Laura Burns (Hollyoaks)

Infobox soap character
name=Laura Burns
series=Hollyoaks
portrayer=Lesley Johnston
first=2000
last=2002
siblings=Brendan Shepard

Laura Burns aka Kerry Shepard was a fictional character on the long-running Channel 4 British television soap opera "Hollyoaks".

She was played by actress Lesley Johnston between 2000-2002.

Character's background

Laura arrived in Tony Hutchinson’s student house and soon found herself fending off Tony’s advances. Laura struggled to finance her first year of college, reaching such desperate measures that she stole the cloakroom money from The Loft. She soon had a fit of conscience and owned up to what she had done.

Laura then became friends with Mandy Richardson but then she began to develop an unhealthy obsession with Mandy’s life, which reached its peak when she started dating Luke Morgan. After the relationship fizzled out, Laura continued to drive a wedge between Mandy and Luke, and seemed to enjoy the problems Mandy had when Mandy's brother Lewis Richardson committed suicide. After Mandy and her mother Helen became estranged, Laura filled the gap and enjoyed being part of the Cunningham family.

As Laura continued to control Mandy, Laura's brother Brendan arrived in the village and started calling her Kerry but Laura refused to recognise him. Laura wanted to get away from Hollyoaks and decided to go Cape Town and take Mandy with her. However, when Mandy felt suspicious and rejected Laura, Laura reacted by hitting her on the head with a glass bottle.Laura continued to taunt Mandy as she locked Mandy and herself in Mandy’s flat until Tony arrived with Becca Hayton, Max Cunningham, Adam Morgan, and Brendan to rescue Mandy and get some help for Laura. It turned out that Laura’s real name was Kerry, and Laura was taken from her best friend’s name who had died tragically at the age of 11. Kerry was still recovering from that, and since then, Kerry found Mandy as a replacement to Laura and had more feeling for Mandy than a friend and had tried to keep Mandy to herself. Laura is most likely still in the mental institution she was taken into after trying to kill herself and Mandy.

Trivia

* Actress Lesley Johnston was part of the first Hollyoaks: On the Pull campaign to find new young actors and actresses to appear in the show. The other three chosen were Marcus Patric (Ben Davies), Andrew Somerville (Theo Sankofa) and Elize Du Toit (Izzy Cornwell).

ee also

List of past characters from Hollyoaks