Back to school for Kimberley Walsh who guest stars in Ackley Bridge

Kimberley Walsh will play Clare Butterworth, the feisty ex of Steve (Paul Nicholls) and mother to their child Zak.

Claire is set to ruffle some feathers when she turns up unannounced at Ackley Bridge.   As Steve’s ex, or ‘sly, home-wrecking netball teacher’ as Mandy (Jo Joyner) so delicately puts it, she had an agreement that she would stay away from the school. However, now that Mandy and Steve have split due to Mandy’s fling with Sadiq (Adil Ray), she sees no reason to stay away when she needs Steve to look after Zak, and she jumps at the chance to get her claws back into Steve… and put Mandy’s nose out of joint at the same time.

Will Claire come between Mandy and Steve once again?

Kimberley Walsh says; “It was so much fun appearing as Claire in Ackley Bridge, it’s such a fantastic show with a brilliant cast so it was an honour to be part of it! Claire is quite different to other characters I’ve played in the past. She is sassy and strong and comes to blows a few times with Mandy which was really fun to play. It was great fun working with Jo Joyner and Paul Nicholls on this storyline”.

Series one stars Jo Joyner, Paul Nicholls, Sunetra Sarker, Liz White, Adil Ray, Arsher Ali, Poppy Lee-Friar, Amy Leigh-Hickman, Arsher Ali, return for series two and are joined by Tony Jayawardena.

Ackley Bridge was created by Ayub Khan Din (East is East), Kevin Erlis (Shameless). Executive Producers are George Ormond (National Treasure, Great Expectations), George Faber (Shameless, Skins) and Ayub Khan Din with Alexander Lamb (EastEnders, Waterloo Road) serving as Producer.