Coronation Street actor reveals death threats over gay character

Daniel Brocklebank has admitted his character on Coronation Street hasn’t completely won over the viewers.

corrie-billy

by Jack White |
Published on

The 35-year-old plays gay vicar Billy Mayhew – and he shockingly revealed he’s received homophobic abuse and death threats on social media for it.

Speaking to the Daily Star, Daniel said: “Somebody tweeted me the other day and said they wanted to kick ‘that f***y Sean’s head in and crucify the shirt-lifting vicar.

“I thought, ‘Crucify? God, can we have a coffee first?’”

But, despite the small-mindedness of some, Daniel insisted he tries not to let it get him down.

Daniel plays vicar Billy on the ITV soap
Daniel plays vicar Billy on the ITV soap

He added: “You learn to try and deflect things with humour.”

It’s not the first time Daniel has had to deal with such abuse, going through something similar when he was coming out in real life.

He said: “There have been dark periods of my life where people and society have told me it is absolutely wrong and I had nobody to turn to.”

Could Billy and Sean have the show's first gay wedding

Playing Billy on the mainstream ITV soap is already doing so much for the LGBT community, but Daniel has his eye on something even bigger.

“Religion is not gay-friendly but with a character like mine it is opening people’s eyes. There are many gay Christians, Muslims and Catholics and it is all right to have a faith,” he continued.

“There has never been a gay wedding on the show before.”

We would LOVE to see Billy and Sean Tully tie the knot, wouldn’t you?

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