Emmerdale star Karen Blick's Dingle-inspired wedding to husband who saved career
Karen Blick very nearly didn't land her dream job as Lydia Dingle in ITV's Emmerdale - but thanks to her supportive husband Simon, managed to score the role.
The 49-year-old soap star had tried for years to get her big break, but was on the brink of giving up when ITV bosses came calling. She had even taken a PGCE qualification in 2008 and had been working as a teacher when she got the call to say her audition for the role of Lydia was successful - then had to break the news to her acting students.
"It was an absolute dream come true," she told the Mirror in 2019. "It was wonderful. I'm a Yorkshire-based actress and I've got a fantastic role in a Yorkshire-based soap. I'd been a jobbing actress for 23 years and had landed some decent roles, but it was hard. When Emmerdale came along, I was lecturing undergraduate acting students at my old college in Halifax."
Karen Blick with husband Simon, who refused to let her give up her acting dream (karenblick1/Instagram)
They've been happily loved-up since meeting in 1996 (Anthony Harvey/REX/Shutterstock)And it was all thanks to businessman husband Simon that she never gave up on her dreams, as he was determined she would become an actor. "Simon is incredibly supportive," she went on. "We've had conversations over the years where I've said, 'OK, maybe I'll give this up'. And he's always said, 'Give it another year, stick at it'.
"When we got to go to the Soap Awards together we clinked some champagne glasses and said, 'Can you believe this?!'" She and Simon first met back in 1996 when they were both working for an outdoor children’s pursuits company, and got together after she graduated from acting school. In 2010 they welcomed daughter Ruby, followed by son Oliver in 2014.
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Lydia and Sam Dingle famously celebrated their on-screen wedding by drinking out of a welly (ITV)In between having their kids, the loved-up couple decided to get married - and there was even a hint of the Dingle clan in their 2011 nuptials. "We had a Dingle element to ours. We had been together for years and so we didn't want to spend much," Karen joked to the Sun in 2020, when Lydia married Sam on the soap.
The savvy pair even hunted high and low for the ultimate savings, slashing the price of their 100-guest wedding to under £2,000 after bagging a bargain through voucher site Groupon. Five years later, Karen's dreams came true when she got the nod from Emmerdale - although her children weren't particularly enamoured of her on-screen character.
"When I did my first few episodes of Emmerdale I sat down with Ruby and asked her what she thought. She said, 'Well, it was all right. A little bit embarrassing,'" she laughed. In December 4, 2021, Karen marked their ten-year anniversary with a sweet Instagram post, sharing a black and white wedding pic alongside the caption: "Happy 10th Wedding Anniversary Mr B! Met 1996, married 2011. Two kids, one cat and lots of laughs."
*Emmerdale airs tonight at 7pm on ITV
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