Nina Lucas is the niece of cafe proprietor Roy Cropper, taken in by her uncle after her sickly father Richard Lucas passed away in 2019.
A kind-hearted but complex young woman, Nina is rarely seen without her Goth attire and make-up, which she considers a part of her identity. In 2021, she and her boyfriend Seb Franklin were brutally attacked by Corey Brent and his gang, an attack which cost Seb his life. As the pair had been targeted due to Nina's appearance, Nina had a crisis of self, ditching the Goth clobber for a while. She overcame this in time to testify against Corey on a murder charge, but it wasn't enough to convict and Kelly Neelan was sent down for the crime instead. The conviction was quashed several weeks later when new evidence was found proving that Corey was the attacker.
Nina earns her keep by working at Roy's Rolls, which Roy transferred into her ownership along with the rest of his estate in 2021. Her real interest is in fashion design. In 2020, Underworld employed her to design lingerie, and in 2021 she enrolled at Weatherfield College in fashion textiles.
After her ordeal with Corey, Nina rekindled her relationship with girlfriend Asha Alahan and began undergoing mental health healing via counselling. In 2024, Asha ended their two-year relationship when Nina kissed her twin brother Aadi, following months of mistrust between the women. She continues to live with Roy at 16a Victoria Street.
Biography
2002-2020: Father figures
Nina was born on 24th April 2002. Her mother died when she was fifteen, after being ill for five years. Losing her helped Nina make sense of her own identity, adopting a "goth" style including black dresses, heavy makeup and piercings which she wore every day.
By the time she was sixteen, Nina also stood to lose her father Richard Lucas, who was terminally ill with pulmonary fibrosis. Nina was attending art college, but skipped classes to give Richard round-the-clock care at their flat in Thorn Road, desperate to keep her dad in her life for as long as possible.
One of the ways Richard took his mind off his condition was playing Scrabble. In 2019, when his online sparring partner Roy Cropper called at the flat to meet his opponent in person, Nina lied that Richard didn't live there anymore in order to put him off, feeling that Richard wasn't up to having visitors. She was annoyed when Richard's carer Chantelle Wilder subsequently let Roy and Carla Connor inside. When Roy revealed himself as Richard's half-brother, the two began to bond, but Nina remained cold, afraid that the shock of meeting Roy would hasten her dad's demise.
2019: Nina is devastated when her father Richard passes away
Nina's fears seemed justified when Richard left the flat to visit Roy's Rolls and meet his brother's friends in Coronation Street, a trip which left him physically and mentally exhausted. Later, when Roy's complaints about Chantelle's timekeeping upset her so much that she quit, he took over Richard's day care while social services found a replacement, allowing Nina to return to college. One morning, Roy had to rush out to attend to an emergency at the cafe, and Richard had a bad fall while on his own. Nina arrived back from college in time to hear a paramedic declare her father dead.
Nina blamed Roy for allowing Richard to die alone and refused to have anything to do with him, holing herself up in the flat. Having promised Richard that he would look after Nina, Roy paid her rent arrears and set up camp in the communal hallway with food and drink, determined to stay until his niece opened the door. He made headway with her after the funeral when he cleaned up for her when a neighbour egged her door, and later when he lent her Hayley's old sewing machine to finish a college assignment and modelled in a corset for her.
With no way to pay the bills, Nina was evicted from her flat in February 2020, and became homeless. Roy learned of her predicament when Beth Sutherland reported that she'd seen Nina scavenging for clothes from the Underworld bins. Nina gratefully accepted her uncle's offer of lodgings at 16a Victoria Street with him and Carla, and a job behind the counter at the cafe.
Nina applied herself to her new role, bringing fresh ideas on how make the eatery more eco-friendly. Carla was concerned that she didn't seem to have any friends and tried to set her up with the other teens of the street, but Nina wasn't interested and went bat-watching with Roy instead. She followed this up by joining the Weatherfield Bat Society and showing off her home-made bat boxes. When Roy lied about the date of a subsequent meeting, Nina presumed that he was ashamed to be seen with her, but Carla let her know that he'd resigned from the society after the other members had insulted her due to her Goth appearance. Nina and Roy agreed that they were better off without the others, and continued to go bat-watching on their own.
