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WARNING: THIS STORY CONTAINS SPOILERS ABOUT THE SEASON 14 OPENER OF HEARTLAND
Roughly two years ago, Amber Marshall received a phone call from Graham Wardle, the actor she worked closely with for 14 years on the CBC show, Heartland. He had some surprising, and somewhat unsettling, news for his co-star. He was leaving the show.
“He wanted to let me know before he told anybody else,” says Marshall, in an interview with Postmedia late last week. “He and I have a very close relationship, we’ve been great friends for a number of years since the show began. And I was hurt. When he first told me, it stung a little bit. But then, as I had time to process it, I understood it. I understood the journey he was on and that nobody should stand in the way of someone who wants to pursue what their true heart’s desire is.”
So Marshall knew Wardle was leaving before producers of the long-running series did. She also knew long before writers were forced to come up with a satisfying way for Wardle’s character, Ty, to exit the series, which he did in decidedly dramatic fashion this past Sunday. It was no easy task. After all, the relationship between Marshall’s Amy Fleming and Wardle’s Ty Borden had arguably become the true heart of Heartland over 14 seasons. Against the idyllic backdrop of a horse ranch in the foothills of the Rockies, devotees around the world watched their relationship progress from an on-and-off teen romance, to marriage and eventual parenthood. To have the characters go through a quickie divorce or have Ty suddenly journey to Mongolia, as he had in a previous season when Wardle requested some time off, just wasn’t going to cut it.
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