Actor who played Ken Barlow’s younger brother in Coronation Street and appeared in Brookside, Heartbeat and Emmerdale Actor who played Ken Barlow’s younger brother in Coronation Street and appeared in Brookside, Heartbeat and Emmerdale The actor Alan Rothwell, who has died aged 89, found fame playing Ken Barlow’s younger brother, David, in Coronation Street . He was seen in the TV soap’s first episode, on 9 December 1960, as the cheerful, likable engineering firm apprentice, mending his bicycle