The Week In Classic Corrie

MONDAY - Episodes originally broadcast 10th and 12th June 1991

With Des's boat occupying a large portion of the Wiltons garden, the gloves came off.  Derek handed over a bill for £850 for reparations, including £200 for emotional distress.  The Barnses stormed out with Steph rightly pointing out that Mavis was always in a state of emotional distress.  Des told them they could keep the boat if it meant that much to them, and they took him at his word, with Mavis trying to arrange to sell it.  Half the boat was still in number six's garden though, so Des painted it with noxious anti-barnacle paint, leading Derek to threaten to turn the rest of it into kindling.  Audrey had left home for the charms of a five star hotel, and luxuriated in the spa and swimming pool.  Alf fought back by cancelling her credit cards then, after Ivy took pity on him and invited him round for his tea, he decided to accompany Don on a fishing trip.  He didn't seem to be missing his wife at all.  Jackie arranged the flowers for the upcoming wedding, giving Mike a shock: she'd ordered them from Maggie Redman, his ex-girlfriend.  He went round to talk to her and ran into Mark - his long-lost son.

TUESDAY - Episodes originally broadcast 14th and 17th June 1991

The fishing trip went ahead, with Don and Jim McDonald getting absolutely hammered (and letting their beer cans fall in the river, the filthy animals) while Alf staggered back and forth not knowing anything about the sport.  It all went wrong when there was a splash and Don vanished from sight.  His cap floated ominously downstream.  After a bit of hunting, Alf and Jim sheepishly went back and confessed to Ivy that her husband might be dead; he turned up, dripping wet, as they reported it to the police.  In more bad news for Alf Audrey was on the warpath after her credit card was refused by the hotel.  She dumped herself on Alma and ransacked the shop till for money.  Mike was on the hunt for a Best Man and, somewhat bafflingly, picked Phil Jennings; I think the last time the two of them were on screen together was when he introduced Phil to Deirdre, and he was still with Alma then.  Des got the boat lifted out of the back garden by a crane, though there was a minor inconvenience as Derek was aboard at the time.  Des was trying to make up for the situation as it was making Mavis incredibly upset, and he even bought them a replacement sun lounger.  Derek wasn't happy and accused her of conspiring to emasculate him.

WEDNESDAY - Episodes originally broadcast 19th and 21st June 1991

Jim's Cafe was the epicentre of all the drama in these two episodes.  Alma received the rent demand from the new leaseholders, Alcazar Holdings, and the name rang a bell.  She dug around in her old photos and found a picture of the Alcazar petrol station Mike had bought a couple of years before.  A bit of digging around and she deduced he was the new landlord.  She exploded at Gail, thinking she was in on it, and Gail said she hadn't known for certain but she assumed Mike was doing it to assuage his guilt.  Meanwhile, Alma's new tenant, Audrey, was losing her marbles.  She went hunting for cash at the house and found only an irate Phyllis.  Desperate, she decided to go back to Alf - twice in fact.  The first time she spotted Betty from Emmerdale leaving and assumed they were having an affair, and the second time she found he'd changed the locks so she couldn't even get in.  She felt unwanted and abandoned.  Des replaced the Wiltons' fence but for some reason Derek was still unhappy.  He wanted compensation rather than have Des fix the damage.  After some persuasion he caved in and invited the Barneses to share some mead with him in the pub, because Derek is a strange, strange little man.  Deirdre was trying to find Phil because she wasn't entirely sure what she was meant to be doing at PJ Promotions, but the slippery devil eluded her, and one of his minions said he'd closed his arcade without telling her.

THURSDAY - Episodes originally broadcast 24th and 26th June 1991

The War of the Roberts continued apace.  Alf was angry and frustrated at being the subject of gossip for half the Street.  It was getting too much for Ivy, and she decided to look into getting a job at Bettabuy.  When Alf found out he shouted at Reg Holdsworth for trying to poach his staff.  Audrey, meanwhile, decided to find another fella, and phoned Canada to try and get with Malcolm, Stephen's foster dad who had a crush on her a few years before.  It turned out he was engaged to someone else so there was no chance.  Mike went round to talk to Alma and she told him she wanted nothing to do with him.  He confessed that Jackie didn't know about the cafe, which gave her a little thrill.  He had other money problems, anyway, as a customer went bust owing Ingram's £50,000.

FRIDAY - Episodes originally broadcast 28th June and 1st July 1991

Today's episodes gave me one of my very favourite soap opera tropes: a hastily rewritten episode done to accommodate real life events.  Bryan Mosley sadly suffered a heart attack in real life, right in the middle of his big storyline with Audrey, and the 1st July episode bore all the hallmarks of being cobbled together.  Suddenly Rita took a deep interest in Alf's private life, berating Ivy for leaving the Corner Shop for Bettabuy and going in the cafe to talk to Audrey about their marriage.  It was abundantly clear that she'd been given Alf's dialogue.  Then, in the closing moments of the show, Ivy told Audrey that Alf had collapsed in the shop and was in hospital, so that's a hurried end to this whole plotline.  Deirdre did a bit of digging around and discovered that Phil was having cash flow problems.  It was worse than she knew though, as he went to Mike and asked for a loan.  Mike was having money troubles of his own of course and had to decline.  Jackie found one solution for their crisis: an offer from Ralph, her old manager, to buy the business.

@merseytart can't believe that anyone in their right mind would try to poach Ivy Brennan.

Thanks to Classic Emmerdale starting on ITV3, there's a slightly different time for Classic Corrie.  It's now on every weekday from 14:50.

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