As she settled into the street, Nina found common ground with some of her more politically-minded neighbours, joining Evelyn Plummer, Mary Taylor and Toyah Battersby in protesting the council's refusal to set a zero-carbon target at the Town Hall, where they were all arrested.
2020-2021: Seb's murder
In May 2020, Nina saw a lad, Jamie, making lewd comments at fifteen-year-old Asha Alahan and punched him on the nose. Asha was having self-esteem issues after a topless video of her was shared online maliciously by Kelly Neelan, having being secretly recorded by her boyfriend Corey Brent. Nina tried to boost Asha's confidence by sending her a sketch of her face, and later supported her when Asha moved schools to escape the bullying and found that her reputation preceded her. She was frustrated when, against her advice, Asha forgave Corey and the teens started seeing each other again.
Nina unexpectedly landed a job at Underworld lingerie factory in September of that year. Dismissive of their old-fashioned designs, Nina scribbled her own alterations on them which impressed client Tom Reed, leading Carla to take her on temporarily. Nina, Carla and Sarah Barlow celebrated when they landed their first big department store order the following month.
In January 2021, Nina got Asha a choker for her birthday. Corey hated it, likening Asha to a dog, and dumped her when she refused to take it off. Nina helped a brooding Asha see that she was better off without him, and was proud when she told Corey where to go when he tried to patch things up. When Asha responded to her words of encouragement by kissing her, Nina was surprised but not upset, and the girls started seeing each other. Content to take things slowly, Nina was taken aback when Asha went all-in on the relationship by coming to her family and telling Nina that she loved her. When she booked a hotel for the couple to spend the night together, Nina got cold feet and told Asha that she wanted to revert to being mates. Feeling rejected, Asha went wild with drugs and Kelly ended up in Weatherfield General after taking some. To Nina's dismay, Asha agreed to go out with Corey again.
Nina took a stand in April when she complained to local handyman Seb Franklin about building site traffic polluting the air. Challenged to do something about it, she set up the cafe tables outside to block the traffic, though Roy forced her to back down when he found out. She started to see Seb in a new light when they discovered they had the same taste in music and Seb took her advice by keeping his man bun rather than getting it cut to stop the lads taking the mickey. They started going out, with Seb going along to a goth concert with Nina. They nearly split up when Nina heard Seb laughing along to Ed Bailey and Paul Foreman's jokes about her appearance, but soon made up and Seb moved into the flat with Roy's blessing.
2021: Nina is targetted for her appearance
Nina remained concerned about Asha and tried to warn her that Corey was interested in Kelly, but her friend wouldn't listen. On the eve of Seb's mother Abi Franklin's wedding to Kevin Webster, Nina and Seb came across a drunken Corey, Kelly, Jay Dowling and Eli Higginson at the Aquaside Industrial Park. They headed off after the group made nasty jabs at Nina, but the group gave chase, hunting the couple down and subjecting them to a brutal beating when they caught up with them. Both were hospitalised but while Nina made a slow recovery, Seb died from his injuries.
Despite being unable to remember anything after the events at the wasteland, Nina was certain that Corey had killed Seb and was furious when Asha stood by her boyfriend. When the evidence placed the four teens at the scene, Corey pinned the blame on Kelly and managed to escape a formal charge, having disposed of the blood-stained clothes he was wearing while kicking Seb. Nina also had to deal with being blamed by Abi for "causing" the attack with her goth appearance and for getting Seb mixed up in her spat with Corey, whose ego had been bruised when she got with Asha. Devastated, Nina washed off her makeup and adopted a more conservative look, sticking with it even after Abi relented and apologised for her behaviour. A few weeks later, Asha used Corey's phone to give police evidence which cast doubt on his story, causing him to be charged with murder. Nina was relieved to learn that Asha had been playing her boyfriend all along, and they became friends again.
Nina went on a downward spiral in her grief. She turned to drink, stealing booze from the corner shop and collapsing in a drunken heap in the Victoria Street ginnel. After quitting her Underworld job, she went to the Chariot Square Hotel with a married and much older man, Hughie, but was distracted when she ran across Corey beginning negotiations with Matt, a lucrative football sports agent. She deliberately ruined things for Corey by telling Matt about the charge hanging over the young player, while Abi intervened to protect her from Hughie. When a vengeful Corey followed Nina home and tried to attack her, Roy called the police, causing him to be swiftly rearrested for breaking his bail conditions. After visiting her dad's grave, Nina decided to go back to her normal, boring life.
