Jane Danson suffered a nasty fall on the ice during rehearsals on Sunday ahead of the live Dancing on Ice show. The actress had to be carried off in a stretcher, with an ITV spokesman revealing: "Jane fainted earlier today on the ice during a rehearsal for this evening's live show.
Jane Danson History
"IT'S SAD BUT I'VE TAKEN LEANNE AS FAR AS I CAN"
Coronation Street's Leanne Battersby has stunned producers by deciding to quit the soap.
Actress Jane Danson, who has played tearaway Leanne for three years, said last night: "It's time to move on and explore other roles.
"I'll be sad to leave the friends I've made but I feel I have taken Leanne Battersby as far as I can. I've had tremendous storylines which have really stretched me as an actress."
Frantic negotioations failed to persuade the 20-year old Jane to stay. Bosses of the ITV show even offered to make her it's highest-paid young star. But money was never an issue as she looked to the future.
Jane revealed that she agonised over whether to sign a new contract in July, then resolved not to.
Her move shocked programme makers. They had more plans for Leanne, who has already been controversially involed in abortion, casual sex and cocaine addiction.
Dismayed producer Jane Macnaught has pledged not to kill of Leanne, the first member of the Battersby family to leave the Street.
They were brought in by ex-producer Brian Park in 1997 to give the Manchester-based show a brash new look,
And bosses are sure that Leanne's scandals have boosted ratings.
At 16, she defied her parents and eloped to Gretna Green to marry teenager Nick Tilsley. She later had an abortion in an attempt to save her marriage, but had an affair too.
Three years on Leanne was still causing mayhem as a Rovers barmaid.
She has been caught up in a robbery, beaten and slept with a drug dealer to clear debts.
Now friends say Jane plans a new life in London with her actor boyfriend Robert Beck.
Robert left ITV's Emmerdale last month, in which he played bisexual Gavin Ferris.
A source close to the couple said:
"Jane's been pining for Robert since he moved back to London. They are very much in love and we wouldn't be surprised to hear wedding bells this year.
"Jane loves London and says she'll be able to go out and be ignored, where-as she can get hassle in Manchester.
"Word is that she could pop up in a major BBC series like Holby City, just like ex-Street pal Angela Griffin did."
At the Street's production HQ, Jane Macnaught said: "Jane has show immense commitment to the programme.
"She is a hugely talented actress and we are really sorry to see her go.
"We are leaving the door very much ajar for her to return at any time."
FHM October 1999 - No More Plain Jane
A machine starts bleeping urgently, the defibrillator paddles are warmed, someone shouts "Clear!" - and seven years of RADA training culminate in spasming realistically with a straight face. Jane Danson can claim the battered, bandaged Victim Crown. At the tender age of eight, she was strangled by Robert Lindsay's character in GBH; then she had her legs broken and set in plaster on The Ward; and was hanged in ITV series The Grand. Then, taking the well-trodden path of any female celebrity worth her salt, she was assaulted as a 14-year-old northern runaway on an episode of The Bill. The tragic list goes on and on. "I was always dripping in blood or wrapped in bandages," Jane laughs. "I've been covered in vegetable soup - posing as vomit - so many time, I haven't been able to eat it for years." Her situation hasn't improved much. Now, as rough diamond Leanne Battersby in Coronation Street, she's been impregnated, talked into an abortion against her will, witnessed a cot death and watched her marriage disintergrate. Worst of all, the man responsible was the Street's latest teen pop wannabe Adam Rickitt - but it could have been worse. "In Corie, Linda's just had an affair with Mike Baldwin. That could have been me. I'm lucky in that department - I get all the good-looking ones. I gave a sigh of relief when they handed out that role to someone else." Her thespian ill-fortune had humble beginnings - a voice over for a KP snack promotion as a mewling ten-year-old. "I had to sit there, trying to say 'These are really tasty!' through a mouthful of crisps. It was really naff - I didn't even get any free samples to take home." You may think the trappings of success - her own house in home town of Bury, people staring at her in the supermarket - would compensate for her early disappointment, but the 20-year old still has things to worry about on the nation's favourite soap. "We don't get any chocolate free from the sponsors - Cadbury's - you know. We were all after Easter eggs, but nothing. It's just like the KP snack thing all over again." 
FHM February 1999But while Leanne has more or less put her wild ways behind her in favour of married life, Jane has been single for more than a year. "Not through choice," she sighs, citing pressures of work - although she admits that she's got her eye on someone and is waiting for him to make the first move. "He knows I fancy him," she laughs, her 5ft3in frame shaking uncontrollably. But despite much probing, Jane steadfastly refuses to divulge any other details, except that her mystery man is a celebrity. So until this plonker asks her out, she's spending her nights alone in her new three-bedroom semi near Bury, sharing her pink and pine bedroom with a stuffed bunny to remind her of home. And what do her neighbours think about the famous girl-next-door? "I haven't met them, to be honest," she says, collapsing into another fit of giggles. |
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