Daphne Clarke Characterisation What are Daphne's major character traits? With her spiky hair and bright clothing, Daphne stood out from other female characters on television at the time.
Does Daphne have an outgoing personality?
Does Daphne Clarke have an outgoing personality?
The character of Daphne was introduced to Neighbours as a "saucy stripper with a heart of gold." In their 1989 book, The Neighbours Factfile, Neil Wallis and Dave Hogan wrote that Daphne came from a rich, but uncaring family. They were rarely mentioned on-screen, making her past somewhat of a mystery. Daphne had received a good education and worked in an office as a secretary, until she told her sexist boss to "jump in a lake." Daphne then chose to become a stripper rather than ask her mother, Tina (Beverley Dunn), for a loan. Of Daphne's profession as a stripper, Smith explained "The whole point of Daphne being a stripper is that she's completely counter to the black stockings and garters cliche. She's a bright girl from a good background who gets fed up with being ogled and pinched by men in her secretarial job and says, right I might as well make some money out of it."  With her spiky hair and bright clothing, Daphne stood out from other female characters on television at the time. She was portrayed as a strong, smart and independent woman. She was often shrewd and "a warm friend" to those around her. Tony Johnston, author of Neighbours: 20 years of Ramsay Street stated that Daphne had "an appealing mix of cheek, savvy and the-girl-next-door." She was a woman in charge of her own life, which helped her to become the serial's first "sweetheart." Smith told Kingsley that her favourite aspects of Daphne's personality were her confidence and stubborn streak. Smith also commented that Daphne wore "zanier clothes" than she did and was more outgoing. The fact that she embodied a "no-nonsense approach" to life and was not embarrassed by her profession as a stripper, meant Daphne became an immediate favourite with viewers.  The way she treated the serial's teenagers as adults also endeared her to the younger viewers. Daphne gave up her career as a stripper to run the coffee shop, which her grandfather Harry Henderson (Johnny Lockwood) gave to her, after he won it in a poker game. Kingsley commented that Daphne ran the business like "a pro". Daphne's position in the coffee shop meant that customers often confided in her and she helped mediate between several parents and their children. She also gained the trust and affection of the teenage characters, most notably Mike Young (Guy Pearce), who she took under her wing, later becoming his legal guardian. CANNOTANSWER
She was portrayed as a strong, smart and independent woman.
Daphne Clarke (also Lawrence) is a fictional character from the Australian soap opera Neighbours, played by Elaine Smith. Daphne was created by Reg Watson as one of Neighbours' twelve original characters. The producer had originally wanted Rebecca Gibney to play the role, but she joined the cast of another television series. When Smith came in to audition for a guest part, her appearance, particularly her short haircut, caught the attention of the casting director, who had been looking for an "outrageous image" for the character of Daphne. Smith won the role and she made her on-screen debut in the soap's first episode, which was broadcast on 18 March 1985.

Daphne was portrayed as a smart, confident and independent woman from a good background. She sported a short haircut and bright clothing, which made her stand out from the other female characters on television at the time. Daphne was not embarrassed by her profession as a stripper and her "no-nonsense approach" to life made her an immediate favourite with the viewers. Daphne gave up stripping when her grandfather gave her the lease to the local coffee shop. She used her position to help customers with their problems and gained the trust of many of the teenage characters, particularly Mike Young (Guy Pearce).

Daphne's marriage to Des Clarke (Paul Keane) was central to many of her storylines. After a brief relationship with Shane Ramsay (Peter O'Brien) and two engagements, Daphne married Des in July 1986. She gave birth to their son, Jamie (S.J. Dey), in July 1987. That same year, Smith announced her departure from Neighbours. Not wanting to kill off a popular character, the producers sent Daphne to care for her dying father. However, viewers were not satisfied with this ending and Smith returned to conclude Daphne's storyline. The actress asked for Daphne to be killed off and the producers agreed. She made her final appearance on 25 March 1988, becoming the first regular character to die.