In August, Nina planned a memorial garden for Seb on a space next to the builder's yard donated by Ed. Asha offered to help collect funds for it and reported back she'd amassed £400, hiding from Nina the fact that she sold her laptop for the majority of it. When Dev let slip, Asha was forced to confess to Nina that she still had feelings for her, making the girl angry at her deception over something that meant so much to her. Abi showed no enthusiasm for the project and hated the glamourisation of her son's death, particularly a large mural of Seb painted by Nina. In the middle of the night, she trashed the site. Nina accused Asha of the vandalism, but Abi confessed, giving reasons that Nina understood.
With Corey and Kelly's murder trial looming, Nina returned to the scene of the crime with Asha, Abi and Summer Spellman, hoping that retracing her steps would help her overcome her memory block. The experiment worked, and she remembered looking on helplessly as Corey kicked Seb while Kelly tried to hold him back. Emboldened enough to put her goth clobber back on, Nina made a revised statement to the police and gave a detailed testimony in the witness box, although Corey's defence barrister Sabeen Habeeb did her best to discredit her. She was devasated when Corey walked free, with Kelly being found guilty of murder.
After the trial, Nina was accepted onto a fashion and textiles course at Weatherfield College. She tried to move on, but the constant reminders of the injustice prevented this, such as when Corey was promoted to the first team at and dedicated a winning goal to Seb's memory. She tried to expose him in the press, on social media and with flyers but was threatened with a charge of slander. Later, she got the chance to drive her car at Corey, but couldn't go through with it because of what she'd be putting Roy through. Abi was similarly afflicted, going one step further by procuring a gun to avenge Seb's death. She went to Corey's house to shoot the lad, but Nina alerted the police with a false report of an assault and Abi was forced to abandon her plan. The discarded gun was later used by Harvey Gaskell to shoot Natasha Blakeman dead. Having protected Abi from the consequences that her actions unleashed, a guilty Roy signed over his estate to a distraught Nina and left the area to atone for what he'd done.
In October, when homeless Stu Carpenter attempted to steal from the corner shop, Asha noticed that he had the rucksack in which Corey had stashed his blood-stained clothes. She and Nina played detective to track him down and he agreed to hand over the bag and the clothes. Corey was re-arrested and charged with murder, allowing Seb to finally rest in peace. When Abi and Kevin's wedding day went ahead in November, Nina walked Abi down the aisle in her son's place.
2021 to present: Mental health struggles
Amidst the search for Stu, Nina rekindled her relationship with Asha.
Corey's conviction resulted in Kelly being released on bail. Nina rejected her apology, as she had been a willing participant in her and Seb's torment up until it became violent. However, when she came across a homeless and drugged-up Kelly being jeered at by a gang of lads, she took pity on her and brought her back to the street.
Nina soldiered on at the cafe without Roy. Under huge pressure, she began suffering from anxiety that something untoward would happen to the people she loved, especially Asha. Little things would trigger panic attacks, such as unruly children running off with the tip jar at the Christmas market. She was overjoyed when Roy returned on Christmas Day and apologised for letting her down. With his encouragement, Nina came clean to Asha about her anxieties. Asha was sympathetic and agreed to sync her phone with Nina's so that they always knew where the other was. In February, Nina found out that Asha was considering studying in Glasgow. Worried sick after her safety, she locked Asha in the cafe to prevent her from going to an open day. With Roy and Asha's persuasion, Nina agreed to seek help for her anxiety. She saw a doctor and was put on a waiting list for counselling.
In September 2023, Nina vacated the cafe flat so that Evelyn Plummer could have her room, and moved into 7 Coronation Street with the Alahans. Meanwhile, she was growing jealous of Asha's incessant talk about Isla Gibbs, a colleague from her uni paramedic course. Asha brought Nina along on a night out to put her mind at ease, but Nina felt sidelined by Asha and Isla. Her insecurities were amplified when Asha told her friends that she was a designer rather than admit she worked in a cafe. In a misguided attempt to make Asha jealous, Nina let Shona Platt send her flirty texts in the name of someone called "Rob". Asha was angry about the deception, but was reminded that she was also very possessive in the early days of their relationship, and the two women made up. A few weeks later, Asha mistakenly suspected Nina when someone at the university reported Isla for having an inappropriate interest in her. Simmering over their row, Nina tried to kiss Aadi Alahan while comforting him over a falling out with Amy Barlow. She instantly regretted it, but the damage was done and when Asha found out, she ended their relationship for good.
