The cast of EastEnders have flooded social media with praise for young actress Aaliyah James, after a powerful episode of the BBC soap.
This week’s episodes have seen Avani Nandra-Hart left traumatised after being strip-searched by police who believed she had been handling drugs after finding a bag of pills at her feet.
The teen was taken in for questioning alongside Amy Mitchell (Ellie Dadd) and Lily Slater (Lillia Turner), who were free to go when their guardians arrived to collect them.
When no one arrived to pick up Avani, police claimed they had no other option but to search her for more narcotics due to her attitude and lack of cooperation.
Later, Suki Panesar (Balvinder Sopal) arrived to take Avani home but was disgusted by the treatment she had been subjected to.
Though Suki was keen to make a complaint, Avani clearly wanted to forget about the whole ordeal. However, she was unable to do that when Priya Nandra-Hart (Sophie Khan Levy) found out what had happened, and stormed over to confront Jack Branning (Scott Maslen).
Humiliated by her ordeal and her mum shouting about it in the street, Avani suffered a panic attack.
Taking to social media after the harrowing episodes, actress Sophie Khan Levy praised the work of her on-screen daughter.
‘Appreciation post for this one!’ She wrote, alongside a carousel of photos of her with the actress.
‘Unbelievably proud of you for taking on such an important and difficult storyline and playing it heartbreakingly well. This is why I love being part of a soap, watching you grow as a performer while Avani grows as a character is something very special and I feel very very lucky!
‘You are a brilliant actor and I absolutely LOVE playing your onscreen mama,’ she gushed.
‘Ps. Thank you for letting me test drive my parenting skills before hopefully having my own one day,’ she added.
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The post was flooded with support from other EastEnders stars, with Balvinder Sopal writing: ‘Absolutely brilliant! Just WOW ladies.’
‘What a duo! You ladies were [fire] tonight!’ Denise Fox actress Diane Parish agreed.
‘Absolutely brilliant performances from one and all,’ Harriet Thorpe, who plays Elaine Peacock, added, while Ravi Gulati actor Aaron Thiara simply said: ‘Ma Girls.’
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