Corrie star unveils tribute to legend
CORONATION Street favourite Brooke Vincent honoured soap legend Jean Alexander by unveiling a memorial in her honour in the late star’s home town of Southport. Brooke, who plays Sophie Webster in the ITV soap, unveiled the bench at the Southport Flower Show in tribute to the actress who found fame as Corrie battleaxe Hilda Ogden.
Jean, who passed away at the age of 90 last October, lived in Southport for many years and was a regular visitor to the annual flower show in Victoria Park.
Brooke, dressed in a white floral-embellished dress, said it was a “massive honour” to unveil the bench to an icon of the show.
She said: “I know she was a huge fan of Southport Flower Show so what an amazing honour.
“I never got the pleasure to meet her, but I hear stories all the time from Mike Le Vell and Sally Dynevor [Brooke’s soap parents Kevin and Sally Webster] about what a wonderful lady she was. She was incredibly professional, and so well-respected.
“I heard that she used to get the train to work, even when she was such a legend in the soap, for her to stay true to her roots and still get the train I think that’s wonderful.”
Brooke has now starred in Corrie for an impressive 14 years, but she laughed off suggestions that she was heading towards soap icon status herself.
She said: “I’ve been on Corrie 14 years, I’m probably a bit like the furniture now!
“But there’s no comparison to the likes of Jean, our Bill Roache, Bill Tarmey. Those real icons of the soap. That was a different kind of era. A lot of how our show is run now and the success is down to these icons that have gone beforehand. I love the show, I love Corrie, to have those icons who have gone before is so special.”
Jean’s god-daughter Susan Dutton and her husband Philip were also at the grand unveiling at Southport’s Victoria Park yesterday, ahead of the grand opening of the show to the public tomorrow and were touched and delighted by the honour.
Susan said: “Coming to the Southport Flower Show was also a real highlight of the year for her.
“She would have been so pleased and honoured by this tribute.”
Southport Flower Show is on from tomorrow until Sunday with tickets from southportflowershow.co.uk