Kara Tointon has revealed that she nearly quit acting after leaving Eastenders.
The actress, who played Dawn Swann on the BBC soap from 2005 to 2009, admitted that she struggled to find acting work initially following her departure from the series.
Tointon told the Yorkshire Evening Post: "I have had a fantastic couple of years and yet there was a point after Eastenders that I strongly considered giving up on acting and resorting to my plan B, training to be an interior designer.
"At that point, I started to think it wasn't going to happen for me.
"After you've been in a soap, people can assume you can't do anything else, because you're associated with your TV character.
"It can be demoralising, going to audition after audition and getting rejected, and you have to be pretty strong to carry on in this business."
Tointon has since starred in The Sweeney and taken on the lead role in a West End production of Pygmalion.
