We’re the real-life Kat Slater & Alfie Moon from EastEnders – strangers say I look like her every DAY, it’s insulting

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KAT and Alfie Moon’s rocky relationship gripped EastEnders fans for over a decade, but the pair aren’t known for their dashing looks or fashion sense.

Now one waitress has revealed how she gets compared to the soap star every DAY – with customers asking for selfies or autographs, and some strangers refusing to believe she isn’t Jessie Wallace.

Waitress Hayley Garbutt, 54, and husband Maurice, 56, a construction driver, say they’re the real-life Kat Slater and Alfie Moon
The iconic on-off couple are EastEnders favourites

Hayley Garbutt, 54, says she and husband Maurice, 56, a construction driver, are the real-life Kat and Alfie – but admits she found the comparisons insulting at first.

The mum-of-three and gran-of-six, from Finley, North Yorks, tells Fabulous: “I work in a restaurant and everybody says to me ‘do you know, you look like Kat Slater?’

“It’s a standing joke at work because people say it to me all the time. I tell the other girls ‘I should become a lookalike, I’d make more money’.

“When people first said it, I thought ‘bloody cheeky buggers’. Jessie’s quite an attractive lady but she looks different when she dresses as her character.

Hayley is compared to Kat every DAY at work and often gets mistaken for Jessie Wallace, with people asking for her autograph

Hayley admits they dress similarly to Kat and Alfie

“I thought my face was a lot thinner and said ‘I don’t think I look like her at all’. I didn’t take it as a compliment but now I do, I’ll say ‘oh thank you’.

“Some people actually think I AM her. One guy came up to me and said ‘good God, you’re Kat Slater’. Others will say ‘can I have your autograph?’ and they’re being serious.

“If I’m on a night out or shopping, I normally get either Chas Dingle off Emmerdale or Kat Slater. Girls will come over and say ‘are you Kat Slater?’ and I say ‘no I’m too posh’. 

“I class it as a bit of fun, if that’s the way people look at me then that’s fine. I don’t really see it but I suppose you look at yourself differently.

“Years ago, we’d be called the Beckhams of Yorkshire, now we look like Kat and Alfie. I’m surprised we haven’t had more comments as a couple, but they will come.

“If Maurice worked with me, I’m sure we’d get it all the time. His attitude and dress sense is exactly like Alfie’s, so we should go out and have some fun with it.”

Hayley first drew comparisons to one of Britain’s best known soap characters seven years ago, when she tried to flog a Rapunzel fancy dress outfit on Facebook Marketplace.

She says: “I had about 60 comments saying ‘I hope you don’t mind me saying, but you look like Kat Slater’. It was every single comment.

“I wasn’t even dressed like her. I thought ‘good God, I’m trying to sell an outfit here and nobody wants to buy it’. I didn’t sell it after that.

“The comparisons started again about two years ago and it’s really ramped up over the last six months. People say it to me every day.

“I’ve even had customers say ‘we’ve come back to take a picture with you, because we’ve told everybody about you’.

“It’s mainly the older generation, about 55 upwards, they must watch a lot of EastEnders.”

Hayley says she isn’t copying Kat, she just dresses very similar to her

In the past, she’s also been compared to Emmerdale’s Chas Dingle

Although Hayley was offended at first, she is slowly coming around to the similarities between her and Jessie, 50.

She adds: “I don’t know what it is, maybe my face has changed as I’ve got older. A few years ago people kept saying I looked like Chas Dingle and I suppose in a way I did, although at the time I thought ‘oh my gosh’.

“I think it’s partly the way I act, I’m bubbly and fun and loud. I’m very friendly with people and quite chatty, so maybe it comes across on both my looks and personality.

“I’ve gone home to my husband many times and said ‘do I look like Kat Slater?’ Even my twin sister said ‘you actually do a bit, if you think about it. It’s the shape of your face and eyes’.

“I can see it in my jawline and the way I do my hair. Like Kat, I love my lipstick and wear my hair to the side. I pin it for work because I have to tie it up.

“I’m quite loud with my clothes, I don’t give a monkey what people think about them as long as I’m comfortable. I’m not one of these people who follows a trend. Kat wears a lot of leopard print and black, which is my kind of fashion.

“I think Jessie Wallace has lost a bit of weight recently and I have too. She’s a bit younger than me, so that’s nice. The only difference is I don’t have a Cockney accent.”

Hayley says she wasn’t pleased at first, but now she takes it as a compliment

Despite these similarities, Hayley insists she isn’t copying Kat – who’s starred in the show on-and-off since 2000.

She says: “I’m not copying her, I dress the way I like to dress, but it’s very similar to her.

“People don’t even say to me ‘you look a bit thinner’ they say I look just like her, in every way.

“At work I wear black because that’s the uniform, but I like to add in some sparkle.

“For me, the comparison is a bit of fun and I take it as a compliment.

“At first I’d be Googling her every time someone said it to me and feeling upset, but now I’m over that.”

We recently reported on a couple who were left annoyed after being dubbed the “Aldi Tommy Fury and Molly Mae”.