Creation and casting
Daphne is one of the twelve original characters conceived by the creator and then executive producer of Neighbours, Reg Watson. When it came to casting, Waston had initially wanted actress Rebecca Gibney to play the role. However, she joined the cast of children's television series Zoo Family instead. Elaine Smith had previously made several small appearances in various established television series. In 1984, she came in to Neighbours to audition for the guest role of Lorraine Kingham and her short, spiky haircut caught the attention of the casting director, who asked her to do a screen test for Daphne. Smith told Hilary Kingsley, author of Soap Box, "The casting director of Neighbours was looking some outrageous image for Daphne, this stripper – he didn't quite know what, but my haircut was it!" Smith revealed that the idea of playing a stripper amused her and quipped that Daphne was the only stripper who never had to take her clothes off.

Development

Characterisation
The character of Daphne was introduced to Neighbours as a "saucy stripper with a heart of gold." In their 1989 book, The Neighbours Factfile, Neil Wallis and Dave Hogan wrote that Daphne came from a rich, but uncaring family. They were rarely mentioned on-screen, making her past somewhat of a mystery. Daphne had received a good education and worked in an office as a secretary, until she told her sexist boss to "jump in a lake." Daphne then chose to become a stripper rather than ask her mother, Tina (Beverley Dunn), for a loan. Of Daphne's profession as a stripper, Smith explained "The whole point of Daphne being a stripper is that she's completely counter to the black stockings and garters cliche. She's a bright girl from a good background who gets fed up with being ogled and pinched by men in her secretarial job and says, right I might as well make some money out of it."

With her spiky hair and bright clothing, Daphne stood out from other female characters on television at the time. She was portrayed as a strong, smart and independent woman. She was often shrewd and "a warm friend" to those around her. Tony Johnston, author of Neighbours: 20 years of Ramsay Street stated that Daphne had "an appealing mix of cheek, savvy and the-girl-next-door." She was a woman in charge of her own life, which helped her to become the serial's first "sweetheart." Smith told Kingsley that her favourite aspects of Daphne's personality were her confidence and stubborn streak. Smith also commented that Daphne wore "zanier clothes" than she did and was more outgoing. The fact that she embodied a "no-nonsense approach" to life and was not embarrassed by her profession as a stripper, meant Daphne became an immediate favourite with viewers.

The way she treated the serial's teenagers as adults also endeared her to the younger viewers. Daphne gave up her career as a stripper to run the coffee shop, which her grandfather Harry Henderson (Johnny Lockwood) gave to her, after he won it in a poker game. Kingsley commented that Daphne ran the business like "a pro". Daphne's position in the coffee shop meant that customers often confided in her and she helped mediate between several parents and their children. She also gained the trust and affection of the teenage characters, most notably Mike Young (Guy Pearce), who she took under her wing, later becoming his legal guardian.

Marriage to Des Clarke

The first episode of Neighbours saw Daphne hired to strip at Des Clarke's (Paul Keane) bucks party. When the night was interrupted by a neighbour, Daphne left some belongings behind and returned the following morning to collect them. Des's fiancée assumed she had spent the night and called the wedding off. Realising that Des needed a lodger to help him pay the mortgage off, Daphne moved in. Des was instantly attracted to Daphne, but he tried to hide his feelings and became awkward around her. Josephine Monroe, author of Neighbours: The First 10 Years, wrote that the local men queued up to date Daphne, but it was Shane Ramsay (Peter O'Brien) who first caught her eye and they soon began a relationship.

During Neighbours''' first-season finale in 1985, Daphne broke up with Shane and proposed to Des, who accepted. However, on the day of their wedding, Daphne's bridal car was hijacked by a bank robber and she was late to the church. Having been stood up five times in the past, Des gave up waiting and left. The couple failed to sort out what had happened and their relationship ended. Daphne rekindled her romance with Shane and they became engaged, but Daphne became worried about rushing into marriage on the rebound and they eventually ended their engagement. Following advice and encouragement from his mother, Eileen (Myra De Groot), and friend, Clive (Geoff Paine), Des tried to "woo Daphne back."

In June 1986, Stephen Cook from TV Week announced that Daphne would accept a proposal from either Des or Shane, which would definitely result in her getting married. Smith told Cook "I don't know whether Daphne actually needs a man in her life but she's certainly got two men there. It's a triangle that's developed, but to try and give a rational explanation to it is next to impossible." Smith thought Daphne was ideal for Shane and that she had a great deal of love for him. On the other hand, Daphne also loved Des, who she trusted and had become good friends with. O'Brien stated that as far as Shane was concerned, Daphne was the only woman he ever loved and thought that he was more suited to her than Des. Keane commented that despite being engaged five times and stood up once by Daphne, Des had always loved her. He added "It was love at first sight for Des."

