Coronation Street Weekly Update, August 16 2010

This week the update’s looking forward to its birthday next week when it’ll officially be middle-aged. The update next week will therefore slide along the pipes a little later in the week as it may take a little while to blow out those birthday candles. And so, without any further ado, here we go with this week's Coronation Street update.

To find out why these Corrie updates have been written for the internet since 1995, have a look here: http://www.corrieweeklyupdates.btinternet.co.uk/

On the Street where time enters the twilight zone and a house sale takes 2 weeks instead of 6 months, the knicker factory reopens just a few episodes after being burned to the ground. It’s still got a dead body underneath the freshly laid cement, however, and Julie thinks she smells a rat when the girls move back in to work at their machines. But the stench is coming from Hayley’s sardine sandwiches so it was something fishy that Julie could smell, not something Fishwick.

The factory’s quick turnaround is thanks to new builder Owen, who works as quickly flirting with the laydees as he does with the trowel and probably lays it on just as thick. He’s winking at Eileen while giving Liz the glad eye in the bar. But he falls out with Bill, tells him he’s too old for the trade before offering him menial work doing some pointing. Not the kind of pointing where you stick out your finger and go “ooh, look at that” but the kind of pointing where you’re up on a roof filling gaps in the brickwork, knock a bucket to the ground that narrowly misses hitting Owen’s daughter Izzy on the head and go “ooh, look at that”. That sort of pointing. Bill’s troubled through lack of work and falls out with Jason who’s now joined the other side and is working for Owen. So troubled is Bill that he tells Owen he’s willing to sell the builder’s yard to him if the price is right.

Down the street at the bookies all bets are off as Deirdre and Lewis are caught kissing under the CCTV watchful eye of big brother and lands everyone in big bother. Leanne had left Deirdre in the betting shop alone and seduced by Lewis’ lips, she nips home for a corkscrew to have a glass of wine with the wily cad. While Deirdre’s out Lewis knocks up a fraudulent betting slip and when Deirdre asks him what he’s doing behind the counter when she returns, corkscrew in hand, he snogs her face off to distract her. And a distracted Deirdre is caught by the camera kissing Lewis in the shop. Well, you just know now that their camera on kiss deserves a wider audience and it gets one at Audrey’s leaving do.

At Gail’s house all the usuals are gathered around for wine and goodbyes. There’s Rita and Claudia and all of Gail’s family who are joined by the Barlows when Peter storms in to show the video of the kiss, demanding his four thousand pounds back that Lewis has ‘won’ on his £2 five horse accumulator. The old nags Lewis has accumulated look on aghast as Peter shows them the video and Audrey breaks down. Gail’s incensed at the Barlows once again making a mockery of the Platts and she picks up the closest thing to hand, a cream Manchester tart and throws it at Deirdre, hitting her slap-bang right in the middle of her face. This was the funniest thing on Corrie in ages, it was wonderful stuff. “Ken! Do Something! Deirdre screams but all Ken can do is turn off and tut. The one saving grace for Audrey is that Lewis might have ripped out her heart but he hasn’t ripped off her bank balance and when she gets back to the house, in pieces and in tears, she finds a photo of them both with “I tried…” written on the back. Once a gigolo, always a gigolo, only this time Lewis heads out to Barbados. David sums up his gran’s situation completely: “She was ripped off by a geriatric rent boy.”

At the Barlows’ the tea-table plays host to an autopsy on marriage. Whose affair was the worst? Why isn’t Ken like Lewis? Why isn’t Deirdre more Martha? What’s for tea anyway? Ken turns off Dusty Springfield for a classical choon on the wireless, and for me, that would have been grounds for divorce. Nobody should switch off Dusty and get away with it, no one.

At Sally’s house, Sophie and Sian’s secret visit to a music festival is uncovered when Sally gets a call from the festival saying they’ve found Sophie’s purse. Sophie’s grounded, Sian’s sent home, Kev agrees with his missus and Sally’s renamed ‘a right fascist cow’ by her second born.

Natasha finds out she’s pregnant but she doesn’t get the chance to tell Nick, he dumps her because she’s being too needy and weedy. Leanne finds her crying at the bus stop and puts two and two together to make one and one plus a lickle baby and although Natasha begs her not to tell Nick, you just know the secret will come out. Leanne and Nick are getting quite close, and when Peter walks into the Rovers to find Nick with his hand on Leanne’s hand he throws a wobbly, takes Nick outside and knocks him out on the cobbles. Oh, how we cheered from our sofa when the Plattilsley boy got socked in the mush. “You’re where you deserve,” spits Peter to Nick lying prone on the ground “In the gutter!” “Yeah, but I’m looking at the stars” replies Nick a la Oscar Wilde by way of Raquel Watts. Later in the factory, Nick and Leanne share a tender moment, it’s clear Nick still loves his ex-wife but this time they’re caught out by Natasha who walks in on them, announces she’s pregnant and then watches in tears as Nick squeals away in his car.

And that's just about that for this week.

Coronation Street writers this week were Jan McVerry, John Kerr, Carmel Morgan and Simon Crowther. Find out more about the Corrie writing team.

Glenda Young
Blogging away merrily at http://flamingnora.blogspot.com/