Steve McDonald
Steve McDonald
Married:
Children: Amy (mother Tracy Barlow) born 9 February 2004
Oliver Battersby (mother Leanne Battersby) born 20 February, 2017
Played by: Simon Gregson
First appeared:
6 December 1989
Steve is the Jack the Lad, black sheep McDonald son, in
contrast to Andy who's dutiful and studious. He stole car-radios (including Alf
Roberts') when he was young.
He went out with Vicky Arden for a while.
She was at boarding school, but would stay at the Rovers with Bet and Alec
during the holidays.
Steve got into horse-racing, having met someone in
the Rovers who seemed to make a living from gambling. He took Steve along a
couple of times, and each time, Steve came back loaded. He liked the idea of
making lots of money while doing nothing and took it up full time. To start with
he did well, and splashed his money around. He bought a car and mobile phone and
rented a flat near Mike Baldwin at Weatherfield Quays - Flat 6, Montreal House.
He worked at a print shop for Mike, screen-printing T-shirts and
producing other promotional material. With some of his winnings he bought this
off Mike and set up on his own, continuing to pay rent. Eventually, the bubble
burst and he had to sell the car and give up the flat.
He started seeing
Fiona Middleton, who was a hairdresser in Denises' salon. They were very much in
love and moved into the flat above Jim's cafe.
All this time, his
parents and Fiona had been going on at him to stop gambling and he kept
pretending that he had. They believed him. One night though, a thug turned up at
the flat asking for money. Fiona didn't know anything about it and was
terrified. It turned out that Steve had been going to casinos and losing
heavily. He owed money to loan-sharks and they were determined to get it back.
They went to the printshop and smashed it up.
Vicky still came back to
the Rovers for holidays and was always very frosty to Fiona. She went round to
the printshop one night while Steve was sleeping there and seduced him. She was
an heiress and Steve saw her as the way out of his money troubles. He dumped
Fiona and started courting Vicky and eventually married her. They had a lot of
opposition from Bet and Alec. Alec tried to buy him off, knowing that it was
really the money he wanted, but Steve could get more from Vicky than Alec and
wouldn't be bought.
They had a long honeymoon in the Caribbean and then
came back to Coronation Street to be partners in the printshop. Vicky had been
to business school and took over the books. She was very serious about it all,
and soon began to despair at Steve when all he wanted to do was swan about
making contacts and painting the town red. She could see that it wasn't a going
concern and they needed to work at it. Steve saw that she had plenty of money
and they didn't need to worry about anything.
Steve went for the KBEC
contract and was talking up a storm. It quickly fell apart though when the
scouts saw the premises and realised that there was no way Steve could fulfil
the contract, giving it to Mike Baldwin instead.
Steve tried to emulate
Mike in many ways, with his flash lifestyle and mobile phone. He didn't have the
business sense though. At Christmas, he bought some stolen whiskey to give to
his clients. The cops found out and he claimed to know nothing about it. He
persuaded Vicky to pay the fence so that he wouldn't be implicated during his
trial. This all went well and he got off. However, later, the guys wife
confessed all to the police. She had received the money from Vicky and wanted to
make things worse for her husband because she'd discovered hed been having an
affair.
When Steve realised he couldn't stop this from coming out, he
claimed that he'd known nothing about it and that it was Vicky who'd been
responsible. This finally made Vicky realise just what she meant to Steve, and
she testified against him in court. Steve was sent to prison for 2 years for
perverting the course of justice.
In prison, Steve persuaded Liz to ask
Fiona to come and see him. She did. He said that it was always her he'd loved
and he wanted her to see him again to give him something to look forward to
while he was in prison (her visits) and to be there for him when he came out.
She saw him a few times, but didn't want to be involved in that way and couldn't
persuade him that she really didn't care for him any more. Steve always believes
that he's irresistible to women, and will get his own way. Hes never grateful
for anything, thinking thats he's getting less than his due.
He started
ringing up the salon, and when Fiona refused to have anything more to do with
him, he picked a fight so that he'd be put in the hospital and Fiona would be
forced to see him. It didn't work.
Vicky divorced Steve and moved away, thus
ending that chapter in Steve's life.
Steve started working with his father in a building company when he got out of prison. Fiona was still there in the background and after her fiancé left her when he found out she'd slept with Steve's father, Jim, he tried again to get back together with her. She had her ex-fiance's baby, a little boy named Morgan. Steve had been there for her when the baby was born and he and Fiona finally grew closer. Steve blew it again though, when he had a one night stand with Fiona's friend and fellow employee, Maxine Heavy. Fiona had enough, sold the business to Audrey Roberts and left Weatherfield and Steve.
Meanwhile, Jim had fallen off scaffolding and was badly injured. Steve kept the business going and was involved in several large projects in conjunction with Pat the Builder, developing Victoria street and later a renovation for partners Duggie Fergusson and Richard Hillman. Steve also started a mini-cab firm with Vikram Desai but got into some shady financing with drug dealer Jez Quigley. He was unable to pay Jez and was beaten very badly. Jim went after Jez and reciprocated the beating, putting Jez in hospital where he died of internal injuries just as he was going to try to kill Steve in his hospital bed. Jim confessed and went to prison for manslaughter and Steve recovered.
Then there was Karen. Karen worked at Underworld and made her way around a few of the available men on the Street. When she reached Steve, sparks flew. Flirtation grew to a serious attraction and to wind up Karen's workmates, they married for a bet. The marriage has had a lot of ups and downs as Karen leads Steve on a merry go round of fighting, screaming and making up. They separated at one point when Steve's jealousy of Karen's relationship with her new boss, Joe Carter, got out of hand. He had a one night stand with someone so she retaliated with Joe and their marriage broke up. Joe was using Karen to scam Mike Baldwin and when that all came out, Karen returned the scammed money to Mike and left town. Steve was bereft and spent his birthday having sex with old "friend" Tracy Barlow. It didn't last any longer than the one night because Steve found out where Karen was the next day and wooed her back. They continued with their divorce because Karen decided she wanted a big white wedding.
Ah but unbeknownst to Steve, Tracy had got pregnant from their encounter though she initially lied and said it was Roy Cropper's baby after she'd drugged him to get him into bed for a bet. She revealed to Steve that it was his baby at Christmas, 2003 after Steve and Karen had had yet another row. Steve didn't want Karen to know but ended up taking Tracy to hospital when the baby was born. He didn't want anything to do with the baby or Tracy who professed her love for him. On the day of his remarriage to Karen, however, Tracy showed up at the wedding demanding her baby from Roy and the truth came out. Steve and Karen married anyway but Karen has struggled with Tracy's connection to Steve through their daughter Amy.
Steve continued to keep secrets from Karen, such as the fact that he pays Tracy money for maintenance and Tracy continues to rub it in Karen's face that she has the baby. Karen decided to get pregnant but when she finally did, she miscarried and went beserk. Everyone thought she took baby Amy and killed her in a car fire but she hadn't. She left the baby with Roy and Hayley. Tracy and Karen had a knock down fight and finally Steve had had enough. On Christmas day 2004, he told Karen to leave. She moved out the next day and has not been back.
Steve had a short fling with a lovely Irish girl a few months later but more and more, wanted to be a bigger part in Amy's life. To that end, he tried to trick Tracy into thinking he wanted to make a go of it with her so that he could get custody. Tracy sussed him out and is making even more trouble, implying to the courts that Amy is not in fact Steve's baby. We await the outcome.
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