Claire: ‘i wish i was more like kim!’

3 min read

Emmerdale turns 50

As Emmerdale celebrates its 50th birthday, actress Claire King looks back on her time in the popular soap and reveals why she loves her character’s mischievous side...

By Alison James

**Getting away with murder: Kim Tate, played by the far more lovable Claire King!**

Claire King didn’t half do herself proud in the action-packed, storm-ridden scenes of Emmerdale’s 50th birthday episodes. As her character Kim Tate, she arrived at her wedding on horseback – ajodhpur-wearing Lady Godiva, no less – but then bravely ventured out into the elements to look for the heavily pregnant Amelia. And what’s more, it was Claire herself on horseback.

“I may be 60 but I do my own stunts!” says Claire. “I wasn’t at all scared – horse riding is one of my passions so I felt perfectly at ease on the horse I worked with. We bonded immediately. He knew I was confident and so he felt comfortable. For me, cantering around on him was absolute bliss and I wish all my days at work were like that. I felt very proud to be so heavily involved in the birthday episodes. It was a real honour.”

I never knew that!

Emmerdale Farm, renamed ‘Emmerdale’ in 1989, was first transmitted in October 1972. It was launched by Yorkshire Television as ‘the living story of the Sugden family – the excitement of country life’ and intended to fill a lunchtime slot, twice a week, for only 13 weeks.

No one actually lives there! It’s a purpose-built set situated in the Yorkshire countryside and is a life-size replica of Esholt, in West Yorkshire, where they filmed the show originally. It took just 20 weeks to construct but the houses look amazingly authentic. “It’s all proper dry stone walling and even the chimneys have smoke that comes out of them, but it’s all fake,” says Claire. “The make-up rooms and the dressing rooms are in the interiors.”

A savage storm destroys the village for the 50th anniversary

PIC: SUTTERSTOCK; ITV PICTURES

The majority of interior shots are filmed at the ITV studio in Leeds.

In The Woolpack, the beer is apple juice while the wine is grape juice, but things weren’t always so innocent. Claire recalls scenes with her late co-star Richard Thorp, who played Alan Tate: “When we were filming in Esholt, it was a real pub and Richard and I would book our lunch and actually order a bottle of wine to go with it, then go back on set in the afternoon. Those were the good old days, you wouldn’t dream of doing that now!”

The Emmerdale cemetery contains real headstones. A London graveyard was cleared for development and the headstones (nothing else!) relocated to the village set.

Twelve wind machines of different sizes were used to create the storm scene. Some were six to eight feet wide and looked like hovercraft fans; they were blown at the foliage, and trees, whipping a realistic wind through the village.

This article is from...

Yours Magazine

18 October 2022

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