Cook later revealed that it was Des who would propose to and marry Daphne. The wedding episodes were broadcast in July and Cook quipped that from the moment Daphne moved into Ramsay Street, there had always been a feeling that she and Des would eventually marry. Despite Shane having once been Des's "rival in romance", he acted as best man. Cook added that the wedding, which saw most of the regular cast on-set, was "no small affair". A few months after the wedding, Daphne became pregnant. Her pregnancy lasted over the usual nine months and Smith explained that the producers had stretched it out for longer, so they could tie it into other storylines. Daphne and Des's son, Jamie (S.J. Dey), arrived in July 1987 and became the first baby to be born in Neighbours.

Departure and death
In 1987, after two and a half years of playing Daphne, Smith decided to leave Neighbours and asked to be written out.Monroe 1994, p.53. She felt that while Daphne had been "a bit of a challenge at first", she felt trapped by her persona. Smith also believed that the role no longer offered her variety and she did not want to stay to be bored, but comfortable. As Daphne was one of Neighbours most popular characters, the producers chose not to kill her off. Instead Daphne's father, Allen (Neil Fitzpatrick), re-entered her life and told her he was dying. Realising that she only had a short time to make her peace with him, Daphne took Jamie and moved away to nurse Allen. Viewers were not satisfied with this ending for the character, especially as it meant Daphne and Des would have to break up, a situation that they would not accept.

Smith agreed to return for a few days in 1988 to finish off Daphne's storyline. This time, the actress asked for her character to be killed off. Smith told Robyn Harvey from The Sydney Morning Herald, "I wanted Daphne to die. I didn't want to be stuck in a television series for the rest of my life. I'd taken Daphne as far as she could go. She's run the gamut of every life experience she could possibly have. I'd had enough." Smith told Nicola Murphy (TV Week) that she would resume filming in February but was not privy to the details of Daphne's final story because producers withheld her scripts. On-screen Daphne was critically injured during a car crash on the way to her father's funeral and she was left in a coma. Off-screen, representatives from the serial's production company tried to persuade Smith to sign a new contract, but she refused. Daphne briefly regained consciousness to say "I love you Clarkey" to Des, before becoming the first regular character to die.

Storylines
Daphne is hired to perform at Des Clarke's buck's party in Ramsay Street. She returns the following morning to collect her watch and emerges from the bedroom when Des's fiancée, Lorraine Kingham (Antoinette Byron), arrives with her parents to call off the wedding. Daphne comforts Des and helps clean up his house. Shane Ramsay, who hired Daphne for the party, flirts with her and asks her to watch him train at the pool some day. He tells her that he wants to see her again and she agrees to go to dinner with him. Daphne decides to move into Number 28 with Des to help him pay off the mortgage. Daphne becomes good friends with Des and she begins dating Shane. Daphne falls in love with Des and after breaking up with Shane, she proposes to him and he accepts. On the day of their wedding, Daphne's car is hijacked by a bank robber dressed in a gorilla suit and she is late to the church. Des assumes that Daphne has changed her mind and he leaves. After failing to sort out what happened, Daphne moves out, while Des's ex-girlfriend, Andrea Townsend (Gina Gaigalas), turns up and claims that Des is the father of her son, Bradley (Bradley Kilpatrick). Daphne rents a room from Clive Gibbons at Number 22 and her best friend, Zoe Davis (Ally Fowler), also moves in.

Daphne's grandfather, Harry gives her the lease to the local coffee shop and she gives up her career as a stripper. She renames the business 'Daphne's' and despite an initial struggle, the coffee shop soon begins making a profit. Daphne gets back together with Shane and they become engaged, but she starts to have doubts about whether she is moving on too quickly. When Des learns that he is not Bradley's father, he tries to win Daphne back. Shane becomes jealous of Daphne and Des's friendship and when he verbally attacks them, Daphne breaks up with him. She gets back together with Des and they eventually marry. Daphne and Des become Mike Young's legal guardians when they learn that he comes from a violent home. Daphne helps Mike when he is banned from seeing Jane Harris (Annie Jones) by her grandmother, Mrs. Mangel (Vivean Gray). Daphne soon discovers that Sue Parker (Kate Gorman) has been sending poison pen letters about Mike to Mrs. Mangel and exposes her. Daphne contracts meningitis, but she recovers and then learns that she is pregnant. Daphne and Des's marriage becomes strained when she learns that he has been in contact with Lorraine. The couple eventually talk and Des explains that he had just given Lorraine some financial advice.

