The sky obligingly has turned a bleak institution grey, as the cameras roll for ITV's Bad Girls. The series is filming at Oxford Prison, yet the fairytale turrets are ignored. Instead, metal grills and flaking paint steal the scenes - along with stars Mandana Jones and Simone Lahbib, writes Amanda Castleman.

Yesterday was golden. Tomorrow will be balmy, but today a chill slices through the air like the barbed wire coils. At least twenty technicians, assistants and lackeys huddle in the cold. They are dressed sensibly - jeans, hiking boots, puffa parkas - but the weather is more insistent. To make matter worse, their job is basically to loiter on the set. A few minutes of frenzied activity is followed by endless delay, hushed anticipation. Silent and still, they watch and wait. All this for a 30-second shot, a snippet of prime-time television.

At least they have gloves and hats and scarves, though. Mandana, who plays lesbian lifer Nikki Wade, wears only a thin uniform. She shakes her numb hands between takes, trying to force some blood and warmth into pale fingers.

Over and over, she musters the emotions of a spurned lover, powerless to effect revenge. She snarls. Simone Lahbib stalks off. Cut.

"That was a very bad scene," Mandana admits later. "It took maybe three times longer than usual - about three hours for 30-60 seconds on film. "It's not that unusual though. TV is like that - I had no idea before-hand - so compressed and dense and contained."

And the herd of on-lookers, the cappuccino-fetchers?

"All indispensable, all working," she reassures. "There's that many people again behind the scenes. It's really a group effort."

That intensity has paid off. Bad Girls' first year attracted over 7.3 million viewers. It was the second-highest rated drama across all channels for the 16-34 age bracket. What began as a break-away project - involving a £5m loan and the daring construction of Europe's largest free-standing TV set- is rapidly gaining cult status. The tidy, orderly fan web-site is proof positive. Though unofficial, www.badgirls.co.uk boasts a huge hit-rate and slick design. These people have made a huge effort. They care, they really do.

The show's creators claim such devotion has nothing to do with "titillating" lesbianism and the erotic lure of jail babes.

As lead writer Maureen Chadwick says: "In many ways, Bad Girls is fuelled by a spirit of protest - against an unjust prison system, male violence towards women and children, poverty and deprivation, absurd drugs laws, the Official Secrets Act and homophobia.

"But it's also a celebration of a unique female spirit of anarchic fun and passionate friendship, such as could never be found in a men's prison." Mandana sees the programme filling a niche somewhere between fluff and raw fact. "Bad Girls draws on reality, but at the end of the day, it's designed to give people a break. It's a glossy, heightened version of reality.

"The producers could have opted for a gritty, grainy fly-on-the-wall approach, but decided to make it more accessible. Still, they try to retain some truth, to be a little bit hard-hitting. It's a difficult balance to achieve.

"They tried the shock tactic once, which back-fired. The show can't be so provocative that people switch off, but it is pushing the frontiers a bit."

She also says the programme stretches far beyond the prison walls, reflecting society at large. Even the name, which Mandana didn't initially favour, is in tempo with the times. "Bad Girls does encapsulate what women seem to be attempting," she admits. "This girl power thing is very curious. The notion of the bad girl - like Denise van Outen - isn't really that bad. The idea's gone a bit tepid now.

"A lot of women are just emulating lads - it's a load of rubbish. Look at our society now, young girls of eight are dressing like they're 18 or 28 in miniskirts and glitter.

"True bad girls rebel, turn their backs on society. That journey is no longer available for women these days. Take 1920s actress Tallulah Bankhead, a nice Catholic girl, who had sex with half the English aristocracy and lived on Bourbon. Her blackness was really black because it came from white.

"Few women now manage to be really bad, maybe Courtney Love ... But most of it's just self-conscious posturing. At the end of the day, they take their clothes off for FHM magazine and shoot themselves in the foot. "They're striking out for power but not calling the shots. Oh, I could get on my soap box, I really could."

Luckily, Mandana is spared the company of these powder-puff feminists. Her fellow actresses will never gaze coyly from a glossy cover: "It's been very powerful working with loads of strong women. They're not wimps. It's been quite a discovery.

"In the past, there's always been an element of competition. When that goes out the window, proper camaraderie can grow. I feel increasingly glad I was born a woman. "Playing Nikki has certainly changed me and the way that I am with women in real life. If you play a story-line where you fall in love with a woman - not just because they're fanciable, but because they're top people - you're exploring an area you don't normally delve into. I love it, I have no problem playing a gay character. At the outset, I had some hesitation. I didn't want to be typecast as a dyke. But it really doesn't make a jot of difference."

Mandana clearly loves Bad Girls , but not every aspect brings her quick flashing smile. In fact, Oxford Prison provided her with quite a challenge - both in acting and courage.

"It was so creepy," she confesses. "I wandered off into the solitary confinement cells. They were so tiny, tiny, with spooky little windows. The inmates had actually scratched marks on the walls, counting the days, and the graffiti was horrid. "I was like a child wanting to be scared, wandering in these catacombs. It's good to absorb that feeling of what it must be like."

So if you see a shadow darken Nikki's eyes next season, or she shudders, perhaps the actress is recalling the haunted corridors of the Oxford Prison.

Or perhaps she's still frozen from this bitter March day.

Story date: Saturday 25 March

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.