18/06/2021
Sally St Claire, who was the first trans gender actor to portray a transgender woman in a British ongoing drama series, has spoken to the ITV programme Loose Women about her journey in soap star land, and the ongoing inspiration she takes from Coronation Street's former trans character Hayley, who was played by cisgender woman Julie Hesmondhalgh. Media analyst site Digital Spy notes that Sally St Claire had helped ITV scriptwriters as they developed the Hayley character, so things have come full circle now that St Claire is popular as Annie Wallace on the Channel Four soap Hollyoaks. Speaking on Loose Women, Annie explained that after the writers created the character, she was brought in to advise, with her own experiences inspiring Hayley's storylines. She told the Loose Women audence that “ they called me in to give advice on how the storylines could be fleshed out in terms of proper legal representation – the facts about it".
