Storylines
Rod first appears in Episode 256 in Albert Square as an acquaintance of fellow punk, Mary Smith (Linda Davidson). Rod is portrayed as a greasy loafer with a heart of gold. Mary has been arrested for solicitation, lost her baby, Annie, to social services due to neglect, engages in prostitution, and uses recreational drugs. Seeing how desperate Mary has become, Rod makes it his mission to help her out of the mess she has gotten herself into. He moves in with her, gets her a job as a cleaner at The Dagmar, and weans her off drugs and prostitution. He also helps in getting her baby back. Annie is now in the care of Mary's parents in Stockport and they do not want to give her back. However, at the end of the year, Mary's father Chris (Allan O'Keefe) arrives in Walford with Annie.
In episode 322, Rod accidentally forgot to pick Annie up from the playground. Mary becomes furious and evicts him. Rod disappears and goes on a road trip. After returning, he refuses to move back in with her and starts squatting in an abandoned flat on the Square. Mary spirals, and Rod's attempts to help fail. He leaves her alone in May of that year and Mary flees Walford.
Rod remains in Walford, as does Mary's father, who employs Rod as his bookkeeper and organizer of his haulage company. Later Rod takes over Barry Clark's (Gary Hailes) market stall. Rod acts against his principles when he is threatened by Brad Williams (Jonathan Stratt), a dodgy member of The Firm, and stitches up local publican Den Watts (Leslie Grantham). The Firm wants Den to take responsibility for the torching of The Dagmar, so they coerce Rod into providing false testimony to the police, which implicates Den. Den flees Walford and manages to escape arrest. When The Firm decides they want Den dead, Rod later gets his whereabouts from Den's best friend Pete Beale (Peter Dean), which leads to Den's arrest and time spent in prison.
Rod starts to become close to Donna Ludlow (Matilda Ziegler), who has recently become homeless, and she comes to live with him in his squat. Donna is widely disliked, and Rod decides to help her become stable. Donna becomes addicted to heroin. Rod tries to get Donna off the drug, in retaliation she plants heroin on him to frame him for drug dealing. Rod continues to help Donna. He rescues her from a vicious gang rape and contacts her parents. In 1989, Donna overdoses on heroin and dies.
Rod takes up lodging with Dot Cotton (June Brown). He becomes involved with Hazel (Virginia Fiol), the girlfriend of Dot's son, Nick (John Altman). Hazel had arrived in Albert Square under the pretense that her baby was Nick's. This later turns out to be a ploy to extort money from Dot. Dot is devastated to learn she has been conned but comes to forgive Hazel and allows her to live with her. When Nick discovers Hazel's deception, he beats her close to death, and she spends time in the hospital. While there, Rod visits her regularly. They briefly become a couple. Rod leaves her, and Walford, in February 1990 to follow a hippy trail in India.
Dennis Alan "Den" Watts is a fictional character from the BBC soap opera EastEnders, played by actor Leslie Grantham. He became well known for his tabloid nickname, "Dirty Den".
Dorothy "Dot" Branning is a fictional character from the BBC soap opera EastEnders, played by June Brown. In a special episode entitled EastEnders: Dot's Story (2003) a young Dot was played by Tallulah Pitt-Brown in flashbacks. A tragicomic character, Dot was known for her devout Christian faith, gossiping, chain smoking, hypochondria, and motherly attitude to those in need.
Mark Fowler is a fictional character in the BBC soap opera EastEnders. Mark, an original regular character when the series started in February 1985, became a semi-regular after his original portrayer David Scarboro was written out of the role in April 1985. Scarboro made brief returns to the role in 1986 and 1987. Scarboro died by suicide in April 1988 and subsequently Mark was recast two years later on his return, with former Grange Hill regular Todd Carty taking on the role. From this point the character was a permanent fixture in the series and Carty remained in the role until the character was written out of the series in early 2003.
Nicholas Charles "Nick" Cotton is a fictional character from the British soap opera EastEnders played by John Altman on a semi-regular basis from the soap's debut episode on 19 February 1985. Altman has stated that his initial exit was due to producer Julia Smith demanding he was written out after he opposed a decision to make his character gay. After Smith's departure, the character made numerous brief or more protracted stints until his onscreen death in February 2015, which was written to coincide with the 30th anniversary of EastEnders.
Demi Miller is a fictional character from the BBC soap opera EastEnders, played by Shana Swash. She made her first appearance on 6 September 2004 and made her last on 7 July 2006, when she was axed by EastEnders executive producer Kate Harwood.
Mary Smith, also known as Mary the Punk, is a fictional character from the BBC soap opera EastEnders, played by Linda Davidson, from 5 March 1985 to 26 May 1988. Punk Mary is Walford's original wild child. She often makes life difficult for herself due to her stubborn, defensive nature and she tends to feel that everyone around her is out to get her. In fact, Mary is her own worst enemy and most of her misfortune is down to her irresponsible behaviour and her inability to heed good advice. Davidson's return to the soap for a single episode was announced in December 2018. She returns for the funeral of Doctor Legg in episode 5871, originally broadcast on 19 February 2019. Davidson reprised the role of Mary again in 2022 for the funeral of Dot Cotton.
Donna Ludlow is a fictional character from the BBC soap opera EastEnders, played by Matilda Ziegler. She appears between episodes 265 and 437 of EastEnders, originally appearing on screen from 27 August 1987 to 13 April 1989. Donna was scripted as a troubled individual, desperate for attention, but shunned by almost all who encountered her. In her storyline, after finding out she was conceived from rape and then rejected by her mother, Donna sets herself on a path of self-destruction. She turns to manipulation, blackmail and prostitution to fund her drug-habit, before choking to death on her own vomit in 1989.
Dickens Hill is a fictional prison in the BBC soap opera EastEnders. The prison is part of a storyline that first aired between 1988 and 1989. The storyline centres on the popular character Den Watts and was filmed on location at Dartmoor Prison in Devon. The episodes were shot in a block of intensive filming, over five weeks, but they were worked into regular episodes of EastEnders later in the year, from September 1988 to February 1989. This was done in order to keep the character Den Watts on-screen after Den's actor, Leslie Grantham, had left the show. Although not part of the original storyline, the prison also briefly appears in 2017 when Max Branning visits his former cellmate, Luke Browning. The prison also appears in a separate storyline in 2018 when Mick Carter is on remand for the shooting of Stuart Highway.
James Willmott-Brown is a fictional character from the BBC soap opera EastEnders, played by William Boyde. The character originally appeared in Albert Square from 1986 to 1989, where he established the square's second pub – "The Dagmar" – and instigated a feud with his business rival Den Watts. Willmott-Brown then developed a romantic obsession with his employee Kathy Beale, which sparked the events of the character raping her in 1988.
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