Mrs. Mangel offers to help Daphne paint the nursery and she is knocked off a ladder by Mike's pet Labrador, Bouncer, and suffers amnesia. Mrs. Mangel threatens to sue and Des decides to settle out of court, so that Daphne does not become stressed. But when Daphne learns what Des has done, she is angry with him for keeping it from her. During a picnic, Daphne goes into labour and Beverly Marshall (Lisa Armytage) delivers her son, Jamie. Daphne briefly suffers from postnatal depression following Jamie's birth. During Jamie's christening, Daphne's mother, Tina, turns up. She and Daphne sit down and talk through their problems and part on speaking terms. Shortly after, Daphne learns that her father is dying. Des persuades her to make things right with Allen. Daphne then decides to nurse her father and she takes Jamie to stay with him. Months later, Gail Robinson (Fiona Corke) offers to drive Daphne and Jamie back to Ramsay Street after Allen's funeral. During the journey, they are involved in a car crash, which leaves Daphne in a coma. Des stays by her side and is holding her hand when she briefly wakes up to tell him that she loves him. Daphne then suffers a cardiac arrest and dies.

Reception
Josephine Monroe, author of Neighbours: The First 10 Years, stated that Daphne became one of the most popular and colourful characters to have been in Neighbours. While reviewing the show's early episodes, Newsday'''s Terry Kelleher thought Daphne was "surprisingly wholesome for a stripteaser, preferring housecleaning to home-wrecking." A writer for the BBC's Neighbours website thought Daphne's most notable moment was "Going into labour with Jamie at a riverside picnic." 

Claudia Pattison from mobile network operator Orange branded Des and Daphne one of the most popular couples in the serial's history, while a Virgin Media writer thought that they had "one of soapland's happiest marriages". The Sydney Morning Herald's Michael Idato called them Neighbours first supercouple. Mary Fletcher from Inside Soap commented that Des and Daphne's troubled romance was "one of Neighbours' best storylines." The couple's wedding gained a lot of attention in the UK and Terry Wogan even discussed the episode with Rolf Harris on his talk show the day after it aired.

Tim Teeman and James Jackson from The Times named Daphne's death as one of their top 15 most memorable Neighbours moments. They commented "Like, was that her in the bed or an actress with a Daphne wig? The romance of Des and Daphne (Mr Ordinary and the ex-stripper) was an early Neighbours classic so we felt this one hard". A Herald Sun reporter also included Daphne's death in their list of top ten Neighbours moments. The reporter wrote that Daphne was a popular character during the serial's peak in 1988 and called Des "her soulmate". They added that her death was watched by millions of viewers in Australia and the UK.

Sarah Megginson from SheKnows placed Daphne's death at number three in her feature on the eight most memorable Neighbours moments. She called the relationship between Daphne and Des "one of the series' classic romances." She added "The couple were the first to tie the knot on the show, so when Daphne was fatally hit by a car, Des – and the Neighbours viewing audience across Australia and the UK – was suitably devastated. A columnist from NOW said that the moment Daphne dies was "a tear-jerking moment."

References

Bibliography

External links
Daphne Clarke at BBC Online

Neighbours characters
Fictional erotic dancers
Television characters introduced in 1985
Female characters in television
Daphne Crane (née Moon; born September 1961) is a fictional character on the American television sitcom Frasier, played by Jane Leeves. An English immigrant from Manchester, Daphne is employed by Frasier as a live-in housekeeper and physical therapist for his father, Martin. Her relationship with Frasier's brother Niles is a major plotline of the series, progressing from Niles' secret infatuation to their eventual marriage later in the show.

Biography 
Daphne was born in September 1961 in Manchester, the only daughter in a family of nine children. She spent much of her childhood playing nurse and housemaid to her brothers. She has a complex love-hate relationship with her domineering mother, Gertrude Moon; her relationship with her father, Harry Moon, is much warmer and closer.

