Gemma Merna: 'Some fan requests freak me out!'

Gemma Merna: 'Some fan requests freak me out!'
Gemma Merna: 'Some fan requests freak me out!' (Image credit: TONY BLAKE)

Hollyoaks actress Gemma Merna has confessed she has been 'freaked out' by some of the bizarre fan mail she receives. The busty blonde stars as ditzy Carmel Valentine in the Channel 4 soap and appears on the front cover of the March issue of Loaded magazine in sexy black underwear and suspenders. But while Gemma is happy to flaunt her curves in a magazine shoot and on screen, she admitted she had been made uncomfortable by some strange requests in her post bag. She told the magazine: "One guy did take it a bit far - he asked if he could have a picture of me naked on a rocking horse - that freaked me out!" Meanwhile, 22-year-old Jorgie Porter, who plays Carmel's teenage cousin Theresa McQueen has a problem with female fans, some of whom mistake her for her hard-as-nails character. She recently told Loaded: "This one time, some girl punched me in the arm - I think she thought I was dead hard, like a little toughie with an attitude, but I was like, 'Ahhh. Oh my god, why would you do that?' "And young girls think I'm the same age as them and start getting cocky with me. I'm like, 'Wow, hold on... I'm 22 years old, I don't want to go and get drunk in a park with you!'" Click here to watch whatsontv.co.uk's weekly soaps video preview, the Soap Scoop

Patrick McLennan

Patrick McLennan is a London-based journalist and documentary maker who has worked as a writer, sub-editor, digital editor and TV producer in the UK and New Zealand. His CV includes spells as a news producer at the BBC and TVNZ, as well as web editor for Time Inc UK. He has produced TV news and entertainment features on personalities as diverse as Nick Cave, Tom Hardy, Clive James, Jodie Marsh and Kevin Bacon and he co-produced and directed The Ponds, which has screened in UK cinemas, BBC Four and is currently available on Netflix. 


An entertainment writer with a diverse taste in TV and film, he lists Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The Chase, The Thick of It and Detectorists among his favourite shows, but steers well clear of most sci-fi.