Nina moved back in with Roy. Much of 2024 was spent worrying about her uncle as he was suspected of doing away with Lauren Bolton, a cafe assistant who had gone missing. When his online accusers kidnapped his dog Freddie in an effort to get him to confess, Asha conned them into handing him back. She hoped that her act would bring her and Nina together, but Nina told her that they were never meant to be together.
Personality
Nina is kind-hearted and introspective young woman who sees the beauty in things most people find ugly. After her mother's death when she was fifteen, she used her dark feelings to feed her creativity, developing the goth look she sported from thereon in, which became a part of her identity.
Having been orphaned at seventeen, Nina had loved and lost by the time she came to Coronation Street in 2020. She hid her pain behind a detached and aloof persona, keen to prove to the world that she didn't need anyone's help; she only accepted Roy Cropper's hospitality when the alternative was living on the streets.
In her new surroundings, Nina kept people at a distance, slow to form new relationships. When she and Asha Alahan became a couple for the first time, Nina was scared off within weeks when Asha declared that she was in love. Their second relationship was affected by Nina's mental health issues; after Seb Franklin's death, she became paranoid that something was going to happen to Asha, and had to have counselling. Nina herself wrecked the relationship with her jealousy over Asha's friendship with her student friend Isla Gibbs. By contrast, her time with Seb showed a more playful side to Nina.
She cares deeply about her community, joining Evelyn Plummer, Mary Taylor and Toyah Battersby in a march on Weatherfield Town Hall for their refusal to set a zero-carbon target in April 2020, resulting in them all getting arrested. In April 2021, when her complaints about the building site traffic polluting the air were ignored, she and Shona Platt set up an outdoor cafe, blocking all traffic in Victoria Street, and refusing to budge until closing time. She has also gone out of her way to support people in time of need, continuing to patronise Speed Daal when most of the neighbours boycotted it over ex-murderer Stu Carpenter being employed there.
Relationships
Roy Cropper
Nina met her uncle Roy Cropper when he inserted himself into her life in order to get to know his half-brother Richard, Nina's father, before his pulmonary fibrosis took him. She didn't like him at first as her priority was keeping her dad alive for as long as possible, and she worried that the shock of meeting Roy would finish him off.
Before Richard passed away, Roy promised to look after Nina and he kept his word after his brother died, taking Nina in at 16a Victoria Street. Although she had only went along with it because she had nowhere else to go, once she lowered her guard Nina found a commonality with her uncle, sharing his interest in bats, and would affectionately call him "Roymond" much to his annoyance.
Nina admired Roy for his morals, and tried to live her life as he did, but found him a stick-in-the-mud at times. For Christmas 2022, she bought her uncle his first smart phone, but feeling that people become slaves to the devices, he gave it away to Sam Blakeman and Nina fell out with him, calling him a technophobe. Later, when Nina found out that a bat-watching trip in Medlock Woods had been cancelled after Roy set off, she had no way of contacting him and went searchin for Roy with Asha Alahan and Brian Packham in tow. At the woods, Nina accidentally fell in the river and had to be taken to hospital. Roy felt guilty for the danger he'd put his niece in and finally started to use a smart phone.
A gift of Nina's which went down well was a sign for the defunct Weatherfield Railway Station, which Roy proudly hung up in Roy's Rolls. Nina had purchased the sign to alleviate her guilt when Roy's late wife Hayley Cropper's anorak was accidentally donated to the Gregory Pope Foundation when Nina mixed up a box of Hayley's things with one full of her old clothes.
Nina would sometimes advise Roy on how to behave in social situations. In July 2020, when Evelyn Plummer invited him along as a wingman on her date with Arthur Medwin to Weatherfield Canal, Nina made him realise that he was a gooseberry and Evelyn just needed help overcoming her nerves. On occasions where Roy has withdrawn from society, Nina has felt compelled to take action. In June 2024, when a false murder charge against him was dropped and Roy hid away in his flat, Nina ambushed him into playing a game of chess with Sam which in his distracted state he lost, and Nina was blamed for the setback.
