Dales' Gaynor warding off soap gods

Emmerdale's Gaynor Faye has revealed she is taking every precaution to try and save her character Megan Macey from being killed off in the live episode.

The soap is celebrating its 40th anniversary with a one-hour live special on Wednesday October 17, which will include two births, two weddings and a death.

Gaynor revealed: "I do reiki [the massage-based spiritual practice] and I've already done some reiki symbols on the script just to protect myself and the show."

The identity of the doomed character is being kept top secret but executive producer John Whiston hinted: "All I want to say about this particular death is that the writers felt that the character had it coming from the soap gods."

As well as the death, during the live episode Gennie Walker and Debbie Dingle are going to give birth, while Chas Dingle is due to wed Dan Spencer and Katie Sugden is set to tie the knot with Declan Macey.

Lucy Pargeter, who plays Chas, said: "I'm starting to have anxiety dreams about it already, where everything goes wrong. But if it does, we've given it a go, and we're all in it together. Some people will be watching it to see if we go wrong anyway, so at least we'll have entertained a few people!"

But Sian Reese-Williams, who plays Gennie, is rather looking forward to it.

"I really wanted to be part of the live episode because I miss being on stage a lot, and I thought that maybe I'd have one line and be thankful for it, but I'm pleased that we've got a big chunk to do, and a nice one too - Gennie and Nikhil are like the light relief to the drama," she said.

:: Emmerdale's week of birthday drama begins on ITV1 on Monday, October 15, with a live episode on Wednesday, October 17.