Emmerdale’s Max Parker nearly played a very different role…

"Originally, I had auditioned to play Jamie Tate, which was funny” he revealed to press including RadioTimes.com. “At the time they did so many rounds, more than usual, and they just couldn't find anybody and I think in the screen test was the first time I saw Alex [Lincoln] who plays Jamie and I was like ‘he's not been in any of the auditions’.”

He didn’t have to wait long to get the role of Luke though, with Parker adding “pretty much when they told him that he'd got that, they said we would like you to play Luke, we've been writing this character, it would be really good for you”.

Whilst the different role meant that he had a bit of a longer wait to start work on the show, it did allow him to learn more about Luke, specifically the villain his character was related to - something he had to keep secret from his new cast mates.

“I didn't know to the extent of what I'd be in the village” he said, “I just knew my relation”. We’d say he landed the right role and it was worth waiting that little while longer!

In the interview, Max also revealed that he hadn’t actually watched Emmerdale before joining the show. He was aware of its significance at the time though. “It's one of those things where it's nice that people will be like oh, you're doing Emmerdale? I watch it all the time. You don't have to promote your job. So yeah, that's nice”.

On working on a soap, Max said that he spoke to others who had worked on the show for advice and he heard nothing but good things about working there. “They work you really hard and it's also a really good learning curve”.

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It’s the complexities of Luke that he has found to be the most rewarding though, alongside the writing for the show which was different than he expected it to be. “Luke's quite a contradiction as a character so there's loads of different avenues you can play. You're really cheeky or you can be really anxious, nervous. Layers like an onion.”

But what's coming up for Luke in the future? Can he live happily ever after with Victoria? Only time will tell...

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