Bonus Scoop: EastEnders' Nina Wadia

Early last week, I caught up with comedy genius Nina Wadia to chat about her forthcoming storyline on EastEnders, which sees her family's financial crisis reach boiling point and her screen daughter Shabnam (Zahra Ahmadi) leaving Walford.

Click here for the main interview. However, stick around here if you fancy reading some bonus bits. My 'outtakes' include Nina's passion for cooking, her love of comedy and how she'd love to film a special week of EastEnders in Pakistan!

You've got an absolutely great screen rapport with little Maisie Smith, who plays Tiffany, haven't you?
"She's brilliant. She's one of those very, very rare child actors who is extremely natural. It's great to work with her."

Do you draw the inspiration for Zainab from your own experiences? How much like Zainab are you?
"Hopefully as far away as possible from her! To be honest, one of the reasons I chose to do an accent for Zainab was to make myself more different from her. There's a fine line of people out there that confuse the two, but when people do meet me, I hope that people see that we're extremely different. My inspiration from her comes from the writers. We have fabulous writers who have the ability to create this character who can be so blunt and abrasive, but at the same time get away with it because she does it in such a funny way. That's the key to Zainab for me. I want to create a character who people genuinely love to hate. It's fun to play. I've played a lot of nurses and civil servants, who are quite boring, so it's nice to be playing a bitch."

Would you like to see a special week in EastEnders where the Masoods go to Pakistan to visit their relatives?
"Oh my goodness, are you kidding me? That would be an absolute dream come true. I don't know if EastEnders has that kind of budget! It would be great if we could take some other characters with us."

We know Zainab's a good cook. Do you enjoy cooking, too?
"I love cooking, I absolutely adore it. Playing the fear of cooking as an actual fear is not an easy task for an actor! I had to really keep a straight face. That and having to say 'The Book of Spice', was another one where we had several outtakes. There isn't even a name for the fear of cooking, either!"

You've had quite a few moments on EastEnders. Do you miss the type of comedy you used to do?
"Yes, very much. The nice thing with EastEnders, though, is that they do accommodate you going off to do other things. I've got a couple of projects that I filmed prior to joining EastEnders that are coming out. There's a film I did called 'I Can't Think Straight', which is a lesbian comedy, which I hope will be out soon. There's a Radio 4 thing I did called Fags, Mags And Bags, which had one of the writers from Goodness Gracious Me contributing. So, yes, I do miss comedy, but that's why I try and make sure that there's a comic side to Zainab!"

Has there been a standout funny moment on set for you?
"Too numerous to mention! Probably one that stands out for me is my inability to say the word 'clock' correctly. I'll leave the rest to you…"