Trevor Morgan (East Enders) - Reception

Reception

Ferns won six awards for his portrayal of Trevor, and was nominated for a further four. In 2002, he was named "Most Hated Soap Villain" by readers of What's On TV magazine, with 21% of the votes. He won "Best Newcomer" and "Villain of the Year" at the 2002 British Soap Awards, "Best Actor" at the 2002 Inside Soap Awards, and both "Best Soap Newcomer" and "Best Soap Storyline" for Trevor's abuse of Little Mo at the 2002 TV Quick and TV Choice Awards. He was also nominated "Most Popular Actor" at the 2002 National Television Awards, and "Best Actor", "Villain of the Year" and "Best Storyline", again for Trevor's abuse of Little Mo, at the 2003 British Soap Awards. Karen Price of the Western Mail wrote in 2008 that Ferns as Trevor had "some of the most dramatic scenes in the history of EastEnders". The domestic abuse storyline received critical commendation for its "sensitive account" of sexual violence, however was also condemned for "symbolising the descent of popular television into distressing and inappropriate material." Boyle gave the storyline a mixed review, writing that Little Mo's attempted murder conviction served to highlight the inequities of the legal system, yet undermined "the more mundane, persistent realities of domestic violence that the soap - patterned on repetition and the deferral of closure - is otherwise well positioned to deal with." In 2012, Digital Spy listed Trevor as one of the "scariest TV characters of all time", saying he "gave plenty of soaps fans nightmares."

"We have no wish to declare particular subjects off limits. We carefully consider each case on its merits, in the context of the audience expectations which have been built up, and having regard also to the general limits understood by the watershed concept. The issue here was not the quality or sensitivity of the drama, but only its scheduling."

—Lord Dubs, chairman of the Broadcasting Standards Commission, on the Trevor-Little Mo domestic abuse storyline.

The episode in which Trevor attacked Little Mo over Christmas dinner was watched by 14.5 million viewers, and voted 57th in Channel 4's 100 Greatest Scary Moments. The storyline attracted so many complaints from the public that the Broadcasting Standards Commission undertook their first study of sex and violence in soap operas in twenty years. The Commission ruled that the Christmas episode, as well as the New Year's Eve 2001 episode in which Little Mo retaliated by attacking Trevor with an iron, should not have been broadcast before the 9 pm watershed. It was felt that the latter episode had a "stark and graphic quality unsuitable for pre-watershed transmission", and while the BSC stated that scenes of domestic abuse were permissible, there were "concern about the intense, disturbing and protracted nature of the scenes portraying Trevor's attacks on Mo". A spokesperson for the BBC defended the scenes as "developments in well-established storylines". They claimed the depiction of abuse was consistent for the series, and that EastEnders viewers expected that seasonal episodes such as Christmas and New Year would always be "overshadowed by crises".

Ferns received a death threat whilst working on EastEnders, believed by police to have been sent from a "crazed fan". He was told to take extra security precautions, including leaving the EastEnders set via the back exit, and not travelling alone. Ferns was surprised by the strength of reactions to his role, and assessed that it was because of the domestic abuse: "You can have violence on screen and it's kind of an everyday thing but there's something about a man hitting a woman, within the confines of their own home, that people find hard to take." The aggression directed at him by members of the public intensified following Little Mo's imprisonment, forcing Ferns to wear a disguise when travelling on the London Underground.