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<\/p>\nHelen Flanagan has revealed that her Corrie co-star Alison King accused soap bosses of \u201csexualising\u201d her, after scenes showing her character having an underage affair with her teacher.<\/p>\n
“I like to feel sexy. I like to feel empowered – and in control,” Helen Flanagan tells the Mirror.(Image: Reach PLC \/ Alex James)<\/p>\n
Just nine when she joined Coronation Street as Rosie Webster – eldest daughter of Sally and Kevin – Helen Flanagan<\/a>, now 35, was 16 – a year older than her character – when Rosie was groomed by teacher John Stape (Graeme Hawley), who was exposed as a serial killer. She was later kidnapped and held hostage by Stape, after the affair was exposed and he was sacked.<\/p>\n Helen tells The Mirror<\/a>: \u201cWas it morally right that I was expected to parade about in my knickers like some mad nymphomaniac when I was still just a teenager? Alison King, who plays Carla Connor, once kicked off in the green room, saying how disgusting it was that they were sexualising me when I was a young girl. I didn\u2019t fully comprehend what she was talking about at the time. I do now. I get it.<\/p>\n READ MORE: I snogged Jason Orange at 19 \u2013 now I’m a mum of two but I\u2019m still under Take That\u2019s spell<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cI had to do kissing and bedroom scenes with a man a lot older than me. Obviously the actor [Graeme Hawley] was lovely, but I don\u2019t think it would happen now. When you\u2019re 16 you don\u2019t really know what\u2019s going on and I was just happy to get the big storylines. But I had scenes as Rosie which didn\u2019t always sit comfortably with me. I felt minging post-shoot.<\/p>\n Helen as Corrie’s Rosie Webster in a bedroom scene with “lovely” Graeme Hawley, who played John Stape(Image: ITV)<\/p>\n \u201cEverything has changed now, which I’m glad about. They wouldn\u2019t write it in quite the same way all these years later and since the Me Too movement.\u201d<\/p>\n She compares playing Rosie to her current role as Catherine, the youngest of three sisters, in the Shelagh Stephenson play The Memory of Water, which opens today at Bolton\u2019s Octagon Theatre. Now she has an intimacy coordinator, to make sure she is comfortable with everything. “Back then you just got on with it,\u201d she says of her Corrie experience.<\/p>\n But Helen says she finds using her sexuality empowering, as long as it\u2019s on her terms. She says: \u201cI post sexy pictures. I work for different lingerie brands. I enjoy that. I like to feel sexy. I like to feel empowered – and in control. That\u2019s the difference. I\u2019ve turned up to some shoots which I didn\u2019t know would be so \u2018sexy\u2019, thinking it would be unprofessional to object and been in tears.\u201d<\/p>\n Helen and her ex, footballer Scott Sinclair(Image: James Veysey\/BAFTA\/REX\/Shutterstock)<\/p>\n Helen and Scott in happier times(Image: Mike Marsland\/WireImage)<\/p>\n During the last few years, Helen\u2019s life off camera has drawn more attention than her acting. Now she says her footballer ex Scott Sinclair, 36 – the father of her three children – has broken her heart all over again by deciding to sell the family home. Recently branding the former Chelsea, Manchester<\/a> City and Aston Villa<\/a> player a \u201cd***head,\u201d she says: \u201cI\u2019ll always love Scott, but he\u2019s really let me down.\u201d<\/p>\n The couple split in 2022, amid cheating rumours. But Helen still lives in the \u00a31 million family house in Belmont, Bolton, with Matilda, 10, Delilah, seven, and Charlie, four.<\/p>\n She says: \u201cHis decision to sell the family has broken my heart. His reason for selling is financial, as he isn\u2019t currently signed to a football club, but it makes me angry when he spends money on fancy holidays and constant trips to Dubai. Scott has other properties he could sell, too – his mother lives in a house similar to mine and yet that hasn\u2019t been put up for sale.<\/p>\n Doting mum: Helen’s children are everything to her(Image: helenflanagn\/Instagram)<\/p>\n \u201cI worry about my future and my security. I have to work constantly to make ends meet. He\u2019s the father of my kids, but their dad’s a wealthy guy, you know?\u201d<\/p>\n In her debut book, Head & Heart: Break-ups, breakdowns and being Rosie, she says of Scott: \u201cI was with him for 13 years, he was my whole 20s. We don’t speak, we don’t communicate at all. I do find it just really sad. I never wanted it to be this way.<\/p>\n \u201cAs a woman, I’ve had to be strong. And this is me having my voice. I’ve upset the apple cart, but why should I keep quiet? What I would want Matilda to do. I would like Matilda to have her voice.