CORONATION Street star Sean Wilson says his eight-minute showdown with ITV bosses over historic sex claims left him “in hell”.
The actor, known for playing Gail’s ex husband Martin Platt, told of his axing during the brutal meeting following his high-profile return to the cobbles this summer.
Last week police cleared Sean and said there would be no further action over the claim, made by a woman with links to the soap.
In an exclusive interview with The Sun on Sunday, he said: “My reputation was ruined in just eight minutes.”
Having left the soap in 2005, he was sensationally brought back in July for Gail’s huge exit storyline for the Christmas special.
But after filming just 10 scenes he was shocked to receive an email from soap bosses on August 1 summoning him to an impromptu meeting.
It comes as…
The email, written by an executive at the soap, read: “I am writing to request a meeting with you at the Coronation Street studios.
“This is to discuss a historical allegation of a sexual nature which has been made about you in the past few days relating to when you were previously under contract to the programme…we will realise this will come out of the blue for you as it has for us.”
Sean first appeared as Martin in Corrie back in 1985, with his character having a son, David, with Gail, played by Helen Worth.
Sean, 59, quit the soap 20 years later over a plot which involved his character seducing an underage girl.
Referring to his return, he said: “I jumped at the chance to reprise my role as Martin when I got the call in February.
“Helen and I go back a long way and I wanted to be the person that she left with and I think the viewers did as well.
“It was special for me and the show to reprieve our relationship.
“I was having a great time on set. It was like rolling back the years.”
Sean said receiving the email from ITV bosses “truly stunned” him.
He first called Carol Hammond – his partner of five years – and then his agent Katherine Stonehouse, who both attended the meeting via a Zoom call.
He explained: “I was so confused. I had no time to prepare.
“It took place 10 minutes after I responded to them.
“I was suddenly confronted with three executives who said they had received an allegation that I had put my hands up a woman’s skirt and ‘rummaged around’.
“They also said police had contacted them and had told them they had referred the case to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).
“I was in bewilderment.
“They said they had to cut the contract and they had to protect their cast.
“I told them that I knew it hadn’t happened and I deserved a chance to convince them but they said once it had become a police matter they couldn’t do anything.
“I said that I was a professional and I had been there for 21 years and there had never been an allegation made against me.
“I wasn’t told the name of the person and was told it only happened some time in 1997 and that the person had worked on the show.
Desperately trying not to break down, Sean took a sip of water, and went on: “All I could think was that this was preposterous.
“I was in total shock.
“I was being thrown out the backdoor after 21 years of a glittering career.”
The nightmare for Sean became even worse when he was unable to find out any details about the allegation.
He said: “We asked ITV to supply us with the details of the police officer who had contacted them so we could initiate an informal voluntary interview with them.
“But they said they couldn’t give us that information and that we would have to wait for the police to call us.
“Two weeks went by and nobody got in touch.”
In desperation Sean hired two lawyers to track down the police officer dealing with the complaint and find out if he was under investigation.
He was also forced to hire a media lawyer after his shock departure from Wetherfield left cast and crew baffled and caused intense speculation about what had happened.
He said: “I had no way to clear my name and save my reputation.
“ITV put out a statement that I had stepped away for personal reasons and I wasn’t able to speak out about what the real reasons were.
“My whole career was in the balance and the police hadn’t come forward with any information.
“I got the lawyers to ring the police stations in Manchester.
“We finally managed to get through to an officer who had just been assigned the case after weeks and weeks of trying.”
Over two months later, on October 25, Sean attended a voluntary interview carried out by a detective constable at Longsight Park police station.
He said: “The detective said there were no witnesses and that the person complaining hadn’t told anyone about it, and they couldn’t say when it happened in 1997.
“I was shocked as well to hear that the allegation was entirely different from what ITV had said.
“The police said it was a touch on the backside over their jeans, over the individual’s jeans, on one occasion, and not a hand up a woman’s skirt.
“Police also said they had never contacted ITV and it couldn’t have been passed to the CPS as they hadn’t even assigned the case to an officer at that point.
“They also told me the name which I didn’t recognise.
“…There are hundreds of people who work for Coronation Street who you never meet and it was one of those.
“They don’t work there now.”
Sean told how he was relieved “beyond belief” when on November 21 he received the news that there would be no further action.
The stoic father-of-two, who spent much of the interview trying to stop himself from welling up, became visibly upset when he confessed: “The past few months have taken their toll as I had weeks and weeks of nothing to go on.”
Overwrought, he added: “When I got that call that was the first time I cried in four months.
“I just let all the emotions out which were all pent-up.
“What got me through it was knowing the truth.
“There were times I’d find myself sitting in the garden, just staring out at nothing for a while and I would think I’d better get my head together because I didn’t want to sink.
“The entire time I felt submerged in water but I didn’t want to sink into depression.”
Sean has struggled to tell his children about what happened – but was planning to sit down with Callum, 26, and Maisie, 24, after speaking to this paper.
He said: “It’s very difficult to tell my daughter about something like this.
“How do you tell your children that you’ve been wrongly accused of this? But they’ll have to be okay about it won’t they? Because their dad’s innocent.”
And it’s not just emotionally Sean has been left in pieces, but financially too.
He has lost out on his lucrative four month Coronation Street contract and has had to shell out thousands of pounds for lawyers.
He said: “It’s been a great cost to me.
“Lawyers are expensive and I needed to hire them to protect me.
“ITV did pay me the contractual amount of guaranteed minimum episodes I was due to film, but I lost money on the future residuals, like episode repeat fees.”
Sean revealed that his role reprisal was part of a wider plan for a big showbiz comeback.
He foresaw panto, more telly and even a stint on I’m A Celeb, but now he doesn’t know if he is ever going to be marketable again.
Sean, looking at his tearful partner Carol who sits quietly in the corner for emotional support, said: “It was going to be a nice, new start for us.
“I was going to be appearing on a flagship ITV show, there were already two tweets put out prior to me arriving on the show.
“It was a very popular return and my agent and I were going to work on that.
“I had plans to write an autobiography and I am a keen writer and have penned three cookbooks.
“But everything that was all very exciting has been put on hold.
“I could have been making thousands of pounds a week but instead I have become persona non grata throughout this whole sorry episode.
“My career is in tatters.”
Sean, who turned to cheesemaking after acting, admitted he was “angry” at the person who complained and that ITV “got their facts completely wrong”.
“It took weeks of my own investigative work to find out what ITV had said was 180 degrees different from the complaint,” he said.
“I’m angry too at the person but what can I do?”
But then he takes a more measured approach with the broadcaster, confessing: “They had to do what they had to do.
“I have no ill feeling against them other than things could have gone a little bit better.
“I understand there has to be a process but people need to realise not everybody is guilty.
“This whole entire thing has been unbelievable.
“No matter who you are, or where you work, you are just one call away from ruin.”
Sean, who was watched by 21 million people in his heyday, was one of the cobbles’ most popular characters for 20 years as nurse Martin.
He briefly returned in 2018 as part of the David Platt rape plot despite vowing to never work on the soap again when he parted ways.
Gail and Martin’s ten-year union survived a brief fling in 1993, but ultimately ended after he had an affair with fellow nurse Rebecca in 2000.
Despite Martin’s womanising ways he is considered the most successful of Gail’s six marriages.
