All Creatures Great and Small star says 'it's difficult' as she addresses tragic loss
Rachel Shenton, who stars in All Creatures Great and Small, has opened up on the heartbreaking loss she suffered as a child
All Creatures Great and Small star Rachel Shenton has revealed her devastating childhood tragedy, confessing it was "difficult" to express "how hard" it truly was. The Oscar-winning actress shot to fame playing Mitzeee Minniver in Hollyoaks back in 2010, before landing roles in programmes including Waterloo Road.
She claimed an Academy Award in 2018 for her short film The Silent Child, which she penned, produced, and featured in. Rachel, 37, has championed hearing loss charities and mastered British Sign Language following her father Geoff's deafness after chemotherapy treatment. The Stoke-on-Trent-born star, who serves as patron of the dDeaflinks charity in her hometown, was merely 12 when Geoff received his cancer diagnosis.
Heartbreak followed for the actress just two years afterwards, when Geoff passed away.
Rachel, 37, reveals that losing a parent whilst young meant she was "never that hung up on being liked" during her youth.
Speaking to The I, she explained: "It's difficult, in retrospect, to say how hard it was."
Rachel believes her father's death at such a tender age transformed her into a "resilient" youngster.
She explains she began to grasp that "you could have the rug pulled at any point".
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She discovered: "Don't attach yourself to any kind of plan. Enjoy yourself. Do the things you want. Don't pretzel yourself into uncomfortable shapes to please other people."
Rachel's father developing hearing loss "sparked an interest in sign language", she reveals. She "immersed herself" in learning the language and discovered that she "fell in love with it".
She believes it can be a "good way of expressing yourself" beyond spoken language. Rachel's career recently saw her selected alongside the likes of singer Robbie Williams and World Cup winner Gordon Banks for a mural of 100 people to commemorate Stoke-on-Trent's centenary.
Her role in All Creatures Great and Small also coincided with a significant anniversary for the story. The Channel 5 show debuted in 2020, 50 years after Alf Wight's semi-autobiographical books were first published.
The narrative follows a vet's life in the Yorkshire Dales in the 1930s and 1940s. Rachel believes the secret to the show's success has been its simplicity, noting: "The themes of love, community and togetherness don't have a sell-by date."
In the programme, she portrays vet James Herriot's wife Helen. She jests that her role is "cuddler in chief" for the animals on the show.
Rachel often finds herself at the head of an animal that is undergoing an operation. On one occasion, she said producers told her to stop stroking a calf because the animal was falling asleep when it was supposed to appear distressed in the scene.
Rachel will be gracing our screens tonight from 9pm on Channel 5 in All Creatures Great and Small.
