Where Is Mark Charnock Now After Cooking With the Stars? Is He Still in Emmerdale?
Cooking With the Stars has always worked best when a celebrity’s day job creates expectations that immediately become useless in the kitchen. Season 6 found perhaps the perfect example in Mark Charnock. After spending almost three decades playing Emmerdale chef Marlon Dingle, Charnock entered the ITV competition with viewers already familiar with seeing him around…
Cooking With the Stars has always worked best when a celebrity’s day job creates expectations that immediately become useless in the kitchen. Season 6 found perhaps the perfect example in Mark Charnock. After spending almost three decades playing Emmerdale chef Marlon Dingle, Charnock entered the ITV competition with viewers already familiar with seeing him around food, even though the actor himself was quick to point out that Marlon’s culinary experience had not rubbed off on him.
His stay in the competition turned out to be brief. Charnock faced Caroline Quentin and Gladiators star Harry Aikines-Aryeetey in the Season 6 premiere before losing the key lime pie Cook Off to Quentin. But leaving Cooking With the Stars does not mean Charnock is stepping away from the television role that made him famous. His regular home remains Emmerdale, where Marlon continues to be one of the soap’s longest-serving characters. ITV’s current character page still identifies Charnock as the actor playing Marlon.
Also Read: Cooking With the Stars Season 6 Episode 1 Recap: Why Was Mark Charnock Eliminated?
Mark Charnock is still playing Marlon Dingle in Emmerdale
As of October 2026, Mark Charnock is still part of Emmerdale as Marlon Dingle. There has been no ITV announcement that Charnock is leaving the soap, and current 2026 cast material continues to list him in the role. TV Guide
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That is an important distinction after his appearance on Cooking With the Stars. Charnock’s elimination only ended his run in the cooking competition. It was not presented as a farewell from ITV generally, and there is no indication that taking part in the series was designed as a replacement for Emmerdale.
Marlon has been part of the village since 1996, making Charnock one of the programme’s most established performers. The character began as a more comic presence within the sprawling Dingle family but gradually developed into a central figure whose stories have covered marriage, parenthood, friendship and major family upheaval. Radio Times also dates Marlon’s first appearance to 1996.
Cooking With the Stars played on Mark’s Emmerdale reputation
Charnock’s casting in Cooking With the Stars was amusing precisely because of Marlon’s profession. ITV viewers have spent years watching the fictional character work as a chef, particularly around The Woolpack, which creates the understandable impression that Charnock himself might be unusually comfortable in a professional kitchen.
The actor dismantled that idea almost immediately in Episode 1. Introducing himself, Charnock acknowledged that playing a television chef for the “best part of three decades” had created assumptions about his own cooking ability, before joking that the reality was very different.
That became the running joke behind his participation rather than evidence that he had secretly spent years developing restaurant-level skills. Cooking With the Stars therefore offered viewers a rare reversal. Instead of Charnock pretending to know exactly what Marlon is doing behind a kitchen counter, the actor had to learn techniques under real competition pressure.
For Season 6, he was paired with MasterChef winner and cookbook author Shelina Permalloo. The premiere challenged him to prepare a potato and chickpea curry with coriander and lime rice, and although the process became hectic, his first dish was far from the outright failure he feared.
Why did Mark Charnock leave Cooking With the Stars?
Mark’s elimination came in the Cook Off rather than during the first family favourites challenge. Harry produced the strongest dish of the opening round with his fish pie, leaving Mark and Caroline to compete for survival by making key lime pies.
The decisive difference was not presentation. Mark actually produced the stronger-looking meringue, with the chefs noting its glossy finish and that it had been cooked correctly. His problem was the element that mattered most for the dessert itself: the judges could not taste enough lime.
Caroline’s pie had a less successful meringue, but its filling delivered the sharper citrus flavour the chefs expected from key lime pie. The dishes were tasted blind, making one detail particularly telling. Shelina, Mark’s own mentor, selected Caroline’s plate without knowing which contestant had made it.
Caroline received enough votes to remain in the competition, making Mark the first celebrity to leave Season 6. He accepted the result good-naturedly and said that he had learned a great deal from taking part, while Shelina told him she was proud of what he had achieved.
ITV’s official Episode 1 listing confirms that Charnock competed against Quentin and Aikines-Aryeetey in the opening family favourites showdown, while the expanded sixth series features 12 celebrities competing across the new season.
His Cooking With the Stars exit does not mean Marlon has left Emmerdale
Reality and competition appearances can sometimes create confusion when an actor temporarily seems less visible in a continuing drama. Cooking With the Stars is a separate entertainment programme, however, and Charnock’s participation does not alter Marlon’s status inside Emmerdale.
There is also a practical reason not to read too much into an actor appearing elsewhere on ITV. Programmes such as Cooking With the Stars are filmed separately from the nightly soap, and a celebrity can participate without the appearance becoming part of their character’s storyline. The competition never suggested that Charnock was closing the door on Emmerdale.
More importantly, ITV continues to maintain an active Marlon Dingle character page naming Mark Charnock in the role. Current Emmerdale material also remains active in 2026, with the soap continuing its weekday ITV schedule.
That means viewers looking for Mark after his early Cooking With the Stars departure do not need to wait for another reality series to see him. His principal television role remains the one he has held for decades.
Marlon remains the defining role of Mark Charnock’s career
Few soap actors are so closely associated with a single character that a completely separate reality show can build an entire joke around their fictional occupation. That familiarity is part of what made Mark an appealing Cooking With the Stars contestant in the first place.
Marlon has changed considerably since arriving in Emmerdale. What began as a quirky member of the Dingle clan developed into one of the soap’s more emotionally versatile roles, particularly through his relationships with Rhona Goskirk, daughter April Windsor and longtime friend Paddy. Charnock has consequently been able to move between lighter material and considerably more dramatic stories while keeping the same character recognizable.
Recent years have continued to give him substantial material rather than quietly moving Marlon into the background. In late 2025, for example, Charnock and Amelia Flanagan were at the centre of a special episode involving Marlon and April, another indication of the character’s continuing importance to the soap.
Cooking With the Stars gave audiences something different from that work. For once, viewers saw Charnock rather than Marlon standing behind the counter, discovering that decades of pretending to be a chef cannot substitute for getting the seasoning, timing and lime flavour right when professional judges are actually tasting the food.
What’s next for Mark Charnock?
For now, Mark Charnock’s post-Cooking With the Stars career takes him back to familiar territory. Emmerdale remains his continuing television commitment, and there is no confirmed announcement from ITV that his long run as Marlon Dingle is ending.
That makes his Cooking With the Stars appearance better understood as a diversion from his regular job rather than the start of a new career direction. His attempt to turn nearly 30 years of fictional kitchen experience into real cooking success ended after one episode, but Mark’s far more durable role at The Woolpack continues.
