Former JFS pupil Melanie Harris has been appearing this month in Eastenders, as Sophie, mother of a teenage killer, in what she says is a “heart-rending” storyline about knife crime.

It is not the first time she has popped up in Walford; a few years ago she played an Aids counsellor in the BBC soap.

She pursued her enthusiasm for drama at the Jewish school, “where I did every play they allowed me to.”

Other TV appearances include The Bill and Holby City and she has been in films such the Anglo-Jewish comedy Sixty Six and Death Defying Acts, about Houdini.