Emmerdale has confirmed that Alicia Gallagher and David Metcalfe won’t be attending Leyla Harding’s funeral.
Leyla’s grieving son Jacob shared the news in Monday’s episode, which was released for early viewing on ITVX this morning.
In an emotional scene at the café, Jacob told his friend and love interest Sarah Sugden that Alicia and David had both turned down invitations for different reasons.
Jacob explained: “[David’s] not coming. Alicia’s blaming a broken leg and dad’s using Theo’s illness as an excuse.
“It’s like I’m the only one who cared about her. They can’t even turn up to say goodbye.”
Sarah tried to smooth the waters by pointing out that everyone deals with grief in different ways, but this did little to change Jacob’s mood.
He asked: “How can they be so unbothered? I can’t even bring myself to go home – I haven’t been since.”
Natalie Anderson played the role of Leyla’s sister Alicia between 2010 and 2015. She later returned to Soapland to portray Lexi Calder on Hollyoaks from 2021 to 2022.
Meanwhile, Matthew Wolfenden left the role of David in 2023 after 17 years in the show. He recently revealed that he bowed out to spread his wings in other projects, but was grateful for the door being left open.
Leyla’s funeral airs in this Thursday’s episode (March 6) after her tragic death in the recent limo crash disaster.
At the weekend, Emmerdale released an emotional spoiler clip revealing that Leyla will play a role in her own funeral episode as she provides voice-overs during key scenes. These will be Roxy Shahidi’s final scenes in the role.
