A HEART-WARMING story celebrating the triumph of true love will be playing to packed houses in Weymouth this Christmas.

The engaging star of Weymouth’s 2008 pantomime, Beauty and the Beast, is former Hollyoaks actress Jennifer Biddall, who plays the role of Belle opposite the ‘beastly’ Scott Armstrong.

Despite being a major player in one of the country’s most popular soap operas, Jennifer is about as far from your stereotypical television diva as you can get. Prone to bouts of giggles, disarmingly open and happy to laugh at herself, she is the perfect star for a festive family show.

“I have loved panto ever since I was little and my parents took me to see Aladdin in Bristol,” she said. “I had my picture taken with a genie and I had a really bad hair cut.”

Although the haircut may have been traumatic for the young Jen, it didn’t prevent her from deciding that her future lay in acting.

“I nagged and nagged my mum to let me go to Sunday school at the local church,” she remembers. “I don’t think I was particularly religious – I just wanted to be in their Nativity play. In fact, I’m not even sure I lasted long enough to get a part in the play!”

Such early enthusiasm carried on to later life. Jennifer, whose parents live in the Wiltshire village of Corsham, became a member of the Musical Youth Theatre Company in Bath, which also provided a useful stepping stone for the likes of Andrew Lincoln of This Life and Indira Varma, who starred as Niobe in Rome.

She then applied to the prestigious Bristol Old Vic drama school, which only accepts four female students a year, but was initially turned down.

“I thought I should do something after that so I asked the school what was the best thing to do and they advised me to get some life experience,” Jennifer said. “So I went backpacking round the Greek islands and worked in America for a year.”

She then reapplied and got in to the Bristol school where she honed her trade and began the audition process.

“I went for the Hollyoaks audition because I thought it would do me good and be good experience,” said Jennifer. “I didn’t expect to get it and I wasn’t sure it was what I wanted to do – I thought I would be doing Shakespeare or something. But if you get a part in something like Hollyoaks, you don’t turn it down!” For the uninitiated, Hollyoaks is the rather glossy Channel 4 soap set around a higher education college in a fictional Chester suburb.

Originally devised by Brookside and Grange Hill initiator Phil Redmond, it soon became well known for its penchant for tackling sensitive and eyebrow-raising topics before the watershed.

Jennifer’s character, Jessica Harris, was mane-tossing, arrogant and beautiful. A flirt and a tease, she cut a swathe through the show and eventually jumped ship – not necessarily permanently – with £200,000 belonging to someone else.

“I was thrilled to land the Hollyoaks role and it was great fun, but I just wasn’t ready for the exposure you get from being in a soap opera,” said Jennifer. “On my first week of filming, I was in Chester with my co-star Carly Stenson and people were stopping to watch and screaming and shouting her name to get her attention. They ignored me of course, and she said: ‘Enjoy it while it lasts’.

The show, which also stars former Coronation Street bad lad Tom Hudson, is at Weymouth Pavilion from tomorrow until Sunday, January 4. Call 01305 783225 or log on to weymouth.gov.uk