Sue Holderness was almost eaten by an alligator.

Sue Holderness was almost eaten by an alligator

Sue Holderness was almost eaten by an alligator

The 73-year-old actress is known for playing the role of Marlene Boyce in the classic BBC sitcom 'Only Fools and Horses ' between 1985 and 2002 and was shooting the 'Miami Twice' episode in Florida with Sir David Jason and Nicholas Lyndhurst when an alligator they were using on the set came after her.

She said: "The idea was this alligator would walk up behind Del and Rodney, they’d run off and the alligator would run towards them where there was a bowl of food. So the alligator was let off its leash and then headed towards the camera to this bowl of food but didn’t stop. The boys were at the other end of the forest by then!"

Sue - who also appeared on the sitcom's spin-off 'The Green Green Grass ' between 2005 and 2009 - went on to add that the predatory reptile ended up almost "two feet" away from her and she almost "died of fear."

Speaking on the new Channel 5 documentary 'Only Fools And Horses: Secrets And Scandals', she added: "I, meanwhile, was filming on my video camera. I didn’t notice the boys had gone and I lost the ­alligator in my ­camera and it was about two feet from me. Sean, the chap who was supposed to be in charge, jumped on its tail, grabbed its jaws shut and wrapped this thing around it. I nearly died of fear, in fact – I nearly died. I could have been eaten by an alligator.”