Real life of Coronation Street's Bernie Winter actress Jane Hazlegrove - Emmerdale star wife, heartbreaking loss and forgotten soap role

Bernie Winter's past is set to come back to haunt her in Coronation Street as she deals with the decline of her son Paul Foreman. As viewers of the ITV soap know, the character, played by Jane Hazlegrove, is heartbreaking witnessing the deterioration of her son following his Motor Neurone Disease diagnosis last year.

Paul discovered the heartbreaking news that he had the fatal, rapidly progressing disease that affects the brain and spinal cord, in scenes aired in April 2023. The former builder, who only discovered anything was wrong after he was accidentally knocked over by Carla Connor in her Underworld van when she had been unknowingly drugged with LSD by Stephen Reid, kept the news from his loved ones.

However, the devastating news soon came spilling out and the family have since been rallying around Paul as the symptoms of the life-limiting disease progress. Soon, Paul's dad, Denny, will come back into their lives after hearing his son is dying via a radio interview he does with Amy Barlow.

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Bernie covers her shock at coming face-to-face with Denny and makes out Paul’s already dead and the interview was a recording. But disbelieving her, Denny follows her up to the flat where Gemma and Paul are shocked to see their dad. When Denny remarks that Paul looks great for someone that’s supposedly dead, Bernie freezes in horror.

Later, Bernie lets off steam to Dev about Denny, secretly worried that Denny might blab about her past. Billy, meanwhile, reminds Paul that Denny used to knock him about when he was a kid and he’s not to be trusted but when Paul invites Denny to watch a film, Billy reluctantly leaves them to it.

Denny soon nips out for ice cream leaving Paul alone in the flat. He bumps into Gemma and begs her to let him meet his grandchildren. But while alone in the flat, Paul has a coughing fit and struggles to breathe. He calls for an ambulance but when the operator answers, he drops the phone. Denny then returns and is shocked to find Paul barely conscious. Meanwhile, Dev Alahan finds Bernie rifling through a shoebox of old letters and photos. When Dev wonders what she’s looking for, Bernie’s uneasy...

Following the star of the storyline, Jane shared how her own personal loss is impacting her time on the cobbles as her character also prepares for tragedy. Speaking about finding out about the MND storyline last year, Jane told Inside Soap: "I was very upset [when I found out about the storyline] as I adore Peter Ash [who plays Paul Foreman] so I was gutted as this meant he would be going. My Corrie family are a tight unit. I'm so lucky to work with them all."

She then shared how her emotions had also been heightened as her own dad died, adding to the publication: "I lost my dad recently, so I know what this kind of grief is like. It has been very emotional."

Away from the ITV soap, Jane has the support of her wife as the Manchester actress has been married to fellow soap actor Isobel Middleton since 2015. Speaking to Lorraine Kelly on her ITV show in 2019, she opened up about her ‘beautiful’ wife and she joked: "We’ve not [worked alongside each other], which is probably why we’re still together. She’s sensational, a really beautiful woman. I am very blessed.

"We relocated back to Manchester last year, before [Corrie]. It was time to get back to the north for all kinds of reasons and that makes me very happy." And Isobel herself is no stranger to the small screen herself having appeared in to rival soaps to Corrie.

Isobel had three roles in Emmerdale as Dr Lane in 2014, a prosecution barrister during Simon McManus's trial in 2018 and Jean Rawson in 2020. And in the BBC soap EastEnders she played Sadie Banks in 2002. Isobel hasn't just had minor soap stints though, because she has a glowing back catalogue of TV credits.

But she did share her excitement over her wife's achievement at the British Soap Awards a couple of years ago as Isobel tweeted: "Very proud that my sublimely talented & hilarious wife has been nominated for Best Comedy Performance at the #soapawards2022 We can’t vote but if I could I would. Repeatedly. #JaneHazlegrove #BernieWinters #Corrie #funnybones."

In the 1990s Jane starred in the ITV detective thriller Cracker alongside the late Robbie Coltrane, and has also appeared in the likes of The Ruth Rendle Mysteries, The Bill and like her wife, Casualty too. One of her latest roles however is on the Channel 5 drama Compulsion as Dr Wilhemina Medlock and this year she appeared in radio drama The Archers as Anna Tregorran.

And playing Bernie was also not Jane's first stint in Corrie. She actually played Sue Clayton in Corrie back in 1985, the youngest daughter of Harry and Connie Clayton. Speaking to Inside Soap, Jane opened up about that long-forgotten role, saying: "Well, it was only two episodes a week then, so it was a totally different beast to what it is now.

"I was in the green room with some of the legends, Bill Tarmey [Jack Duckworth], Barbara Knox [Rita], Thelma Barlow [Mavis Riley], so I was a little apprehensive. But they were just gorgeous to me." But before being known for her cobbles alter-ego, Jane was probably best known for starring for portraying the role of Kathleen "Dixie" Dixon on and off for 20 years in Casualty.

She actually made her first appearance on TV, however, in 1984 at the age of 16. Jane appeared in a TV movie called Threads, in which she starred as a character called Alison Kemp. She later went on to star in a number of other TV shows before getting her big break in the show How We Used To Live, when she won a recurring role as the character Maggie Selby between 1984 and 1987.

Despite her fame, in 2019 she revealed her battle with 'Imposter Syndrome.' She told chat show host Lorraine Kelly: “It is quite difficult when I pop up. I tend to throw things at the television. I am quite hard on myself. I think that’s important though don’t you? Imposter syndrome - that at any moment I could say, are you Jane Hazelgrove? Yeah, get out.”

She added: "The arrogance of youth - I wasn’t nervous at all then. Now I’m a woman in my 50s, it was really frightening because it’s Coronation Street. It’s a big gig and I don’t want to let the show down and I don’t want to let myself down or the family or anything."