What memento was EastEnders legend Anita Dobson offered from the Queen Vic?
Anita Dobson reprised her character Angie Watts for EastEnders' 40th anniversary episode in February, and a crew member on the soap, who helped to destroy the Queen Victoria pub for the special, offered her a piece of a dado rail and one of the wall tiles in the boozer.
Anita Dobson got "emotional" when an EastEnders crew member gifted her pieces of the destroyed Queen Victoria pub as mementos.
The 76-year-old actress reprised her character Angie Watts, the first landlady of the iconic soap boozer, for the BBC One show's 40th anniversary episode in February, with the character appearing as a ghostly vision to her daughter Sharon (Letitia Dean) urging her to fight to survive as she was trapped under rubble after an explosion at the Queen Vic.
Anita - who plays Mrs Flood in Doctor Who - was at a fan convention when an EastEnders crew member presented her with the keepsakes, which she thought was the "sweetest thing to do".
Speaking to entertainment reporter Simon Gross at the TRIC Awards at The Great Room at Grosvenor House in London on Tuesday (24.06.25), Anita said: "I did a Comic Con, and a lovely young man came up and he said, 'I hope you don't mind this, but I was a part of the team that destroyed the Vic. And I brought you a little bit of the dado [rail] and one of the tiles if you'd like to keep it.'
"And I got so emotional and went, 'That is the sweetest thing to do.'"
Anita - who played Angie from 1985 until 1988, with the character dying off-screen in 2002 due to alcohol poisoning - agreed to make a special appearance in EastEnders' 40th anniversary episode, which was headed by the programme's ex-executive producer Chris Clenshaw, to bring "closure" for her and the character.
Asked if it was a "big decision" to go reprise her alter ego on the soap, Anita - who is married to Queen guitarist Brian May - explained: "I did a podcast and interview with Lacey [Turner, Stacey Slater], and I thought it was so lovely, everybody was so welcoming.
"And then when Chris said, 'What do you think [about coming back],' we had a Zoom [meeting].
"So in the end, I thought about it, and then I thought, 'Do you know what, it's closure for Angie and it's closure for me.'
"So I said to Chris, 'I would love to do it,' and I had the best time."
Chris created “mind-blowing plot twists and devastating real-life storylines” - with many coming in 2023, such as the return of Cindy Beale (Michelle Collins), the award-winning Loving and Losing Lola plot which saw Danielle Harold depart as her alter ego Lola Pearce, who died of a brain tumour.
Ben Wadey, EastEnders' former Story Editor, has replaced Chris, and Anita thinks he is going to do a great job.
She said: "Ben's lovely too, so I think he'll do a good job."
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