As a young girl, Daphne's early career was as an actress in the hit British sitcom Mind Your Knickers (a show about 12-year-olds in a private girls' boarding school). Her career ended at age 16 when she became too tall and busty to play her shorter pre-teen character. During her youth, she gained considerable skill at billiards and darts, claiming to have won many tournaments. She also raised show rats, was a member of the Manchester Light Opera Works, and was a skilled shoplifter.

As an adult, Daphne takes up a career as a physical therapist, working one-on-one with various invalids and shut-ins. At an undisclosed time, she migrates to America to live in Seattle, seeking a new life free of her domineering family. Her first job in America is at a convenience store, and it is implied she once shoplifted there. In the third season finale, "You Can Go Home Again", it is revealed that prior to being interviewed and hired by the Cranes, she had a chance encounter with them at Cafe Nervosa. In the series premiere, "The Good Son", Daphne is hired by Frasier to assist his father, Martin, with his daily activities and exercises; Martin suffers pain and discomfort from a gunshot wound to his hip that forced him to retire from the Seattle Police Department. Although Frasier is initially less than impressed with her, Martin takes a liking to her sense of humor and convinces Frasier to hire her and make her position a live-in one.

Personality 
Daphne is mostly portrayed as kind and down-to-earth, often perplexed and exasperated by Frasier's snobbery and pretension. In the earlier seasons, Daphne portrays herself as a no-nonsense physical therapist with Martin. Although they fight and bicker over Martin's therapy sessions, she gets along with Martin well and acts as his caregiver and constant companion.

Like most characters on Frasier, Daphne has many eccentricities. She often tells rambling stories about her family, cheerfully remembering rather grim or traumatic events, to the considerable discomfort of the Crane family. She is also a firm believer in the supernatural, and believes herself to be "a bit psychic". Daphne's apparent psychic abilities are often treated with ambiguity on the show, and her various "visions" are sometimes shown to have come true, sometimes in a roundabout way and sometimes very accurately. As the series progresses, Daphne's psychic abilities are considerably downplayed. In the season 8 episode "The Wizard and Roz", Niles hires a paranormal expert to assess whether or not Daphne truly has any psychic abilities. During the course of her discussion with the expert, Daphne implies that her grandmother told her she had psychic abilities.

Role on the series 
Like Martin, Daphne acts as a working class foil to Frasier and Niles's upper-class snobbery, while also vexing Frasier's scientific views with her eccentric behavior. As the show progressed and this aspect of her character was toned down, more focus was put on her relationships with the other characters.

Daphne's most significant developing relationship over the course of the series is with Frasier Crane's younger brother, Niles. Unbeknownst to Daphne, Niles falls in love with her in the third episode, when they first meet. Despite how Niles shows more and more signs of being infatuated with her, she remains completely oblivious to this, though they become increasingly close friends. Niles says nothing to Daphne, at first because he is married, later because she is involved with numerous (frequently unsuccessful) relationships with other men. Even when she is not, Frasier has one excuse or another to prevent Niles from telling her anything.

Niles' feelings are ultimately, and accidentally, revealed by Frasier in season 7. Shocked to discover Niles's true feelings towards her, Daphne finds herself falling in love with Niles in return, placing her in the position Niles had been in for many years: in love with someone unaware of her true feelings. Daphne realizes her feelings after a court-ordered therapy session stemming from an incident where Daphne caused a dangerous traffic jam by throwing a neighbor's laundry off Frasier's balcony; the therapist points out that the entire chain of events leading to the incident was set off by Daphne's decision to wear her "best dress" while giving Niles a cooking lesson.

Heartbroken to discover that he had, on impulse, married his girlfriend Mel, Daphne intends to go ahead with her own marriage to Niles's divorce lawyer Donny Douglas (Saul Rubinek), until Frasier intervenes. In a four-part episode closing Season 7 and opening Season 8, Niles finally confesses his feelings to her, and although she initially tells him both of them are better off staying with their current partners (each having made a serious commitment), Daphne changes her mind by the next morning, abandoning Donny at the altar, to Niles' delight. Niles and Daphne have a precarious courtship during season 8 after Mel forbids Niles from being seen in public with Daphne, and Donny retaliates with a lawsuit for the being left at the altar after Frasier confesses to Donny that he was the instigator of the breakup. Tensions arise, with Daphne blaming Niles for all their new relationship problems.

