Cherylee Houston has been a part of the Coronation Street family for more than a decade. The actress has played Izzy Armstrong since 2010 and has become a firm favourite with ITV viewers over the years.
She first joined Weatherfield as Kirk Sunderland's new love interest and has gone on to receive praise from critics for her acting - and has even been awarded an MBE. Unfortunately, it has been a while since she has been a permanent weekly fixture on our TV screens.
Cherylee was forced to take a break from filming Corrie during the height of the coronavirus pandemic due to shielding requirements, but has returned for brief scenes via video call. So what do we know about Cherylee's real life?
Cherylee grew up in the Lancashire seaside town of Morecambe and trained at the Arden School of Theatre in Manchester. Before appearing on Corrie, the 47-year-old actress starred in a number of soaps.
In 2001 she landed a part in the daytime TV soap Doctors, playing a girl with multiple sclerosis. More TV work followed, including appearances in The Bill, Holby City, and Emmerdale.
Before she became best-known for her role on the cobbles, Cherylee also played the girlfriend of wheelchair-user Andy Pipkin, played by Matt Lucas, in BBC cult comedy Little Britain. Before her career kicked off, at the age of 23, Cherylee was diagnosed with the rare connective tissue disorder - Hypermobility Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (hEDS) - after suffering from pain as a teen, reports the Mirror.
Since her diagnosis, she has had to use a wheelchair and experiences painful symptoms on a weekly basis. Over the years, the talented actress has worked to promote disability representation on screen and in her spare time has formed the Disabled Artists Networking Community - which provides webinars and masterclasses for disabled artists and connects them with others working in the media industries.
Reflecting on how the health condition has changed her life during an interview with the Mirror, Cherylee revealed: "I wouldn’t not want to have my disability because it’s taught me so many things. Even though the pain is horrendous it’s taught me to push through and it’s taught me inner strength.
"I wouldn’t have the mindset I have if I hadn’t lived through that." At the start of this year, the actress was awarded an MBE (Member of the Order of the British Empire) in the 2022 Queen's New Years' Honours List for her services to Drama and to People with Disabilities.
On her latest achievement, Cherylee said: "Equality and inclusion of disabled people is something that's been very dear to me throughout my career so far. It is so important that we are represented in the media and that our stories are told - disabled young people need to see people like themselves on our screens."
Cherylee has also opened up about starring alongside her real-life partner in Corrie. The actress's husband, Tony Hadoke, is also in showbiz and has appeared in Emmerdale, Shameless, and Peter Kay's Phoenix Nights - in addition to running the XS Malarkey comedy club in Manchester.
The couple filmed scenes in their own home where Toby, who played a concerned neighbour of Izzy, Fergus, was shown protecting the character when she was threatened with the sack for not returning to work during the pandemic, despite having to shield. The storyline exposed the pressures faced by millions of disabled people during the lockdowns.
On how the couple working together came about, Cherylee, speaking to the MEN and other media, said last year: "When you’re in a relationship with another actor, you never canvas for a job on that person’s behalf. But I was very lucky because I have been around and a couple of the writers knew my work and the casting directors probably first saw me about 20 years ago.
"So I think when they were thinking about telling the story, early on they thought they needed somebody else but how will they get somebody else in and one of the writers said well, 'Toby could do it.'"
Toby gushed: "She’s great as well. She’s such a good actor. I think it’s forgotten because she’s so brilliant at bringing attention to the importance of disability representation, she’s really good."
And it wasn't the first time Toby had appeared in Corrie. "If you delve into the archives you know, I once married Curly Watts" he said. I was a vicar."
"They wanted a young vicar at Curly Watts’ wedding. If you go back it was about 747 years ago," Toby joked. "That was just a one-off."
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