- Jacqui Gordon-Lawrence
Jacqui Gordon-Lawrence is a British former actress, most famous for playing the role of
Etta Tavernier in theBBC soap opera "EastEnders ". She no longer acts and as of 2008 works incriminal law .Career
She trained to be a
dancer at theMartha Graham Center of Contemporary Dance inNew York , when she moved there with her Jamaican born parents. However, she felt she was not good enough to excel in this profession, so in 1981 she switched to stage acting and later to film and television.cite book |last= Kingsley|first= Hilary|title= The EastEnders Handbook |year=1990|publisher=BBC books|id=ISBN 0685529576]Her first notable role was in the 1989 film
Strapless , where she played anurse . However, her role in "EastEnders" has been her most notable. She played the school teacher Etta Tavernier from 1990 - 1992, returning briefly in 1994. The introduction of the Tavernier family heralded the first time that an entire family had joined the programme all at once. Their introduction was also a well-intentioned attempt to portray a wider range of black characters than had previously been achieved on the show. During her stint, Gordon-Lawrence's character battled with many family, marital and religious problems, including the abortion of an unborn child, who had been diagnosed withsickle-cell anaemia .Since leaving "EastEnders" she has gone on to appear in the television mini-series "close relations" (1998), the televised film "The Greatest Store in the World" (1999) and an episode of the
ITV police drama "The Bill " (2001). She has been credited in no other roles since this time and as of 2008, she works for Steel & Shamash solicitors in London within their criminal department. She is a credited police station representative, and has expertise in this specific area of criminal law. [ [http://www.steelandshamash.co.uk/our_people/-/page/60/ steelandshamash.co.uk] ]Personal life
She lives in Hayes,
Kent , with the formerboxing champion Horace Notice and their daughters, Naomi and Amelia. Singer and actressMichelle Gayle is godmother to one of Gordon-Lawrence's daughters." [http://www.voice-online.co.uk/content.php?show=3050 MICHELLE MARK II] ", "The Voice". URL last accessed on2007-01-05 .]References
External links
*imdb name|id=0330686|name=Jacqui Gordon-Lawrence
* [http://www.steelandshamash.co.uk/our_people/-/page/60/ steelandshamash.co.uk]
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