Richard Cole

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“	You stupid little pillock!	„
	~ Richard cursing his sworn enemy, Ian Bale, after the latter exposes his illict activities in public.

Richard Cole is a supporting antagonist in the British soap opera EastEnders. He appeared as the show's main antagonist from July 1992 to July 1994.

In his characterisation, Richard is a notorious womanizer and market inspector who became sworn enemies with protagonist Ian Beale. Their feud develops over the course of Richard's story arc, in which he seduces both Ian's wife Cindy and mother Kathy just to antagonize him; clashed with the Mitchell Brothers that consisted of Ian's future stepfather Phil Mitchell and his brother Grant; and made enemies with several other residents that included both Ian's uncle Arthur Fowler and fellow resident Alan Jackson respectively. Eventually Richard was forced to leave the square after Ian exposed his past illicit activities.

He was portrayed by Ian Reddington.

Biography[]

Richard Cole first arrived at Albert Square in Walford, a fictional borough in East London, from July 1992. He appears to be the square's new market inspector, but it soon becomes clear that Richard is a corrupt man who will pull every trick in the book to make profit for himself. It also turns out that Richard is a notorious womaniser who often engages in various flings with women before dumping them after they discover his true colors.

Upon settling himself in the square, Richard begins to antagonize some local residents in the community. Soon he develops a longstanding feud with his arch-nemesis Ian Beale, as the pair are rival entrepreneurs who grow to dislike each other from start to finish. At one point Richard seduces Ian's mother Kathy, who initially falls for his charm until she later finds out that Richard has been taking cash bribes and allowing a mobile hot dog van to trade in direct competition to her café. Afterwards, Kathy began dating local hardman Phil Mitchell and he soon found out that Richard had been spreading vicious rumours against Kathy following their break-up; Phil confronted Richard and threatened him before Phil's brother Grant and his wife Sharon Watts were forced to restrain him.

Soon Richard turned his attention to Ian's wife Cindy. He flirts with her and she briefly considers choosing him over Ian, as her marriage with Ian is on the verge of collapse ever since her affair with lifeguard Jeff has been exposed. Richard later attempted to seduce Cindy before going as far as to falsely claim that he is the father of her and Ian's unborn twins Peter and Lucy. When Cindy realizes what he is up to, she turns on Richard and he responds by blackmailing her - threatening to tell Ian the truth if she doesn't do as Richard says. But eventually Ian finds out after Cindy tells him the truth; despite Cindy's past actions that include a previous fling with his half-brother Simon Wicks, the father of Cindy's son Steven, she is forgiven by Ian when he realizes what Richard has done.

As time goes on, Richard begins to establish a number of sworn enemies in the square. Among them include Ian's aunt Pauline Fowler and her husband Arthur, the latter of whom had initially worked for Richard until he caused Arthur to lose his job as a market sweeper; local neighbour Alan Jackson, whom Richard reported for benefit fraud; Alan's wife Carol Jackson, who is angry that Richard had slept with her 17-year-old daughter Bianca before persuing her best-friend Natalie Price; his ex-girlfriend Rachel Kominski, who broke up with Richard after he gave away her permanent market pitch to his friend Sanjay Kapoor out of spite; fellow resident Big Ron, who comes to resent Richard after he evicted Big Ron from his stall; and Sanjay's wife Gita, who attacks Richard with an umbrella after he blackmails her over their previous affair and threatened to tell Sanjay about it. He also crossed paths with local couple Mandy Salter and her lover Aidan Brosnan after they brought one of his properties, only for Richard to later evict the pair for squatting in one of his bedsits; the result of this made Aidan homeless and have contemplations of suicide in Christmas 1993.

In 1994, Richard again causes trouble when he tells the police that car salesman Frank Butcher had recently been in dire financial straits. This led to the police investigating Frank's involvement in an incident that he and Phil had perpetuated not long ago; an arson at a car lot that resulted in the death of a homeless man named Alan Hall. While the police are unable to fully uncover the truth about the crime, Phil later finds out that Richard grassed him up to the police. Phil tells Grant about this and the Mitchell Brothers later confronted Richard at The Queen Victoria public house. When Richard started taunting them, the brothers got aggressive with him until Sharon intervened to stop them from making the situation worse. Richard then left after Phil and Grant told him that he got a warning.

By then, Richard's rivalry with Ian has escalated to the point where they have several altercations. Richard soon planned to get one over Ian by arranging the closure of Ian's catering business "The Meal Machine", which involves reporting Ian to the environmental health agency. The situation further escalates when Richard begins insulting Kathy in public. Ian then confronted Richard over his behaviour, to which Richard responded by punching him. Afterwards, Ian vowed revenge against Richard.

A few weeks later, Ian approached Richard and claimed to be interested in photography. He asked Richard to pose for a photo and they seemingly made amends afterwards, but it soon turned out that Ian was merely playing Richard from his own game. As such, the photo Ian took of Richard was proof that he needed to show to his former colleague Neil Bradley and thus expose Richard's previous crime from several years ago; in the past Richard had been a former planning officer for the council in Doncaster and soon befriended Bradley when they teamed up to engage in monetary bribes, but then Richard betrayed Bradley after they were caught by implicating him as the perpetuator - thus causing Bradley to be imprisoned whereas Richard got away with it scot-free.

Ian soon gathered up his friends and family for a showdown with Richard, who was then summoned to the square where he found himself confronted by everyone. Ian humiliates Richard by exposing his dodgy past before mailing the photo he took of him in a mailbox, which would consequently notify Bradley of Richard's whereabouts and prompt him to confront Richard for revenge. Richard attempted to stop Ian, but was foiled when Alan restrained him to get payback on him. Ian then issued Richard an ultimatum - either leave the square forever and don't come back, otherwise Richard can stay and face the consequences of his past actions. Richard reluctantly chose the former option, but not before he angrily curses Ian for his actions.

Later on that night, Richard left Sanjay to manage his businesses and departed the square for good. Soon Bradley arrived and he was unhappy to find out that Richard is gone; he then left himself to find Richard, vowing to kill him for what he did to him in the past.

Trivia[]

He made a total of 153 appearances during his time on the show.

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Richard Cole

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