Angela Dotchin

Angela Dotchin won fame on Shortland Street, at the age of 17. Over six years of playing receptionist Kirsty Knight, she survived two crashes, an attempted drowning, a volatile marriage and the attentions of the drug-dealing Greg Feeney (Tim Balme). Three Lawless tele-movies followed; her role as the crime-fighting partner to Kevin Smith's private investigator character won her an NZ Television Award for Best Actor in 1999. Dotchin has also acted in satire Serial Killers, and co-starred as a British spy across two seasons of adventure series Jack of all Trades.

The issue of stardom is one of publicity and hype and b***, but the issue of what actually makes an actor loved by an audience has got very much to do with the heart and that magic behind the eyes. That girl’s got it. Shortland Street producer Tony Holden, on Angela Dotchin