‘Coronation Street’ star Bill Roache claims his late co-star Anne Kirkbride was an "alcoholic".
The 83-year-old actor – who plays Ken Barlow in the soap – also revealed the actress, who died in January 2015 from breast cancer aged 60, was occasionally "weepy" and "waily" in between takes for some scenes filmed in 2014 which led stars to believe her anti-depressants had stopped working.
He said: "What happened with Anne was – she was alcoholic, she was on drugs for depression but she was a beautiful person.
"She had been alcoholic but she was off the drink. Then she was on anti-depressant drugs all her life.
"She just started crying a lot and I spent half my life sort of comforting her. That got a bit worse, and we were holding up scenes because she was being weepy and waily.
"We just thought her medication wasn’t working, you know, you get older, your body changes."
Anne’s husband Dave Beckett admitted she was an alcoholic, but insisted she hadn’t had a drink for "30 years or more" before her death.
He told The Sun newspaper: "Whilst Anne did describe herself as an alcoholic, as many alcoholics do, she had not touched a drop of alcohol for 30 years or more."
Bill also revealed Anne – who played Deidre Barlow in ‘Corrie’ for more than 40 years – was paralysed down one side after suffering a stroke and was diagnosed with a brain tumour shortly before she tragically passed away.
He added to the publication: "The management gave her three months out to get herself sorted out, which is what we thought would happen, then she’d come back and be perfectly OK.
"And then they rang one Friday to say she’d had a stroke and was paralysed down the left side. They’d 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. And they hadn’t known so in a way that was a blessing."
Bill Roache: Anne Kirkbride was ‘alcoholic’
