9 Coronation Street hidden gems - No. 1

Here we go with the first of nine guest blog posts from David at Corriepedia as their site celebrates 10 years online!

Hello! Flaming Nora has kindly agreed to host a blog post from me relating to the tenth anniversary of Corriepedia, the Coronation Street Wiki. After some thinking, I've decided to expand on something my friend and fellow admin John brought up in his interview with the wonderful Conversation Street podcast last week.

As some may know, 5th April 1976 is a key episode in Corrie history for two reasons. In 1976, it marked the return of Pat Phoenix to the programme as Elsie Howard after a two-year absence, but more significantly, in 1996 it was the starting point of satellite channel Granada Plus's repeat run. This means that everything from that point onwards was shown in the video age and therefore could theoretically be findable if you know where to look. If, like us, you're completist fans, you'll want to start from the very beginning. Of the 1,587 episodes which aired before Elsie's return, 134 have been released on DVD by Network, with a handful more on VHS and a small amount given special repeats on Granada Plus. The vast majority have never been re-broadcast and so our mission to watch everything would seem to end there.

As John said in the podcast, thanks to a couple of sources we're now well on our way towards documenting those early years. The first was the BFI archive at Stephen Street in London, where the defunct 2-inch mastertapes of nearly every episode between July 1969 and 1983 are held, copies of which are viewable for a fee. Since 2009 we've been going through every unseen Corrie episode they have, taking down plot synopses, cast and production credits, locations, character notes, and anything else of interest, with our final visit taking place earlier this year. The other source is the missing episode group Kaleidoscope, who recently granted us access (with ITV's permission) to their archive of 1960s and 1970s episodes to update the site with all the usual information plus screencaps. So far we've barely scratched the surface of Kal's archive so look out for a lot more info on those episodes in the coming months!

Now that the preamble is out of the way, onto the good stuff. If you're like me, watching the 60s episodes is the holy grail - Ena, Minnie and Martha in the snug, Arthur Lowe as Mr. Swindley alongside Miss Nugent and Doreen Lostock in Gamma Garments, Jack and Annie Walker's hilarious bickering at the Rovers, Dennis Tanner and his showbiz career, the will they/won't they with Elsie and Len Fairclough, all vintage Corrie greatness. And especially viewing it in order, seeing the programme take shape, familiar episodes in context and the highlights that didn't make it onto the DVDs, much like ITV3 viewers are seeing now with the late 80s and the slow buildup to Alan Bradley. On that basis, join me as I go through nine hidden gems from 1961-69, episodes which haven't been repeated or released on DVD/VHS.

Here we go with the first of nine. The remaining eight gems will be blogged every morning for the next eight days.

Ena complains about her gas pressure (#23, 1/3/61)

"Who's in the wrong? All 'av done is bring a snake 'ome!"

A magnificent episode by Harry Kershaw and the funniest up until this point. It's an early one so it carries on the Tony Warren style of being structured as a series of vignettes, showing what's going on behind each of the doors, but the storylines are a little more eccentric than Warren would probably have come up with.

The quote above is uttered by Dennis Tanner after he introduces Elsie to their houseguest - a seven-foot python he's looking after for "La Composita". What starts out as a scene played for laughs becomes more serious as the pair exchange some home truths.

The meat of the episode is Ena Sharples's trip to the Town Hall to complain about her gas pressure. She arrives prepared with a list of the times it took for her friends' kettles to boil - though Minnie has to be bullied into changing her time after measuring a brisk 32 minutes. The Town Hall scene is classic Ena. Dealing expertly with two inexperienced young clerks who do everything they can to fob her off, she abandons her mission only after reading a notice announcing the planned demolition of Coronation Street.

There's also a touching scene where Frank Barlow shows his softer side with Ken, assuring his son that he's proud of him for going to university.

Hidden Gem 2 will be blogged tomorrow. And don't forget to check out Corriepedia and follow them on Twitter too.

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