Coronation Street fans criticise Bill Roache over 'hurtful' Anne Kirkbride remarks
The actor opened up about working with the star.
Fans of Coronation Street have hit out at actor Bill Roache for publicly claiming the late Anne Kirkbride was an alcoholic.
Bill, who played Ken Barlow alongside Anne’s character Deirdre, said the actress would hold up filming because she was ‘weepy and wailing’.
Speaking to The Daily Mirror he reportedly said:
"She was on drugs for depression. She had been an alcoholic but she was off the drink. She was on anti depressant drugs all her life and then she just started crying a lot and I spent half my life sort of comforting her and getting her back on track.
“That got a bit worse and we were holding up scenes because she was being weepy and wailing.
“We just thought her medication was not working as you get older and your body changes. The management gave her three months out to get herself sorted out which is what we thought would happen and she would come back and be perfectly OK.
(Credit: Bill Roache, Johnny Briggs and Anne Kirkbride, PA Images)
“And then they rang me to say she has a stroke and was paralysed down the left side and they had taken her in for a scan and in the scan they found her right lung full of cancer and she had a brain tumour.
"They took her into hospital on the Friday and she died on the Monday. In a way it was a blessing.”
However her husband David Beckett, who married the star in 1992, didn’t agree.
(Credit: PA Images) He said “Whilst Anne would describe herself as an ‘alcoholic’, she had not touched a drop of alcohol in 30 years.”
Fans weren’t happy with Bill's comments and shared their views on Twitter.
Bill, who worked with Anne for 35 years, added he misses the star ‘very much’ and spent more time with her than he did with his wives.
The actress had previously spoken about battling depression after being diagnosed with non-Hodgkins’ lymphoma and admitted that even when she was cleared of the cancer, she wanted to die.
The nation was heartbroken when Anne died of breast cancer on January 19th, 2015.