she had to learn for the show.

She is noted for her association with Steven Berkoff, performing in many of his theatrical works, creating a one-woman show based on his female characters called Berkoff’s Women, and being referred to as his “muse” by a number of critics

Timothy West

Timothy West is widely regarded as a versatile British actor both on TV, the classical stage and in several other mediums including radio, film and television.

He joined the cast of EastEnders in 2013 playing Stan Carter and filmed his final scenes in February 2015 when his character finally lost his battle with cancer.

Timothy has also appeared in both Coronation Street as Eric Babbage and Not Going Out, as the original Geoffrey Adams.

The 87-year-old has been married to Fawlty Towers actress actress Prunella Scales since 2014 and the pair regularly document their travels on British and overseas canals in the Channel 4 series Great Canal Journeys.

The star recently spoke of his wife’s agonising battle with Alzheimer’s, saying: “It’s been incredibly tough over the past 20 years to see the gradual disappearance of the person that I love.

“But we still enjoy life together and we get away to the Lake District for lovely walks and visit our favourite pub in West Wales.”

The couple have two sons together – Samuel and Joseph.

In 2019 he played Private Godfrey in Dad’s Army: The Lost Episodes, a recreation of three missing episodes of the BBC comedy Dad’s Army.

EastEnders airs Monday to Thursday on BBC One at 7.30pm from March 7

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Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk