Carla Barlow (also Connor and Gordon) is a fictional character from the British ITV soap opera Coronation Street, played by Alison King. She made her first appearance on screen during the episode airing on 1 December 2006 and introduced as the wife of Paul Connor (Sean Gallagher). This was King's second role in the soap as she previously played Mrs. Fanshaw for one episode in 2004. King appeared in her 1,000th episode as Carla on 22 May 2015. Carla has been referred to as "the new Elsie Tanner". King was off-screen from February 2009 until October 2009 due to her maternity leave. King later took a 6-month break in May 2012 and was offscreen from 16 July to 10 December. King quit the role in 2015 and her final scenes aired on 26 May 2016. The following year, producer Kate Oates reintroduced Carla and she returned on-screen on 22 December 2017. Carla has had relationships with Liam Connor (Rob James-Collier), Trevor Dean (Steve Jackson), Frank Foster (Andrew Lancel) and been married five times to Paul Connor, Tony Gordon (Gray O'Brien), Peter Barlow (twice) and Nick Tilsley (Ben Price). Her storylines include being kidnapped in her factory by Tony and escaping when the building explodes (known as Siege Week), battling alcoholism, drink driving and running over Stella Price (Michelle Collins), being raped by Frank, attempting to commit suicide, becoming a suspect in Frank's murder, an affair and marriage with Peter, learning that Peter has been having an affair with Tina McIntyre (Michelle Keegan), suffering a miscarriage because of the stress, escaping a fire at her flat started by her arch-enemy Tracy Barlow (Kate Ford), coping when people blame her for starting the fire, developing a gambling addiction, learning that family friend Johnny Connor (Richard Hawley) is actually her biological father, being blackmailed by Tracy and later trying to kill her which leads to two car crashes on the street, suffering from kidney failure and undergoing a kidney transplant with her half-brother Aidan Connor (Shayne Ward), dealing with Aidan's suicide, a feud with Alya Nazir (Sair Khan) over the ownership of the Underworld factory, attempting to frame Abi Franklin (Sally Carman) for arson, becoming a public enemy through her workaholism which leads to the factory roof fatally collapsing and her subsequent psychotic episode.