True Charity

CHARITY Wakefield seems to have spent most of the last 12 months in a corset. In January we saw her take on the role of Marianne Dashwood in the BBCs lush adaptation of Jane Austens Sense And Sensibility, and now shes back as an Edwardian nurse in Casualty 1907.

It was actually quite an intense experience wearing those uniforms, says the 27-year-old of her nurses costume. You are so strapped in.

Youve got really thick tights, youve got all your undergarments and youve got a very difficult corset to wear.

In Sense And Sensibility the corsets were tight, they are ones that want to pull in your rib cage because the dresses are empire line, but the Edwardian ones come much higher and much lower, so they actually constrict your walking. The breathing is right from the bottom of your lung to the top, so you dont have any choice but to be calm and collected as a woman, she laughs.

You cant run around and be silly.

It forces you to be demure, which is really not very easy for us modern women.

Wakefield plays probationary nurse Ethel Bennett in Casualty 1907, a follow-up to Casualty 1906.

Ethel actually existed 100 years ago, and the drama has been constructed from her diaries, as well as those of other medical staff in the Royal London Hospital, and hospital records and newspapers.

Ethel is new to the East End hospital, and its clear from the beginning that she is intelligent, ambitious and instinctive. When Dr Culpin (William Houston) takes her out in an ambulance to go to rescue some men trapped in St Katherines Docks, something that would have been against the rules for a nurse at the time, she takes it all on the chin.

Her role is more pastoral than medical, Wakefield explains. Shes there as a look-out and if she notices something is wrong, she has to go through all the ranks to be able to tell anybody important. But she pushes the boundaries, almost like a young suffragette, because she wants to be a doctor. Shes unusual because she doesnt just accept the way things are, she wants to be one of the people to try and change it.

Its that refreshing attitude that leads Dr Culpin to take a shine to Ethel. In Edwardian times, it was forbidden for nurses to become engaged to doctors, and in Casualty 1906 we saw Nurse Ada Russell, played by Sarah Smart, having to make a tough decision between her burgeoning career and her love for Dr Walton (Tom Riley). The news is out that, in real life, Ethel and Dr Culpin married and Wakefield says: Its amazing to play a woman of that time who falls for somebody because of a meeting of minds, because she has a similar outlook in life, she says. Even though shes young and making mistakes, he sees in her somebody who has the potential to do something, and if anybody in those times was going to change the role of women in society, it would be people like her.

The role of women was certainly different in Edwardian times, and so too were the procedures in hospital.

Anesthetic had only just made an appearance, and although it may sound ridiculous in 2008, the Matron at the Royal London was among the first to take on Florence Nightingales advice of keeping everything clean and sanitised.

Conditions were tough C the average life expectancy was just 45, and if you did end up in hospital you could expect some pretty severe treatment.

Later on in the three-part series, we see the hospital struggling with funding. At the time the NHS didnt exist, and the Royal London was one of the first hospitals to provide free care for poor and rich alike.

The NHS is something you absolutely take for granted, and everyone feels at liberty to moan about it all the time, Wakefield points out. But sometimes you think, God we dont realise what weve got.

While Wakefield hadnt had much experience of hospital herself before filming, a sad event during the summer when Casualty 1907 was filmed made her realise just how much the work of NHS staff should be appreciated.

My grandfather died in the summer, she says. I hadnt really been in hospital before very much at all, and then found myself travelling up to Liverpool to work in a thing about a hospital and then coming all the way down to East Sussex to be with my grandfather in a hospital. It was very sad and obviously really resonated.

Being there for quite long periods of time and watching how people cared for my grandfather in the modern day, I realised that in some ways, things havent changed.

Nurses are absolutely amazing; they are multi-talented and they have this skill of being able to understand what somebody needs, whether thats being gentle, giving somebody a kick up the bum, joking and making people laugh or just being full of energy.

I dont think Id be able to be a nurse, I dont think Im made of the right stuff.

ö Casualty 1907, BBC1, Sunday, 9pm