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Sian Reeves has appeared in a number of high-profile TV series including Hope Springs, Cutting It and Northern Lights. In Lunch Monkeys, Sian plays Gloria, the so-called office manager.

Speaking about the character, Sian says: "Gloria is very, very important to herself and nobody else. She thinks she runs the whole ship but she doesn't.

"She has these underlings, which she loves, because they do nothing and she does nothing. She has never shown them anything or what to do, so really they are not in the wrong because she never lets them do anything.

"She thinks she is sexy, she thinks that she is gorgeous and she has loads of power trips that she does on the youngsters which is terrible and sets them spinning a little bit, I think, but then they get on with it because they are a bit stupid and so is she."

Gloria has a grand but completely unrequited passion for Mike, the boss of the firm played by Nigel Havers.

Sian says: "She is madly in love and in lust with Mike and she thinks anything he says is wonderful, she actually believes one day that she could have a future, marry and have a home with him. There is no way of that happening, she is so common and crude, and she is really a girl from nothing who thinks she has made herself into something with make-up and hair and awfully tight-fitting clothing. I can sort of imagine she has been an employee for 20 or so years and they just can't get rid of her.

"You would get sacked if you were a man doing the sexual advances that Gloria does. She is in the men's faces with her chest all the time, and is always full of innuendos. If it was a bloke he would be pulled up for it. It's very interesting – it's been lovely to play."

In her role Sian worked very closely with the younger cast members and was very impressed by their comedic performances: "Oh they are lovely, I am constantly amused and bemused by them all day on and off screen. They are very good, very talented and they have such a modern way of being and performing. Each one of the boys and the girls is a certain type of comedian and I think they are very brilliant."

Sian is also full of praise for co-star Nigel Havers: "Nigel is naughty. He just tells me all these stories all the time of things he has done and got away with. I thought he would be a bit more aloof, but he's not, he is right in there. He is an absolute joy and such fun to work with."

Sian has recently been seen in Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ One's drama series Hope Springs and working on Lunch Monkeys meant a completely different style of working.

"This is very much a contrast to Hope Springs; I've never really done a proper comedy series, so it's very much a change of rhythm to work with. Usually you learn lines, then you get on set and have a little practice and then it develops from there in but with this you have to have a pitch and style.

"With Gloria, she is so mad that lots of her dialogue doesn't make sense, it's very hard to learn... she's sort of battling on about herself. I've got to learn verbal diarrhoea and it needs to be very quick so it's a whole different experience for me."

Lunch Monkeys is about a group of people finding themselves in a job they don't particularly want and Sian has had experience of being in the wrong job at the wrong time:

"I got asked very nicely to leave once. It was in this bank in Piccadilly and I just simply wasn't good enough. They said I was nice, which was great, but each day I had to look after the phones and touch type all day and I just couldn't. I was awful.

"But I kept smiling and getting tea for everybody and just generally trying to be helpful but just doing nothing. And the next thing it was, 'Look, we really like you but you are going to have to go, we do really like you but you're not quite good enough'.

"But then, my friend got me some part-time work, and all the sex stuff in that office was really there. So I'm aware of all the naughtiness that goes on in cupboards, and suggestions and cheeky lunches with married men. We got away with all sorts by pretending we had a lot of filing to do."