Emmerdale is my life but I am up for Strictly, says actress Isabel Hodgins

Isabel Hodgins (Jeff Spicer/Getty Images)

SOAP star Isabel Hodgins has just clocked up a milestone decade in Emmerdale.

It’s an impressive record – made even more so by the fact she’s only 22!

Isabel plays Victoria Sugden and she’s told iN10 how growing up with the cast and crew on the ITV favourite has shaped her life.

“They’re the people I spend 90% of my time with,” explains Isabel.

“So I think I’m older than my years because since I was 12 I’ve been in an adult working environment.

“But then again actors are a weird bunch of people who are just like big kids themselves.

“I think the younger cast here keep the older ones youthful and older ones help us to find our feet working around adults.”

Isabel – whose first love was dance – didn’t really think of what the future might hold when she was asked to join the ITV soap back in 2006.

“I wasn’t that much into acting, so it was really just a case of seeing how it went.

“If I had been unhappy I’d have said it wasn’t really for me, but everyone was so friendly that I fell in love with it.

“When you’re so happy, why would you want it to end? So every year they’ve asked if I want to renew my contract and I just tell them to show me where to sign.

“When I first started I knew absolutely nothing about the world of TV so I’ve had the opportunity to learn so much.”

And just a few days short of her 23rd birthday, Isabel hasn’t lost her appreciation of how lucky she is to be starring in the popular drama.

“I was in a Nando’s the other day and a girl working there recognised me from the show,” she reveals.

“She was saying she was studying at college and wanted to know the best way to get her foot in the door.

“I just thought: ‘That could be me’.

“If I hadn’t been fortunate enough to get the role at such a young age and had all the experience under my belt then I’d have been in that position.

“So I do feel extremely lucky. I know the business amazingly well at such a young age, having had 10 years of it already.”

Being a soap, there has been plenty of drama chucked at Victoria in her young life, from near-death falls through the lake to much heartbreak.

And this week her relationship with Adam Barton – played by Adam Thomas – is tested again.

“Adam’s lost his sister and his biological father so things really aren’t too good for him,” Isabel explains.

“He ends up having a fight with Ross and Victoria gets caught in the crossfire and has to go to hospital.

“They run through basic questions including whether there might be any chance she’s pregnant.

“She has to admit to Adam that she hasn’t told him, but there is a chance she might be.

“They talk about it and he says they’ll face it however it turns out.

“But while she says to Finn she’d really like to have the baby if she does turn out to be pregnant, she’s feeling that Adam’s not too enthusiastic.”

It’s the latest phase in the relationship between the two and will shape their feelings in the coming weeks and months.

While she admits she does watch other dramas and would like to test her acting mettle elsewhere at some stage, Isabel insists she’s more than happy where she is just now.

But the one thing that’s had to take a back seat is her dancing which she started when she was just four.

Although intensive training is out, she still travels from Leeds back to Manchester every Tuesday night for two hours of rehearsals with her old pals.

And the group still put on annual shows.

As a Strictly Come Dancing superfan, she says she’d jump at the chance to appear on the Saturday night sensation.

“I’ve been watching this year and saying: ‘Get me on that dance floor’,” she adds.

“Soap stars have done well on the show but I wouldn’t want them saying that was until Isabel came along and ruined it!”

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