Scots lawyer makes double career change

Shuiken Chan (pictured), 38, who also goes by Sue Cann, spent a month in Paris filming Madame after getting a breakthrough role.

In 2009, Ms Chan left the Edinburgh legal scene to go globetrotting before taking up acting classes in New York City.

An avid cook, she returned to the capital last year to start up a jam business and applied for JobSeeker’s Allowance to get things going.

She said: “I’m so thankful to my adviser at the Job Centre, because had it not been for him I never would have gotten this opportunity.

“When I attended my first interview with my adviser, my focus was on setting up a jam business. But he encouraged me to give priority to my acting and to go out and find an agent immediately.

“And so I did. At our next fortnightly meeting I told him I had now found an agent and he said: ‘Great. So I expect to see you in a big movie by the time I see you next’.”

She had her first audition within a few days – and launched her My Jambrand too.

And, while filming in France, she even managed to get her product in a scene.

She said: “During filming there was a breakfast table set up every morning outside where people could just help themselves to some breakfast.

“On one of the mornings I put my jams on the table and let the cast and crew try it. They all loved it, and everyone was saying how amazing the jam was. Then several weeks later, I saw a tray on the kitchen table with tea and toast to be used in a particular scene.

“I decided to be bold at the last moment and asked the director if I could put my jams out on the tray for the scene.

“Usually, the set designer plans this some time ahead of the scene, so I thought that the chances of the director agreeing would be slim. But I thought that it wouldn’t do any harm to just ask and the director said yes.”