a spiked drink. Later in the 1990s a further two weekly episodes were commissioned to bring the total output to four episodes per week. Audiences rose to four million, before they fell to an average of around nearly 2 million per week. 2000s By March 2000, Redmond had handed over his production responsibilities to Jo Hallows and in that year a series of open auditions were held around the country using the title On The Pull. The number of attendees was far in excess of anticipations - indeed, there were thousands - but it is claimed that all were seen and the most promising of them were called to further auditions in Liverpool. As a consequence of this process, several new cast members were engaged: Marcus Patric and Andrew Somerville were cast as Ben Davies and Theo Sankofa, respectively, having attended the initial auditions in London Elize du Toit attended the Edinburgh auditions and was cast as Izzy Cornwell The Belfast auditions produced Lesley Johnston to take the role of Laura Burns In 2002, Johnston left the programme to become a midwife. On 21 April 2003, Hollyoaks celebrated its 1000th episode which saw the unmasking of serial killer Toby Mills. The serial was broadcast by TVNZ in New Zealand and was such a success that in 2004 the BBC soap opera EastEnders was axed there in order to accommodate it in the schedules. The same year saw Mikyla Dodd leave her role of Chloe Bruce after four years in order to pursue other projects. Helen Noble also left but agreed to return for four more episodes in 2005 and has claimed that the possibility of returning again remains open. A similar claim was made by Sarah Jayne Dunn who played Mandy Richardson, who left in 2006 to pursue other projects The departure of Alex Carter and Gemma Atkinson, who played siblings Lee and Lisa Hunter in 2005 caused producer David Hanson, who had taken over from Hallows in January that year, to write out the characters' parents Les (John Graham Davies) and Sally (Katherine Dow Blyton). At the same time Du Toit left for an acting career in Los Angeles. Bryan Kirkwood replaced Hanson as producer on 16 January 2006. His task was to rejuvenate the series and change a perception that because the cast were good-looking they were therefore unable to act. Kirkwood introduced the new character of Mercedes