15-07-2025
Hollyoaks alum Steph Waring reveals co-stars stopped talking to her after brutal axing from the soap - and slams lack of support for cast after exit
Former Hollyoaks star Steph Waring has revealed her former cast members no longer speak to her following her brutal axing from the Channel 4 soap last year - and admits she's been devastated by the sudden loss of both her career and decades-long friendships.
The actress, 47, who played Cindy Cunningham on and off since 1996, says since being culled she has struggled with crippling insecurity, financial pressures and a lack of 'duty of care' from the industry for long-serving cast members
'I did feel the quiet from the family that I once knew on the show,' she said. 'No one's picking up the phone. No one's checking in.
'Everyone's just getting on with their life. When you're in that Hollyoaks bubble and they call it a family - I feel you're only family when you're in it.'
Speaking candidly on the latest episode of the Secure The Insecure podcast, Steph - who didn't specify anyone in particular - added: 'You pour your heart out to these people and then you go and it's like it never happened. Where did that friendship go? There's only a couple of people I'm in contact with.'
The actress was one of several casualties in the soap's dramatic 2024 cast shake-up and now claims there was a lack of 'duty of care' to help them navigate the aftermath.
'When this whole cull happened, it was across the whole family. There were people from the costume department to sound and makeup that were losing their jobs. What happens next?'
Reflecting on the sudden end to her regular income, Steph admitted the short notice left her financially anxious.
'I got told that I was leaving within twelve weeks... that was no time for me to go: 'What the f*** do I do now? Where's my next paycheck going to come from?' she said.
'Because it's all very well saying, go and get another acting job. But unless you're on a soap or a Netflix series, you ain't getting paid big money. So you have to do something else. You have to wear many hats, so to speak.'
It was revealed in May last year that Hollyoaks had become the latest soap to be hit by stringent budget cuts, with show bosses planning to reduce the workforce by 40 per cent.
Budget cuts forced Channel 4 bosses to carry out a mass axing of cast and crew, as well as scale back episodes to three a week.
Script writers came up with a bizarre plan to 'time jump' the programme by a year, which fast-forwarded 20 characters out of the soap permanently.
As well as Steph, other cast members to be axed amid the mass cull included Ellis Hollins (Tom Cunningham), Suzanne Hall (Suzanne Ashworth), Gregory Finnegan (James Nightingale) and Annie Wallace (Sally St Clair).
The actress was one of several casualties in the soap's dramatic 2024 cast shake-up and now claims there was a lack of 'duty of care' to help them navigate the aftermath
Steph is now retraining as a life coach, studying under celebrity guru Jay Shetty. She said the transition helped her get through a tough period where she stopped going to the gym, drank too much, and struggled with her self-worth.
'I have my bad days,' she admitted. 'I'll stay off social media for a while because I think I look like s***, people don't like my content, I don't know what I'm doing. I'm not Cindy anymore… so what am I doing?'
Her candid admission of crippling insecurity comes as she reflected on her decades-long battle with body image and bulimia, which began when she was a teenager.
And while the mother-of-two now chooses to step away from overtly sexual content, she admits she once loved being objectified.
'When I first started on the show in the nineties, it was all about the lads' mags,' she said. 'That's how you propelled yourself to some sort of status. When I got picked to do Maxim along with all the other [Hollyoaks] girls, I was so excited. I was like, 'Oh my God. I'm going to be a Hollyoaks girl!'
But the high didn't last as Steph was told she had been dropped from the Maxim cover.
'I got a phone call saying I wasn't going to be included on the front cover. They said it was because I had different coloured underwear to everyone else, which wasn't true… I knew deep down it was because I didn't look like everyone else,' she said. 'It still upsets me thinking about it.'
She also claimed she and her co-stars were never paid for magazine shoots or the Hollyoaks calendars.
'Even back in the day, we didn't get paid for any of the lads' mags. I don't know who was pocketing the money but we should have been. That's my only issue with it - pay me,' she said.
Steph, however, wouldn't dream of using her body to make money now - unlike her former Hollyoaks star Sarah Jayne Dunn, who is on OnlyFans.
'I don't think I could ever sexualise myself in that way,' she said. 'I'm nearly 50 and I just don't think that's my angle… Never say never though. People change all the time.'
Still, she admits the transition from soap stardom to normal life has been painful. 'People say a job's a job, but at the same time it is your life,' she said. 'Cindy Cunningham is you. Cindy is the village. It's more than just a little role. It's everything.'
She added: 'It's been a while since someone's asked how I feel. I think I'm definitely a work in progress… But on the good days, I feel unstoppable.'
