Coronation Street's Kevin Kennedy looks back: ‘I collapsed after going two days without alcohol. I knew I'd die if I carried on'

The Guardian

01-03-2025

Born in 1961 in Wythenshawe, Manchester, Kevin Kennedy is best known for playing Norman 'Curly' Watts on ITV soap opera Coronation Street. The Manchester Polytechnic graduate portrayed the supermarket worker from 1983 to 2003, as well as sustaining a career in music as a solo artist and in bands. He has appeared in musicals including We Will Rock You and Rock of Ages, and stars in Punk Off – The Sounds of Punk and New Wave, which tours until 7 March.
That Barbour jacket and I have been through a lot together. Being Curly was always comforting, like putting on a pair of slippers you've worn for years.
This photo reminds me of a time when everything felt brand new. In any picture taken of me in Coronation Street before 1998, I would have been in active addiction. It all changed when I collapsed after going two days without alcohol. That incident scared the hell out of me, and I knew I would die if I carried on. I needed to change, and it had to be dramatic. The outcome would have been dramatic, otherwise.
By 2002, I'd been sober for four years. The man in this photo was very much coming to terms with what was in front of him – I was up for everything and scared of everything at the same time. I remember feeling completely insane, but in a really good way: my insanity had been channelled into positivity. This absolute belief that I could do anything.
For example, I had just signed to Simon Cowell's label. It was before he was involved in The X Factor, when he was just the head of BMG. I had decided I wanted to play more music and sent a demo to him, and he liked it. He didn't know who I was as it was under a pseudonym, just to avoid any 'soapism'. When we finally met he said, 'Oh wait, it's you!' But it didn't turn him off. I'd be filming an episode of Coronation Street on a Friday afternoon and by the evening I'd be in Memphis, playing on Beale Street, or in Arkansas at a country music festival. Johnny Cash and Willie Nelson would be headlining, and barely visible at the bottom of the poster was my name.
It was an exciting time, but as I was sober I was feeling everything for the first time in a long while. That included fear and uncertainty. As if I had stage fright of the whole world.
Another change was on its way, too: when this photo was taken my role in Coronation Street was coming to a natural end. That sort of news would usually send an actor into a spiral of depression but my glass was half-full. Plus my wife and I had just found out we were expecting our first child. It felt as if everything was happening at once.
Growing up in Manchester at the time of punk gave me the confidence to believe that anything was possible. I was never brave enough to go full punk, with the hair and clothes, but it was the mindset that I loved: that you could do whatever you wanted if you just got up off your arse. I'd turn on Granada News at 6pm and see my peers, people that I knew from the area, becoming actors, writers, poets, sculptors or politicians. Punk was a galvanising force, and for me that manifested itself at the age of 14, sitting in a bedroom with Johnny Marr.
Along with [the Smiths bassist] Andy Rourke, we were in a band called Paris Valentinos. As soon as I heard Johnny play the guitar, I thought: this is special, what a privilege to be here for this. Fast-forward to when I was 19. I was in Hamlet at Sheffield Crucible, and at the hall nearby the Smiths were playing. It was surreal to think a few years before, Johnny and I had been putting tunes together for a local gig for the Queen's jubilee. We'd perform with just one amp and one mic, and the stage was a kitchen table. It was punk, and that was all we needed.
I was never shy growing up, but my creativity definitely needed channelling. I knew I wanted to be in the entertainment industry. However, when you go to see your career officer in Wythenshawe and say, 'I want to be an actor', they look at you like your head's come off. Regardless, I applied to drama school and I got in.
I was 22 when I auditioned for Curly Watts. I'd been in the West End of London when the producers first started sniffing around. This went on and on. Eventually they asked me to go for an audition. I got a train up to Manchester, read for the part on Sunday, and started work on Monday.
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The most attractive thing about joining the cast of Coronation Street was that I didn't have to pay for my digs. I could stay at my mum's house in Manchester and get the washing done. It was two weeks' filming but I'd get a week off in the middle, so I could go and sign on. The fame never crossed my mind – it was just a home gig and I was happy I was doing it. It wasn't until the episodes went out that I realised how powerful that show was, and still is. Walking down the street and having people turn and look took some adjusting to.
On the outside everything in my life looked amazing: I had a great job, I drove a nice car, I lived in a nice house. Meanwhile, my personal life was in turmoil. I was a swan on top, but underneath the water was chaos. When I stepped into Norman's shoes there was a bit of respite. I think a lot of actors feel like that, irrespective of addiction. Acting is their safe place, because they don't have to be themselves.
At first I really enjoyed drinking, but quite quickly I became dependent on alcohol. It was self-medication. I don't blame the booze; it could have been anything. There was nothing sinister from my childhood, or the rest of life, that triggered the addiction. I just liked it. I liked the feeling and the escape. In my head I became a better dancer, funnier, more handsome. Fame was never the reason for drinking. I think it would have happened whatever my job was. But I suddenly had the funds to enable myself and speed up the process. It also sped up the recovery, for which I am very grateful.
Sometimes I look at other people my age and think, 'It must be horrible being that old.' I still run around the stage like a lunatic. An hour later my 63-year-old body reminds me that I am no longer 19. But I don't care. I hope I never stop playing. Right now I'm living on a tour bus, a rock'n'roll sleeper with a 'no poo' toilet. It doesn't sound romantic but it's that element of the job that attracted me to theatre in the first place – going from venue to venue, town to town, one step ahead of the law, breaking hearts as you go. I'm not breaking hearts and I'm not one step ahead of the law, but the spirit is the same.
This picture marked the start of a new stage of my life. It's a quizzical look, as if I'm asking, what's going to happen to me now? I've got a child on the way. I'm losing the job that has looked after me for 20 years. Why am I not depressed? I am completely terrified, but also – how exciting.