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Behind the scenes

Go an exclusive tour with the Packed to the Rafter's cast

Meet Ben Rafter

We chat to the cheeky Hugh Sheridan

Rachel, 25, is the eldest of the three Rafter children. Sassy, creative and clever, she’s always been the apple of her father’s eye.

Possessing a very dry, often acerbic sense of humour, she’s not one to shy away from saying what she thinks. “I think people will be drawn to Rachel’s kindness,” Jessica says. “Under her prickly, dry sense of humour, there’s a real heart and spirit to her. She really is quite generous and she has real love and respect for her entire family.”

Rachel left the Rafter home at 18 to move into a shared house with students in her graphics design course. She was always the good girl and, even at that stage of first experimentation, drugs and alcohol never appealed to her. It was more the need for independence and to escape what she saw as the over-protection of mum and dad.

It was only really when she fell for sexy young freelance account-executive Daniel Griggs that she took her first real excursions into long nights of booze and drug use.

They met at the boutique ad agency she joined as a graphic artist. And for a time things were fantastic. Rachel couldn’t wait to tell her mother all about the amazing man she met. And he was an instant hit with the entire family.

They were young and had the powers of recovery required when you’re burning the candle at both ends. But after they moved in together, things slowly started to sour. We first meet Rachel at a delicate point in her life; her relationship with Daniel has clearly hit rock-bottom. Her parents can sense something is wrong, particularly with him, but they can’t quite put their finger on it. Their intuition is spot on when it’s later revealed he has an ice addiction.

“Rachel is a character with enormous strength in the face of adversity,” Jessica says. “Life throws quite a few challengers her way. But ultimately it’s her spirit and courage that defines her.”

Watch Jessica Marais give the lowdown on why women can relate to the pressures Rachel faces and what she looks for in a man here