\u201d<\/p>\n But Scott isn\u2019t the only man to have broken her heart. After they split, she briefly dated former boxer David Haye and heavily denies rumours of being involved in a throuple with him and his girlfriend Sian Osbourne.<\/p>\n Helen met boxer David Haye on I’m A Celeb, and the pair became romantically involved (Image: ITV\/REX\/Shutterstock)<\/p>\n Helen, who appeared on the 2012 series of ITV<\/a>\u2019s I\u2019m A Celebrity, and then again on the All Stars edition in 2023, met David on the show and dated him knowing he had an open relationship. She says: \u201cHe doesn\u2019t know he\u2019s in the book. I do think he loves Sian. And I do think he loved me. I just don\u2019t think he really knows how to love anyone.\u201d<\/p>\n Born in Bury. Greater Manchester, Helen, who joined Corrie in 2000, leaving in 2012, returning briefly from 2017 to 2018, says of her soap years: \u201cI\u2019m a very normal, northern working-class girl, so Coronation Street<\/a> really changed the circumstances of my life.\u201d<\/p>\n And she is not ruling out going back. Currently single, she adds: \u201cI\u2019m focusing on being an actress without any noise getting in the way. I\u2019d love to do more TV, a drama or something on Netflix<\/a>.\u201d Reflecting on her 2017 Coronation Street stint, she continues: \u201cThe first time [on Corrie] I was always getting the main storylines. Returning and not kind of getting those was tough. But I\u2019d love to return at some point.\u201d<\/p>\n Helen as Rosie Webster in Coronation Street in 2008(Image: ITV)<\/p>\n Helen left because of a mental health crisis and eating disorder, which saw her \u201cself-harm by scratching\u201d and \u201csurviving on cups of powdered soup\u201d. But she does not blame Corrie, adding: \u201cIt would have happened to me no matter what job I was doing.\u201d<\/p>\n Open about her diagnoses of obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD and premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD), she has also suffered suicidal idealtion and intrusive thoughts. And in January 2024, she suffered a terrifying breakdown after an adverse reaction to her prescription OCD medication.<\/p>\n She says: \u201cIt was the worst time that I’ve ever struggled with my mental health. I do think the medication was really bad for me, but I became quite addicted to it.\u201d It came at a time when her relationship with Scott was also tricky and she was working full blast, as well as being a single mum.<\/p>\n Helen is so proud of how far she’s come(Image: Reach PLC \/ Alex James)<\/p>\n She says: \u201cHe really wasn’t playing fair. So I had quite a lot of financial stuff going on as well and the stress of solicitors. I was also totally heartbroken after David Haye. It just all became too much and I began to experience psychosis. I thought I was being watched, filmed, hunted, possibly even drugged, I was seeing things that weren\u2019t there. It was really frightening – I thought my kids were going to be taken away, the nursery got involved.\u201d<\/p>\n Supported by her parents and therapists, she spent months rebuilding herself and started writing her book. She says: \u201cI probably won\u2019t read it. I\u2019d only over analyse it. I don\u2019t think Scott will read it either\u2026 but he might hear about some of the things I have to say.\u201d<\/p>\n She hopes her book will help others who are struggling with their mental health. She says: \u201cWhen you talk about mental health, it saves people’s lives. And it makes you feel less on your own.\u201d No longer taking medication, of her own mental health struggles, she continues: \u201cIt’s not just going to go away. Sometimes your brain is wired more differently – mine is. And mental health is something that’s in my family as well.<\/p>\n Head & Heart by Helen Flanagan (Mirror Books, \u00a322) is on sale now(Image: Chelsea White)<\/p>\n \u201cI have three children that are half me, so I have tried to be more educated about mental health and how to deal with it in healthy ways – because maybe one day one of my children might have some struggles. For me, healthy ways are therapy, talking and exercise. It feels like everything’s coming together now. I\u2019ve come a long way and I\u2019m really proud of myself. Onwards and upwards.\u201d<\/p>\n *We contacted Coronation street for a comment<\/p>\n Helen Flanagan’s Head & Heart: Break-ups, Breakdowns and Being Rosie<\/p>\n This article contains affiliate links, we will receive a commission on any sales we generate from it. Learn more<\/a> \u00a322<\/p>\n \u00a317.45<\/p>\n Amazon<\/p>\n![\"Helen](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/0_CORONATION-STREET.jpg\")
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