One Neighbours star was left so downtrodden by the direction bosses took her character that she lost thousands of pounds in a failed lawsuit.
Anne Charleston starred as Madge Bishop in the Australian soap opera from 1986 until 2022 – but she sensationally left Ramsay Street behind seemingly for good in the early 2000s after being left fuming at how bosses transformed her character into a “total b***h”.
The star says the soap hit “rock bottom” with one episode, and she certainly wasn’t happy with the direction her iconic character was going in before deciding to return for another stint. Back in 2002, Anne fumed: “Madge became a joke.
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“I’d made her into a feisty firebrand, but bit by bit the writers dismantled her. They tried to change her into a bitch. I argued with them, so they turned her into a victim. Madge had an aneurysm – an enlarged artery. Then she went blind. Then the coffee shop was broken into and she had post traumatic stress disorder… all in just a few weeks.”
(Image: Getty Images)
At the time, Anne took a job on comedy series Dossa and Joe – despite warnings from her co-star Ian Smith that she’d struggle to find other work away from Ramsay Street. She told The Mirror: “It’s such a relief to get away from Madge. Ian Smith tried to persuade me to stay in Neighbours. He has this attitude that at our age we can’t expect to find other work. He thought I was mad for going. Well, I’ve proved him wrong.”
Madge was killed off after a cancer battle in 2001, but returned in 2015 as a figment of Harold’s imagination, returning again in 2022 for the series finale in the same way.
(Image: Handout)
Anne, who has also starred in Emmerdale as Lily Butterfield from 2006 until 2009, even sought legal action against the News of the World paper when it took talk of a soap sex scene too far. The publication had superimposed images of Anne and her co-star Ian Smith’s faces onto models in pornographic poses, which she fumed was defamatory.
But the pair lost the battle, and was forced to shell out £45,000 in legal fees. She later found out her agent was cheating her out of thousands, explaining: “I was working relentlessly. I trusted my agent to bank my money. Instead, she took the panto earnings from an entire year.
(Image: Fremantle Media/REX/Shutterstock)
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“I sued her and I won, but she liquidated her business, so I’ve never seen a penny. When Neighbours asked me back, I didn’t have any option. It was the only way to get back on my feet.”
Despite returning to the soap again, Anne confessed it hit “rock bottom” with one 1990 scene which depicted Labrador Bouncer dreaming of tying the knot with Border Collie Rosie, and welcoming puppies together. Anne said she “cringed” at the scene, which saw the soap “really hitting rock bottom”.
She said: “It was a disgrace because he was such a beautiful dog. He didn’t deserve a scene like that.”
Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
