Jo Joyner has received a "bigger response" to starring in ‘Shakespeare and Hathaway’ than she ever has for reprising her ‘EastEnders’ role.
The 40-year-old actress has returned to play Tanya Cross in the BBC One soap on a number of occasions since she left Albert Square in 2013, but she has been more inundated than usual on Twitter after taking on the role of private detective Lu Shakespeare in the BBC daytime show.
She exclusively told BANG Showbiz: "I’ve had a bigger response on Twitter than I ever have for nipping back to ‘EastEnders’.
"A new audience of people who are around and watching daytime stuff have been watching, or, lovely for us, the snow happened, so people who wouldn’t normally be watching TV in that time of the day put it on iPlayer and caught up with it because they were snowed in.
"So everything was in our favour."
Jo recently starred alongside former ‘EastEnders’ actor Timothy West when he made an appearance in ‘Shakespeare & Hathaway – Private Investigators’ episode ‘The Chimes at Midnight’ as an elderly resident alongside ‘The Windsors’ star Vicki Pepperdine, who Jo was "star-struck" by.
She added: "We’ve had some quality guest stars.
"I think Vicki Pepperdine is phenomenal, I was quite star-struck with her.
"Every week, Mark Benton and I felt really blessed that we had such fabulous people.
"The more people you can get like that who can come in and give you their time and talents, we felt really special that they came to visit."
Jo is now hoping the Stratford-upon-Avon-set series – which sees private detectives Lu Shakespeare and Frank Hathaway (Mark Benton) solving crimes in the medieval market town – will be re-commissioned for a second series.
She said: "I really hope there’s a second series. The figures are really great, they’re really happy with the figures for that slot, and the share was great.
"All those pointing factors seem to be going well.
"I would really, really love to explore the characters a little bit more and see what worked this series and what didn’t.
"That’s the great thing about doing a series again is you can really improve things and give people more about what they wanted."
‘Shakespeare & Hathaway – Private Investigators’ airs at 2.15pm on BBC One until Friday (09.03.18) and the series is available to catch-up on BBC iPlayer.
Jo Joyner’s huge Shakespeare and Hathaway response
