{"id":362418,"date":"2026-01-10T07:55:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-10T07:55:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/362418\/"},"modified":"2026-01-10T07:55:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-10T07:55:09","slug":"coronation-street-legend-pays-tribute-as-star-gutted-by-death-of-itv-soap-actor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/362418\/","title":{"rendered":"Coronation Street legend pays tribute as star ‘gutted’ by death of ITV soap actor"},"content":{"rendered":"

Simon Gregson has paid tribute as he and his co-stars were left ‘gutted’ by the death of an actor who appeared in the show\"Coronation<\/p>\n

Coronation Street actor Simon Gregson(Image: ITV)<\/p>\n

Coronation Street<\/a> legend Simon Gregson has paid tribute as he and his co-stars were left ‘gutted’ by the death of an actor who appeared on the long-running show.<\/p>\n

It was announced on Thursday (January 8) that Tony Little<\/a>, who was a non-speaking supporting actor on the ITV<\/a> soap and known to many fans as Old Kebab Guy, died over the festive period.<\/p>\n

While he never spoke during his appearances in Weatherfield, Tony was often seen alongside some of the soap opera’s biggest stars, including William ‘Bill’ Roache, who has starred as Ken Barlow in the long-running show since the very first Corrie episode in 1960. He also had a small part in the film, Raining Stones, with Brookside and Royle Family legend Ricky Tomlinson<\/p>\n

Taking to X, formerly known as Twitter<\/a>, a fellow Coronation Street supporting actor, Adam Blease, paid tribute to Tony Little, the Mirror reports. He said: “05\/09\/1937 ~ 28\/12\/2025,” alongside a broken heart emoji.<\/p>\n

Adam, whose character Dirk works at Underworld, added: “Comedian, Singer, Entertainer and #Corrie Supporting Artist for many years. Tony Little was not only hilarious, he was also a great friend. We had the most unlikely friendship brought together by joy and laughter. Always iconic and a true legend.”<\/p>\n

\"It<\/p>\n

It was announced that Tony died just a few days after Christmas(Image: ITV)<\/p>\n

Now, Simon, who is famed for playing Weatherfield’s Steve McDonald, has shared his own emotional tribute. In a video shared on Instagram, he said: “I’ve just heard the very sad news that a very dear friend Tony Little passed away over the festive season. Me and Tony laughed every day he was at work. I just want to send all my love and thoughts to the family.”<\/p>\n

He added: “I loved Tony and we had a great relationship. He will be sorely missed. Night god bless Tony,” before captioning the post: “Tony Little was a very funny lovely man and he will be missed my thoughts go out to his family and friends.”<\/p>\n

Simone’s Corrie co-star Antony Cotton was left surprised by the news, as he commented on the post: “Oh no!!! Really? I’m gutted.” Meanwhile, Samia Longchambon and Kate Ford posted red heart emojis in the comments section. Former Corrie star Ryan Thomas also added: “Noooo what a legend.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Simon Gregson has paid tribute as he and his co-stars were left ‘gutted’ by the death of an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":362419,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[2525,96,347,391,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-362418","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-coronation-street","tag-entertainment","tag-itv","tag-tv","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362418","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=362418"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362418\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/362419"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=362418"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=362418"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=362418"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}