Shortly thereafter, she gains 60 pounds, but Niles is so blinded by love that he does not notice until Daphne falls to the floor and is too heavy to get up without the help of Frasier, Niles, and Martin (who remarks that "it took three Cranes to lift her"). The weight problem was written into the show to allow Leeves to continue working while pregnant. Daphne then leaves for several weeks to attend a "spa for fat people" and returns with her figure restored. Her therapist at the spa tells her that she began over-eating to create distance between herself and Niles because she was afraid that she wouldn't be able to live up to Niles's lofty expectations after he spent the last seven years believing she was perfect ("Daphne Returns"). During the episode "It Takes Two to Tangle" in which she did not appear while at the resort, Niles tells Roz that Daphne had lost 9 pounds, 12 ounces (the weight of Leeves's baby in real life).

At some point in Season 10, she becomes a U.S. citizen (her lack of citizenship having set up some humorous situations in earlier seasons). In the first episode of Season 10, Daphne and Niles marry in a small, private ceremony in Reno, Nevada. The rest of Season 10 and early Season 11 show Daphne and Niles adjusting to their new life as a wedded couple. Daphne and Niles have their first child, David, in the final episode of the series, "Goodnight, Seattle".  (He is named after the show's co-creator David Angell who died in the September 11 attacks.) A flash-forward scene in an earlier episode reveals that the couple will also have two daughters.

Family 
Daphne grew up in a very large dysfunctional family. They are often the subject of her long-winded tales that sometimes leave the Cranes somewhat perplexed. Although they are frequently mentioned, the first time one of her family members appears on the show is in the season 7 episode "Dark Side of the Moon", in which Donny surprises Daphne with a visit from her brother, Simon (Anthony LaPaglia), not knowing that she dislikes him. (Her favorite brother, Stephen, never appears until the final episode, where he is played by Richard E. Grant). In "Something Borrowed, Someone Blue", Daphne's mother makes her first appearance, while her father only makes his debut in season 9.

In the episode "An Affair to Forget", she mentions she had an ancestor who served on HMS Bounty who took Fletcher Christian's side in the mutiny. According to her, he made it to Pitcairn Island with a Tahitian wife and had several children. 

Five out of Daphne's eight brothers appear on the show; few of them maintain consistency with Daphne's Northern accent. LaPaglia, an Australian actor, faked a Cockney accent playing Simon, while Robbie Coltrane, who is Scottish, played Daphne's brother Michael with a muddled Brummie (Birmingham) accent—which had a distinct Scottish lilt to it—explained away by Niles as being a result of his being dropped as a baby. The effect is completed by his speech's being virtually unintelligible. Richard E Grant played Stephen Moon with an indeterminate accent somewhere between Received Pronunciation and Cockney. Her brother Billy is implied to be gay, such as in the episode "Daphne's Room", in which Daphne says her brothers would "sneak into the bathroom and peek at me in the shower … except for me brother Billy, the ballroom dancer. He never peeked at me, though he did peek at me brother Nigel." When Daphne talks with her mom Gertrude about resuming her sex life with Niles after his heart surgery, Gertrude tells her to "use your feminine wiles – that's how your brother Billy landed Kevin." According to Daphne, Billy rejected the family's traditional fishing background by announcing that he "hated the smell of fish, and was going to teach ballroom dancing." Daphne also has an uncle, Jackie, who lives in San Francisco.

Accent 
Writing for The Guardian, Lucy Mangan criticized Daphne's adopted Manchester accent as the show's only "weak link".

References 

Television characters introduced in 1993
Fictional immigrants to the United States
Fictional people from Manchester
Fictional servants
Frasier characters Daphne Eleanor M Iking (born Daphne M Iking), known as Daphne Iking, is a Malaysian television personality, an emcee and an occasional actress.

