"To be honest, all I ever wanted to do was to save up enough money to open my own dog shelter," she says. "It's been a dream and a goal of mine for a really long time."
Sheridan was notorious in her neighbourhood as the local stray dog keeper when she was a young girl growing up in Epworth, Doncaster. "I was constantly taking in strays in our neighbourhood," says Sheridan. "But if one of the ones we kept got old and died, if I couldn't find another stray, I'd go and take the collars off my neighbours' dogs and try to convince my parents that they were strays too so I could keep them!"
Sheridan's cover was usually blown by a few phone calls from her parents to the neighbourhood dog owners. But her parents say it was all just part of Sheridan's insatiable love for animals.
"Yes, she was helping to find a home for strays before they were even strays," says Sheridan's father, Colin Smith. "But, you know, I remember Sheridan would bring home all kinds of animals. She once cleaned out the inside of an old-fashioned wood television set, kept the screen on, and made a maze and a house with different floors for some pet white mice she'd brought home from her school. We'd come home and it would be like watching white mice on the telly."
Today Sheridan is providing shelter to her own 'babies' - Barry the Pug (aged 18months), Trish the Japanese Spitz (two-and-a-half years), Enid the Shar-Pei (four years), and Lily the Boxer (also four). She's also a patron of The Raystede Centre for Animal Welfare and the PACT Animal Sanctuary.
Although her neighbourhood pet-stealing days were behind her when she approached her teen years, Sheridan's mother remembers when Sheridan would be thrilled to have canine co-stars for some of her theatre roles.
"When Sheridan was in Annie - I think she was 11, 12 and 13 when she performed the role - they let her bring our old dog Ben to act in the play with her as Sandy," mother Marilyn Smith recalls with great affection. "And, you know, Ben was good as gold! And when she played Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, she got to help audition dogs for the role of Toto. She just loved that!"
Having been in the spotlight since performing with her parents at the age of four (her parents are the country western duo The Daltons), Sheridan had no problem beating young theatre hopefuls for the part of Tallulah in a West End production of Bugsy Malone at the tender age of 16. Since her agent picked her out of that production for representation, Sheridan's CV has boasted roles in The Royle Family, Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps, Love Soup, and Gavin & Stacey, among many others.
Also a theatre darling, Sheridan had a very successful year-long run on the Duke of York's Theatre stage as Audrey in Little Shop of Horrors, and was hailed as "best of all" by The Stage for her role as Vanessa in Lucy Kirkwood's Tinderbox at the Bush Theatre this past spring.
In preparing for future projects Sheridan says her dogs are always well cared for.
"Some of my closest friends share the house with me and they all make sure that the dogs are fed and get outside when I'm working," she explains. "We all take turns."
And the doggie shift-work system she and her close friends have ironed out will come in handy this year, as Sheridan is as in demand as ever. Most anticipated at the moment is the pilot of a BBC remake of Bewitched, with Sheridan in the lead role.
"It's like one big family," says fellow actor and Bewitched co-star Joe Tracini, who is always happy to help look after the canine family members at Sheridan's house.
The fact that Sheridan surrounds herself with animals is, according to her parents, down to the fact she was raised with pets as a child.
Watching Sheridan with her friends and her dogs is like watching a happy family frolic with total ease in the backyard on a warm summer's day. The affection between her and her pets is palpable. But suggest to Sheridan that her life might play out any differently, and she scrunches up her face in disapproval. She says that she'd still rather curl up on the couch and watch telly with her dogs most nights than go out on the town.
"They are easier to look after than men are, and they don't ask you to do the ironing," quips Sheridan. "Seriously, though, I was on a talk show recently and one of the production people asked me, 'You're an attractive, successful young woman; what are you doing hanging out with your dogs all the time?" And, I just kind of looked at the person and thought, 'What?' I think that some people who don't have dogs don't understand, but I truly look forward to seeing my dogs when I come home at night and love going on long walks with them. They are a constant joy, and they give me unconditional love at all times."
