"She's gone, says Sophie Thompson, seemingly pleased that child-abusing psycho Stella fell to her death on her wedding day in EastEnders.

Shed spent the previous months terrorising, both mentally and physically, the young son of fiance Phil Mitchell. Her plunge from a high building put an end to her terrible child-torturing ways.

For Thompson, it was a case of packing her bags and heading for Italy. Days after filming Stellas demise, she was in Florence shooting ITV1s new version of EM Forsters A Room With A View.

If it was a plan, it would be a good one. But it was just way it fell out, just a really lucky thing getting one job after another, which is unusual for me, she says.

To go from Walford to Florence was a real treat, a lovely contrast. It was literally a matter of days and I was in a corset looking over olive groves. It was a tonic to be involved in such an uplifting story after being part of such a sad, dark story in EastEnders.

In the ITV film, she plays fussy, uptight Victorian spinster Charlotte Bartlett, on a visit to the Italian city with her young cousin Lucy Honeychurch. The cast also includes Elaine Cassidy, Timothy Spall and his actor son Rafe Spall.

IN Merchant-Ivorys cinema version two decades ago, the role of Charlotte was taken by Maggie Smith. Thompson has memories of the movie but avoided watching it again because Maggie Smith is so sublime you wouldnt get her out of your head.

She has no qualms about doing another version of the book. I just think its such a good story. Shakespeare, Austen and stuff always gets told again because theyre so good, she says.

Were talking about yarns. When I read A Room With A View again I thought it was a corker and will get told again in another few years and different things will come out because different people will be interpreting the story in a different way.

Charlotte is a very different character to a dark soul like Stella. Maybe she had romantic opportunities and didnt take them. Shes certainly a woman of her times and has that suppressed nature, and her instinct gets stirred in Florence. You peel back the layers, its all part of the job and the fascination of people, says Thompson.

Like many of the characters shes played, Charlotte is a bit flaky. I wonder what thats about? No stretch there, she says with one of the merry laughs that punctuate her conversation.

Making A Room With A View also brought home how nice it would be to play the romantic lead, something that has tended to elude her in her career. I can see the attraction C running into a field of poppies and snogging Rafe Spall. Thats a good days work, she says.

EastEnders Stella was no bundle of laughs, although the actress sister of Emma Thompson knew what she was in for from the start. They had to tell me what the storyline was going to be, because its one of those that perhaps some people wouldnt have wanted to tell, she says.

I can understand that. It was such a challenge and there were some really tricky areas that light could be shone on in that storytelling way.

Joining the cast and having such a major storyline was like getting on a moving vehicle, she says. Everyone was very welcoming and you just have to get on with it. I watched a lot before I started so I could get an idea of it all and be abreast of events in Walford.

I enjoy watching it more now knowing where everyone is and what theyre up to.

One problem was keeping her own children, sons of ten and seven, from watching her EastEnder psycho act. I know a lot of kids do watch it, but its on at 7.30 at the time youre winding down and, ha ha, trying to get the kids to bed, she says.

I thought its not bedtime viewing really, not in our house. They said, please, mummy, can we watch the bit where you jump off the building?. So I said okay and took them through it and told them about the stunt lady.

Normally, her sons Ernie and Walter take what she C and actor husband Richard Lumsden C do for a living in their stride. They know its our job, what we do to buy the sausages, she says.

What has surprised her is peoples reaction to Stella. I thought I would get more people being rotten. But people have been ever so nice really and its not been too bad.

People enjoy a good yarn, thats why EastEnders is so popular because its a series of good yarns. Thats certainly why I enjoy watching telly.

ö A Room With A View: tomorrow, ITV1, 9pm.