Former EastEnders star opens up about ‘childhood trauma’ and reveals family’s ‘dark side’

The actor provided a candid insight into their childhood(Image: BBC)

A former EastEnders star has opened up about suffering ‘childhood trauma’ as he offered insight into his family’s ‘dark side’.

Actor Richard Blackwood played the role of the iconic Kim Fox’s husband Vincent Hubbard on the popular BBC soap from 2015 until 2018.

Known for being a bad boy, Vincent’s fate was left unknown for three years after last being seen with a gun pointed at him by a corrupt police officer.

With Kim discovering she was pregnant with their son Mica shortly after his disappearance, Vincent’s death wasn’t confirmed until 2021 by Phil Mitchell, who knew what had happened all along.

Since leaving the programme, Richard has competed on Dancing on Ice in 2019 and joined Hollyoaks the following year as Felix Westwood.

Looking back on his rise to fame, Richard has revealed that his mum Juliet was an alcoholic and he used to see a ‘demon come out’ when she drank.

Due to what he saw his mum, who died in 2020, go through, Richard doesn’t drink much and remains compassionate when speaking about her.

Richard Blackwood as Vincent on EastEnders(Image: BBC)

He told Digital Spy: “I’ve never really admitted this before, it’s an exclusive: my mum was an alcoholic. So, I saw the effect it had on her. Drinking brought out a dark side.

“It was a childhood trauma. My mum was a very funny woman, but when she got to a certain level of drink – you could see this demon come out.

“As a kid, I realised I just didn’t like what drinking does, so I stayed away from it. She’s dead now, but she always respected that I never said it.”

Despite his reservations about drinking, Richard has had a cocktail every now and then, but ‘has never been drunk’.

“Yes, why not? Pina Colada, or what’s the other one? A strawberry daiquiri is a very manly drink. But I have never been drunk, and I don’t think I ever will be,” he said.

Looking back on his childhood, Richard admitted that he once stole a Whizzer and Chips comic and a Superman annual from his local corner shop in London when he was a kid.

He recalled: “I never got involved in crime. It just wasn’t me. I wasn’t raised that way. The worst thing I ever did was steal a Whizzer and Chips comic from our corner shop. I put it up my T-shirt and ran away.

“If Mum had found out, she would have killed me. I also stole a ‘Superman’ annual. Do you know how much that is worth now? You could buy a house in London!”

Richard’s parents Juliet and Cliff split when he was 10, with his dad later marrying supermodel Naomi Campbell’s mum, Valerie Morris.