YOUNG SOAPIE STAR'S SHOCK DISCOVERY... CANCER FEAR!

Handsome Mark Conroy, one of the newest additions to Channel 7's popular soapie, Sons and Daughters, is currently playing out a real-life drama of his own.

Mark was worried about a sun spot on his lip and went for a check-up with a surgeon.

He was shocked when the specialist ordered its immediate removal because it might be cancerous.

"I'd had it for some years," Mark told SCENE this week.

"But the spot seemed to have got larger recently, so I thought maybe I should see someone about it.

"The specialist said rather than take any chances I should have it removed straight away.

"He explained that the fact that it had started to grow was a bad sign, so I went through the treatment where the doctor freeze-dries it off."

Mark was forced to take some time off from Sons and Daughters, but so that his absence was minimal, the writers had Mark's character - Glen Young - receive a punch in the mouth and thus explain his badly bruised lip.

Mark's troubles are not yet over - the spot has not cleared up and there's concern that further surgery may be needed.

"The worrying thing is it still seems to be there," a concerned Mark explained.

"Hopefully, it hasn't been aggravated because of the freeze-drying.

"I'm due to go back to the specialist in three or four weeks, but if it's still there in a fortnight I guess I'll have to go through it all again, but this time making sure they've got everything out."

Mark has been with Sons and Daughters for almost five months, but viewers have only just been introduced to his character.

But the show's producers must be happy with his work because the 28-year-old actor has just had his contract extended to the end of the year.

"It was pretty nerve-wracking at first," Mark admitted.

"And very much a case of getting used to how things are done.

"But I'm really enjoying it now."

Mark's original aim was to get into commercial art.

After university he studied art and worked in advertising before becoming a freelance designer.

"Then someone offered me a job in a commercial, but I turned it down," Mark said.

"It was only then that I found out how much it paid... so I took up modelling."

Mark worked as a male model for seven years, with most of that time spent in England and Europe.

"But while I was in London I realised the modelling wasn't stimulating me and as I'd spent a lot of years studying, I thought I should do something about putting all that study to work."

So Mark returned to Australia and went back to studying five nights a week in method classes, TV and voice, and after being back here for nine months was asked to audition for a role in Sons and Daughters.

Mark, a Yoga enthusiast, who bears a striking resemblance to actor, Gary Sweet, is still studying at NIDA in the evenings.

But between his heavy Sons and Daughters schedule during the day and the study at night, Mark's social life is suffering.

Mark's girlfriend is a dancer with the Sydney Dance Company and is currently touring Adelaide and Alice Springs.

"Unfortunately a lot of her time is spent touring which doesn't do much for the social life either," Mark said.

Mark is reluctant to reveal the name of his 'mysterious touring dancer' on the basis that he's not sure she'd want her name linked with his.

"I don't know whether it would do her good or do her bad," he laughs.

 

By: Robert Fidgeon
Source: Unknown
Date: Unknown