Emmerdale legend Claire Kings battle with addiction | UK News

Emmerdale‘s Kim Tate has skilled her honest share of drama since coming into the Yorkshire village in 1989, and Claire King, the actress who performs her, has also been through a lot over the many years. In an unearthed interview, Claire, now 63, bravely opened up about her addiction battle, bitter divorce, and how she confronted financial destroy.

Speaking to counsellor Mandy Saligari on the Channel 5 show Therapy in 2017, the star stated the breakdown of her marriage to Peter Amory, who performed Chris Tate on Emmerdale, set it all off.

She stated: “I knew he always gambled, but not in that way. Lose your house money, lose everything money. I was £9,000 short of paying my mortgage off and then ­suddenly, poof. It was just horrible and it was draining.”

The couple ended their marriage after 10 years when it emerged Peter had been untrue with their co-star Samantha Giles, who performs Bernice Blackstock on the cleaning soap.

Claire admitted, “We’d split up due to his infidelity. That and the fact every bugger knew. “It occurred in my home, the ­native pub, office.

“Then they split, and we thought we’d work it out, but then they got together again. Six months ­later – finished. I felt as though it was the end of something, but also a failure. And I didn’t want it to be a failure. It was a loss as well. It was a failure of a marriage, but the loss of a good friend. I really didn’t know it would ­affect me so badly.”

The well-loved actress stated she drank alcohol to masks her own financial issues after she struggled to discover work when she left the ITV drama Bad Girls.

She’d been having fun with an array of roles since her massive break in an Adam and the Ants music video in 1982, and the thought of financial destroy was a robust capsule to swallow for Claire.

Claire informed the therapist: “Hitting 40, having a divorce, not having children, and getting deeper into debt. I sold my wardrobe, dresses, and everything, even collectors’ items, as I had no money. I thought, ‘God, am I ever going to work again?’”

“I think I was depressed. I was on a very rocky road at the time,” she admitted. “It wasn’t a great time, and that’s where I went a bit off the rails, drinking too much.”

The star managed to turn things around when she landed a role in Coronation Street in 2014 following a facelift. She quipped: “My agent at the time had said, ‘Right, what you need is a facelift.’ It got me loads of work because I just felt better about myself, and it gave me a little perk up.”

Claire rejoined the Emmerdale solid completely in 2019, and according to stories, she is presently the highest-paid actor on the ITV cleaning soap. “That’s why I work, that’s why I try and put some money away for a pension, for the future, in case I’m ­disabled,” she informed the counsellor. “I don’t have the kids who could look after me.”

According to London Theatre News, she earns £230,000 per year for her role as Kim.

She recently put pen to paper to sign a new deal, which will keep her on the soap for another year.

Speaking about what is in store for Kim, a source told The Sun: “She’s going to stop at nothing to get what she wants – and make a few more enemies in the process as well as potentially changing the village forever.”

A spokesperson for Peter informed The Mirror: “Peter continues to be very busy working as an actor but can ­verify that he and Claire have a very amicable relationship and are in common contact with each other.”