Early life
Daphne was born in Keningau, Sabah, Malaysia to a former nurse, Naili Juliah Ganahong (b. 1954) who was a resident of that town and a former policeman, banker turned local politician Mozes Michael Iking (1951-2016) who hailed from Tambunan district. She is the second eldest amongst four siblings and grew up in the UK before moving back to Malaysia in 1988, where she resided in Penampang. before leaving to Penang to further her tertiary studies there.  She completed both her degree and master degree in Communications at the Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang in 2002.

Television and other ventures
Prior to her career in television Daphne worked as a marketing executive for Skywalker TV. Iking first entered the television scene as the model in a Pond's advertisement. The next year saw her co-hosting Ringgit Sense, a TV3 show on finance, alongside Nazrudin Rahman.

Daphne Iking won the beauty queen title of Unduk Ngadau of Sabah in 2003, representing Klang Valley.

Iking quickly became a recognisable face as the host of reality show Explorace, a reality show similar to The Amazing Race, in 2004 for two years where she is known for her lively personality. She then went on to host PNB World Investment Challenge on TV3, Vector Challenge on 8TV, Explorace Kids on TV3 and Health and Beauty Capsule in May/Antabax. She also reported for TV3's factual programmes The Brand and Majalah Tiga.

In 2006 she gained a supporting role as Daphne in 8TV's dramedy series KL Lights. She also hosted with Nazarudin Rahman again in My Australian Adventure, a sponsored travelogue show in TV3.

As well as having hosted My Australian Adventures, the Malaysian celebrity was also the scriptwriter for the show.

Later that year, she moved to ntv7 and hosted The Breakfast Show. She was the assistant producer of The Breakfast Show.

She was a supporting actress in telemovie Adik, in 2007 and played a minor role in Singaporean drama District 9 Pilot.

In 2009, Iking was nominated in the Malaysian Shout! Awards for "Favourite Television Personality" as host for The Breakfast Show.

Iking played a con-woman in Belukar, a Malaysian independent film released in 2010 and won the "Most Promising Actress" for this role

In late 2010, Iking played as a nurse suffering from domestic abuse which is one of the characters included in the short film Prelude in F Minor.

She was also the supporting actress in the local comedy film My Spy in 2010.

In October 2010 Daphne Iking was nominated for the second time for "Favourite Television Personality" as the host of The Breakfast Show during the Shout! Awards.

Iking left The Breakfast Show after four years in 2011 as she was invited to be part of an English Women's programme called "Bella" on ntv7.

Daphne has stepped out of her comfort zone hosting shows only in the English medium, and started taking offers to do Malay programmes. RTM commissioned a production house to create a new program “Ekspresi Kreatif D.I.Y Daphne”  with Daphne as the host - a show that depicts her love for DIY projects.

Recognised as a well-known face in the Malaysian entertainment industry, Daphne was offered to host TLC's hit reality show "Say Yes To The Dress Asia" alongside fashion designer Dato' Jovian Mandagie.

She appeared for the third time in the list of FHM Malaysia's annual Most Wanted Female 2010 at number 40.

She also appeared in music video "Sumandak Sabah" by Marsha Milan and Velvet Aduk alongside the Unduk Ngadau winners.

In 2019, she was invited to share her journey as a Mualaf on Astro’s Naura Shares, followed by a guest host stint with Sheikh Hussin Yee.

In August 2019, she was invited to host a 10 episode show “Girl’s Day Out” with fellow activist friend and TV Personality, Lisa Surihani for Astro Naura. The show talks about Women’s Rights in Islam and debunking the common myths surrounding Muslim Women and their roles in society.

Personal life

By October 2006 she started a relationship with businessman Ryan Chong Yiing Yih. They met while Iking was filming KL Lights. She revealed that she was getting married, in a live talk show. The wedding was held in Bali, Indonesia in January 2007 and the event was published in the Malaysian edition of Hello magazine. The couple had a daughter, Isobel Daniella.

In 2009, Chong accused a managing director, Darren Choy Khin Ming under the Penal Code of 498 of Malaysian law for "enticing or taking away or detaining with a criminal intent a married woman". Iking and Chong divorced that year.

She embraced Islam, prior to her wedding with entrepreneur Azmi Abdul Rahman.

References

External links
 

Malaysian television personalities
1978 births
Converts to Islam
Living people
Kadazan-Dusun people
People from Sabah
Malaysian film actresses
Universiti Sains Malaysia alumni
Malaysian Muslims
People from Keningau District