Brian and Maggie star Steve Coogan 'cried all the way' to hospital after 'terrifying' health scare

Steve Coogan
-Credit:Getty Images


Steve Coogan has been a fixture on our screens for decades. Best known for his role as the politically incorrect radio and TV host Alan Partridge, he's also played one of Britain's most infamous paedophiles and sex offenders, Jimmy Savile, in the BBC drama The Reckoning and starred in the Night At The Museum film trilogy.

Steve, 59, is tonight returning to our screens in the anticipated new Channel 4 drama Brian and Maggie, a dramatic re-creation of Margaret Thatcher's final TV interview with journalist Brian Walden which is widely credited for being a step towards her downfall.

Away from the cameras, Steve has previously been candid about how his battle with a cocaine addiction caused a number of 'terrifying' health issues - including one night when he was certain he was going to die. The star’s battle with cocaine began in 1992, when he was regularly given the drug for free.

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He recalled how he had thought he was going to die once as he felt dizzy and had pins and needles in his left arm. He wrote: “I’d been up all night doing drugs, and when I sat down to have breakfast I started to feel dizzy. My blood sugar level had dropped dramatically and I was on the verge of blacking out.

"I could feel pins and needles in my left arm, and my heart was thundering. I thought I was having a heart attack. Patrick [Marber] put me in a car and drove through red lights to get me to hospital. I cried all the way.

"I couldn’t stop thinking, ‘I’m going to die. This is it. My headstone will say: Stephen Coogan, born in Middleton in 1965, died in Edinburgh in 1992, aged 26 years.’ What a waste!"

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He was kept in hospital overnight, later discharging himself. He was told he was suffering from 'terrifying' panic attacks, which badly affected his mental health.

He added: “The next day I had another panic attack. And another. They wouldn’t go away. I started to think I was going mad.

“I’d be having dinner in a restaurant, surrounded by people I did and didn’t know – or anywhere I felt I couldn’t easily escape – and I couldn’t breathe. I very quickly became depressed.”

Brian and Maggie airs tonight (Wednesday, January 29) on Channel 4 at 9pm.