Zack Morris watched knife crime documentaries to prepare for his latest ‘EastEnders’ storyline.
The 19-year-old actor’s alter-ego Keegan Baker survived a neck stabbing last week but his pal Shakil Kazemi (Shaheen Jafargholi) was bludgeoned to death by gang members in brutal scenes, and the former ‘One Night’ star ensured he looked up plenty of real-life examples before playing out the plot.
He said: "I did some research online and watched some documentaries. The show has also been working with Brooke Kinsella and the Ben Kinsella Trust and they’ve have been really helpful with research.
"As an actor, you want to be as realistic as possible."
Zack has enjoyed working with Bonnie Langford – who plays Shakil’s mum Carmel Kazemi – on the storyline, and has hinted his alter-ego will become closer with hers, despite there still being "a clash" between the two characters.
He said: "Bonnie’s great – both as an actress and a person. She’s a legend.
"It’s been nice to work so closely with new people. I’ve worked with Bonnie before but we haven’t had in-depth scenes together.
"It’s always been a bit of a weird one with Carmel and Keegan because she’s never really liked him. You’d think this would give her a reason to hate him even more, but we actually see them interact a lot over the next few weeks.
"There’s definitely a clash there, as there always has been, but Keegan was Shakil’s best friend and she wants to know he’s OK."
Zack admits it is a "privilege" to have been asked to portray such a serious storyline, despite expecting it to be "hard" to get into his character’s mindset for the difficult scenes.
He added: "You have to put yourself in that person’s shoes and with a storyline like this that’s going to be hard, but as an actor it’s a privilege to be doing this storyline."
Zack Morris’ EastEnders knife crime research
