Roy Evans (EastEnders) - Creation and Development

Creation and Development

Roy was one of the introductions of series producer Barbara Emile in 1994. He was introduced primarily to be a love interest to Pat Butcher (Pam St. Clement). Actor Brian Croucher was shortlisted for the role; however, the production decided they did not want to use him for the part of Roy, and as Caunter and Croucher shared the same agent, Caunter was suggested for the part and was successful. Croucher was later cast as Ted Hills. Caunter has said that he was only brought in originally as a temporary replacement for Pat's husband Frank Butcher (Mike Reid), whose actor was taking a hiatus "but fortunately the storylines were quite good so they kept me in".

Scripted as a successful businessman, Roy moved to the soap's setting of Walford in 1995. Caunter commented to fan magazine, Walford Gazette: "I think there was that concern in the beginning but the writers created a plausible reason for him to move into the Square. He's from that environment initially; he's an East End boy. He's not a posh gent although he does know about good wine and fine dining. He really loves Pat and she didn't want to leave because her family and friends were there and by then he'd have done anything for Pat. He'd reached a time in his life when he desperately wanted a good home life with a good woman. He was already semi-retired and could afford to sit back and smell the roses, so to speak - and he wanted to smell them with Pat!"

A notable storyline in Roy's narrative is his disclosure to Pat that he is impotent. Caunter believes the writers made Roy impotent because they were concerned about Pat having sex with someone so soon after her husband Frank absconded. The dangers of viagra were explored in the storyline, when Roy, after suffering from angina, illegally buys the drug and suffers life-threatening repercussions, which leads to him attempting counselling instead.

In 2002, it was announced that Roy was being written out of the soap. Caunter said playing Roy had been "the happiest period of my career. We felt we'd done enough with Roy, and it was time for me to move on. I will miss working alongside my screen family and all the team at EastEnders, but I look forward to trying out some new roles." Executive producer Louise Berridge said, "The character of Roy has been invaluable to us. He provides a centre of stability it will be hard to replace, and represents a sense of values we must make sure we retain. I agree that it's time for the character to move on, but we will all miss Tony very much. Apart from being always the consummate professional, he is also a really lovely man, and we all wish him every success in whatever he turns his hand to next." In 2003, it was reported that Roy would depart the serial by being killed off. A source told the Daily Mirror, "He decided to leave the show but wanted scriptwriters to leave the door open for his character to return for guest spots. Sadly, the producers have closed that door by killing him off. Tony is disappointed by the way he'll be leaving Albert Square. He's a popular character and viewers will be sad to see him go." Roy suffered a fatal heart attack following the breakdown of his son Barry's (Shaun Williamson) marriage to Natalie (Lucy Speed), making his final appearance in March 2003.

In 2010, in an interview with website Walford web, Berridge reflected on Roy's axing, saying that she did regret it in retrospect: " personality didn’t generate story material, but in his case he was also beginning to stifle Pat. John Yorke and I share a great passion for the old, wild dangerous Pat who wore the white mac and looked as if she chewed up broken bottles for breakfast, but the Pat we had had become too safe and comfortable. She’d had her affair story with Frank – and since he was and is the love of her life, if she didn’t leave for Frank she wasn’t going to do it for anyone else. To galvanise Pat we had to lose Roy. But I wish now we’d found some other way. Roy had a stability about him that we needed, and losing both him and Mark Fowler (Todd Carty) within a year left us a kind of moral hole in the centre of the show. Those older ‘good’ characters have a role that extends far beyond the immediate gratification of story – as Lou Beale did in the past."