Abi Webster
2024: Nina and Abi confront the producer of a documentary glorifying Corey
Abi Franklin (later Webster) was the mother of Seb Franklin, Nina's boyfriend who was brutally murdered by Corey Brent in 2021. The women grieved differently for Seb; while Nina wanted justice, Abi sought vengeance. They were unable to move on, as Corey had been cleared of murder and his football career was going from strength to strength, with a German team eager to sign him.
In October 2021, a month after he walked from free, Nina found a notebook in the cafe which mentioned football training and realised it was a diary of Corey's movements. It turned out to be Abi's notebook, and that the grieving mother was stalking the footballer. Abi returned the pad to Abi, urging her not to carry out her revenge plan and turn Corey into a martyr. When Abi went to Corey's house to shoot him, Nina alerted the police with a false report of an assault and Abi was forced to abandon her plan. The teen then demanded that Abi either shoot her or hand the gun over. Abi complied, but palmed Nina off with a glue gun. Although Abi got her chance to kill Corey, she couldn't go through with it and decided to try things Nina's way. Nina was validated when Stu Carpenter handed over Corey's bag including the clothes he was wearing when he kicked Seb to death, which was enough for the CPS to charge him.
Nina and Abi maintained a bond through Seb. In May 2024, Abi discovered that Corey was going to appear in a TV documentary which painted him as a redeemed character managing the prison football team. Incensed, the pair barged into the office of the documentary producer, Jasmine Readman, and demanded the programme be pulled. When that failed, Nina got in touch with the Weatherfield Gazette and arranged an interview with Abi so that she could get her side of the story in first. Nina was satisfied when the production company released a statement saying they would consult the victims' families if they did a second series but Abi, naturally, considered it a cop-out and continued to let the situation eat away at her.
In January 2025, Abi was on the scene at Weatherfield Precinct after Mason Radcliffe was stabbed, and waited for the ambulance with him. The incident brought back memories of Seb's death and triggered her dormant PTSD, leading her to hallucinate her son's dead body. Not knowing what she was really going through, Nina told Abi that she often had reminders of Seb too and told Abi that if she could survive his death, she could survive anything life threw at her.
Hobbies and interests
Nina was highly artistic, with a passion for drawing and fashion design. She made her own clothes to befit her unique dress sense, and pursued her ambition to design clothes professionally at Weatherfield College and Underworld.
She also enjoyed sketching portraits from behind the cafe counter, and was the artist behind the mural of her late boyfriend Seb Franklin at his memorial garden. In 2021, after Seb's death, Nina attempted to recover her memories of the attack on them through her drawings.
Background information
Introduction
2019: Publicity shot of Mollie Gallagher as Nina Lucas
Nina first appeared in Episode 9923 on 11th November 2019. Mollie Gallagher's casting was only announced a week prior to the episodes airing on 5th November, with Gallagher commenting "Nina is a really interesting character, she is a bit of an outsider and although she is reluctant to let Roy into her life she soon realises they have more in common than she first thought."[1]
Gallagher was born in Swinton, Salford, and studied drama at Pendleton College in Salford before moving to London to train at the Academy of Live and Recorded Arts.[2] At one time, she worked as a seat filler at the National Television Awards. [3] She had done theatre, bu Nina was her first TV role.[4] At 21, she was four years older than the character when cast.
