EastEnders star Shona McGarty revealed how she is able to cry so effortlessly when filming emotional scenes for the BBC One soap.

The actress, who played Whitney Dean, is no stranger to having to act out a heartbreaking scene or two, with her Walford counterpart having gone through just about everything that a person can during her 16 years on the show.

Shona delivered some truly remarkable performances along the way as Whitney, who left the show earlier this year, and recently, the soap star was quizzed on how she was able to achieve such levels of emotion during the heightened scenes.

Appearing on RTE show The 2 Johnnies Late Night Lock In, Shona said that when it comes to crying on screen, there are two methods available for stars to use.

‘You can either think of something really sad’, she said, ‘or [you can use] what I like to call the acting stick’.

The 33-year-old removed a tear stick from her top and proceeded to show it to the camera as the show host asked her to explain exactly it works.

‘You just get a little bit like this, right?’ she replied, putting some on the back of her hand and rubbing gently, before placing the substance ‘in the corner of your eye.’

‘It’s a tear stick!’, she said in a ‘voila!’ moment as her eyes started to well up, which received a round of applause from the audience. ‘It makes you cry!’.

Crying for the camera is certainly a skill and Shona isn’t the first star to discuss such a thing and the challenges that come with it.

Barbie star Margot Robbie revealed that she can ‘cry on command’ and often thinks of something really sad, though added that she also has a method of her own in the build up to shooting such scenes.

‘I try not to sleep a lot the days leading up to it’, the former Neighbours actress told TV personality Chris Van Vliet in 2022 when promoting Babylon, which featured a big crying scene. ‘The more tired I am, the easier it is to cry.’

Tom Holland, meanwhile, told Teen Vogue that he no longer has to rely on past experiences to get the tears flowing when filming scenes, as he adopted a breathing technique from Avengers Infinity War co-star Benedict Cumberbatch, in which he simulated laughing.

‘I started doing that and I love crying scenes now,’ said the Spider-Man: No Way Home star. ‘I love it, I feel really confident, it’s something I really feel like I have in my wheelhouse.’

One of the most discussed instances of an actor being able to cry on demand is that of nine-year-old Henry Thomas, who played Elliot in Steven Spielberg’s E.T.

During his audition, Henry improvised and cried, with his performance proving so moving that Spielberg offered him the part there and then.

‘I was blown away by this nine-year-old,’ the Jurassic Park director told Premiere magazine in 1982.

This article was originally published on 8th November 2024.