Rita Simmons is still angry that her character Roxy Mitchell was killed off in ‘EastEnders’.
The 42-year-old actress and Samantha Womack – who played her on-screen sister Ronnie Mitchell – both left the BBC One soap at the same time when their characters drowned in a swimming pool in a dramatic episode which aired on New Year’s Day in 2017.
Although Rita did want to leave ‘EastEnders’ after portraying Roxy for 10 years she wanted her alter ego to have the chance to come back to Albert Square rather than exit in a coffin, and even now, almost three years later, Roxy’s death still irks her.
In an interview on ‘Good Morning Britain’, she said: "When we watched it – it’s no secret, we were gutted to leave because we loved our characters and I loved Sam she’s like my best friend and we were this pretend family. We did want to leave but we didn’t want to die."
The two fictional sisters died in tragic circumstances on the day of Ronnie’s marriage to Jack Branning (Scott Maslen).
Roxy, whilst drunk, decided to jump in a swimming pool and when she didn’t resurface Ronnie dived in to save her but she was weighed down by her wet wedding dress and never left the water either.
Rita admits watching the scenes were incredibly emotional for her as she was saying goodbye to a character she had invested so much into and closing a chapter on her career.
She said: "We both watched it when it aired and it was one of the weirdest things, people don’t get how much you invest yourself in the character."
Recalling the day’s shooting schedule, she added: "We laid in the pool for four hours and with floats on our backs and there were divers around us arranging everything and the crane shot you saw came in and it just panned out and it’s us dead."
Rita Simons still upset her EastEnders character was killed off