Nina was normally seen in full goth attire, with heavy makeup and all-black clothing with added frills, bows and lace. It was a more extreme version of Gallagher's own fashion style.[5] In an interview with ITV, the actress talked about her dress sense: "I have always liked being creative and just like whatever I like I guess. I'm a very expressive person, and I love fashion and physically expressing myself through what I wear."[6] Highlighting the simarities between her and Nina: "Me and Nina both like making a statement in life.... I’m a bit more extroverted than Nina."[7] On wearing the costumes: "I absolutely love the costumes that she wears, and I get really excited to know 'oh, what is she going to be wearing today?'"[8]
Just a few months after Gallagher joined Coronation Street, the COVID-19 pandemic hit and. After the production break, the actress had to apply her own makeup for a time, which she found difficult, admitting ironically: "I am not the best at makeup."[9]
Hate crime storyline
In 2021, Nina was an integral part of a hate crime storyline which saw she and her boyfriend Seb Franklin brutally assaulted at the hands of Corey Brent and his mates. The story was inspired by the real-life case of Sophie Lancaster, a 20-year-old woman who was murdered due to her goth attire in 2007. Coronation Street worked with the Sophie Lancaster Foundation to craft a storyline which echoed the real world events. [10] Sophie's mother Sylvia also worked directly with Mollie Gallgher and Harry Visinoni, as Gallagher told Loose Women: "I've had Zooms with Sylvia who is absolutely amazing and completely inspiring. She did a presentation with us, and any advice that we needed, she was there. So a lot of the research I got from Sylvia as well as finding stuff online, and learning about the hate crime in general."[11]
After Seb's tragic death, Nina had a crisis of self and ditched her goth clobber for a time. Gallagher enjoyed the exploration of her character: "I thought it was really sad to see a character like Nina, who was so distinctive, change her specific ways and become more introverted but I love the layers of the character and the depth Nina has."[12] Nina found the courage to testify in court as her old self: "She decides she wants to show Corey that she's not scared of him and she won't change herself for anyone. She does like who she is and that overrides what anybody else thinks of her because she is so content with who she is."[13]
The hard-hitting storyline helped Mollie Gallagher win Best Serial Drama Performance at the National Television Awards in September 2021. Nominees she beat to the honour included fellow Street co-star Sally Carman, who plays Seb's mother Abi Franklin. She followed this up that November by winning Best Partnership at the Inside Soap Awards, alongside on-screen uncle Roy Cropper (David Neilson), while Nina and Seb's attack won Best Storyline at the same ceremony.
The storyline was impacted by COVID-19 restrictions; Mollie Gallagher and Harry Visinoni observed social distancing rules throughout their characters' romance, and they were never seen kissing. The only exception was the flashback scenes in episodes 10416 and 10417, which were set during the attack on Nina and Seb but recorded after restrictions had eased.
First and last lines
"Yeah?" (First line, to Roy Cropper and Carla Connor)
Appendices
List of addresses
| Address | Duration |
|---|---|
| Flat 5, 4 Thorn Road | unknown date to late December 2019 |
| 16a Victoria Street | 5th February 2020 to 11th September 2023 |
| 7 Coronation Street | 11th September 2023 to 12th January 2024 |
| 16a Victoria Street | 12th January 2024 onwards |
Employment history
| Role | Institution | Duration |
|---|---|---|
| Waitress | Roy's Rolls | 10th February 2020 to present |
| Designer | Underworld | 30th September 2020 to 17th June 2021 |
| Owner | Roy's Rolls | 24th November 2021 to present |
See also
References
- ↑ https://coronationstreetupdates.blogspot.com/2019/11/meet-roy-croppers-niece-nina.html
- ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mollie_Gallagher#cite_note-1
- ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mollie_Gallagher#cite_note-3
- ↑ https://metro.co.uk/2020/05/06/who-plays-nina-coronation-street-goth-real-life-12664012/
- ↑ https://www.dailystar.co.uk/tv/corries-mollie-gallagher-looks-totally-22522321
- ↑ https://www.itv.com/coronationstreet/articles/mollie-gallagher-nina-lucas-hate-crime-interview
- ↑ https://metro.co.uk/2020/05/06/who-plays-nina-coronation-street-goth-real-life-12664012/
- ↑ https://www.itv.com/coronationstreet/articles/loose-women-mollie-gallagher
- ↑ https://www.itv.com/coronationstreet/articles/loose-women-mollie-gallagher
- ↑ https://uk.style.yahoo.com/coronation-street-hate-crime-sophie-lancaster-nina-140615529.html
- ↑ https://www.itv.com/coronationstreet/articles/loose-women-mollie-gallagher
- ↑ https://www.digitalspy.com/soaps/coronation-street/a37425508/coronation-street-star-mollie-gallagher-nina-lucas-trial/
- ↑ https://www.digitalspy.com/soaps/coronation-street/a37425508/coronation-street-star-mollie-gallagher-nina-lucas-trial/