Age? I’m getting younger, insists Bill Roache (85)
THERE are plenty of doctors and scientists who might disagree with him, but William Roache says the body is designed to go on forever.
The 85-year-old Coronation Street star is apparently so certain of this that he insists he is getting younger.
Roache, who has played Ken Barlow since the inaugural episode of the ITV soap in 1960, says his advancing youth is all down to a ‘belief system’ – and only our lifestyle choices keep us from living much longer.
‘I’ve decided that I’m actually getting younger,’ he tells Radio Times. ‘A few years ago, I made the decision that I was going to start getting younger. It’s a belief system, really.
‘A lot of people think if they’ve got an ache or pain, then it must be age. But it’s nothing to do with age. Age has no ailments attached to it whatsoever – all your cells renew themselves equally all the time.
‘If you’ve got an ailment, it’s probably because you’ve been eating the wrong stuff or living the wrong sort of life. The body was actually designed to go on for ever.’
Roache also believes exercise – he plays golf – meditation and learning lines help him to stay young. He adds: ‘You see people who retire after having very active, mental jobs and there’s a sense of them slowing down. We have to keep up to the mark.
‘There are certain basic principles to a good life: get a minimum of eight hours sleep a night, drink fresh clean water, get some fresh air and eat good, healthy food. We all know that. But our lives are so stressful and people don’t get the sleep they need.’
There must be something in what he says. With his floppy, blond hair, Ken Barlow could pass for a man two decades younger. Roache continues to work 12-hour days on the Manchester-based set, for the show which airs six episodes a week and says he will never retire.
In 2012 he claimed in a TV interview to have bedded up to 1,000 women. Four years ago he was cleared after five women had claimed he assaulted them when they were aged 16 or under, between 1965 and 1971.