Corrie’s Ben lured back with ‘family friendly’ TV deal

CORONATION Street star Ben Price has revealed that he only agreed to return to the show after bosses offered him more family friendly working hours.

The actor, who plays Nick Tilsley, quit last year after finding it a struggle to juggle time with his children at home in Bath with his work commitments on the cobbles 200 miles away.

But he was tempted back after 18 months away when bosses offered him a deal which will allow him to get home at weekends.

Ben, 46, said: “I was coming home late Friday night, leaving on a Sunday. But I now have a different way of working. I get a longer weekend – they make sure I get to be at home on a Friday or a Monday.

“They crush my work into busy days, but I get to do it, rather than it elongating over time. They are aware that I have to find that balance now, so it’s a really different working week.”

Ben, who has children Paloma, 11, and Maximilian, nine, with his fashion stylist wife Alexandra, revealed he had spent most Ben Price is back as Nick Tilsley of the past 18 months as a full-time father. He said: “I only left to go back to my kids. It was never about me going off and doing other things, it was only ever about me going home and doing the school run and making sandwiches. “So I took them to school and made packed lunches and became a dad and didn’t think about acting or Nick Tilsley or the Street. “I took my daughter horse riding and tucked my son up into bed and listened to him read and I did that for a year and a half. I was a stay-at-home dad. I did some writing, I did my film stuff, which was great, but I just took my kids to school. It’s pretty unglamorous, it’s just life.” Ben joined Coronation Street in 2009. He featured in a host of dramatic storylines before leaving in April last year. Nick returned to Weatherfield last night after his screen former girlfriend Leanne Battersby was seriously injured in a car accident. The hospital called him because he was still listed as her emergency contact. Viewers saw him sitting at her hospital bedside as she lay unconscious.