Coronation Street Episode Review; Weds 06th Feb 7.30pm

Welcome to Wednesday's edition of the Coronation Street Blog, and the first of tonight's two episodes-reviewed in a handy blog post.

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Paul dossed at Rita's flat, with the siblings now reunited after the Victoria market saga. Armed with underworlds van, Paul seems to have really settled on the street. With twins reunited, let's hope no more van mishaps are in store...
The day of Jenny's court case has arrived and residents talk turns to The Rovers landlady. Is our (my) favourite redhead facing jail?.
Returning from London, Johnny greets an obviously anguished Jenny and does little to dispel his wife's fears.

Liz, also due to take to the stand, feels ready to take on the Connors. Swayed by Steve to give the Connors 'what for', Liz bumps into Rita on the street who tries to convince her that the court case is actually a fruitless affair. As the Connors gather outside the pub ready to depart, a distraught Gemma hatches a plan. Harassing Imran at the solicitors, Imran gives Gemma some perfect free advice. If Liz doesn't make it to court, the case could collapse.

At The Kabin, Brian and Cathy are feeling furtive with getting their feet under the newsagent's door, Rita, distracted by Jennys drama, knows little of who Norris is selling to.

Nick and David talk shop, with the delivery of a football table and a stack of hairdresser CVs. 
At the cafe, the lads decide that tattooed barbers may not attract enough hipster clientele and decide to hire sexy stylists instead (not very PC that boys!). Failing to poach Emma, the brothers turn down Bethany, as they want eye-candy to ogle (obviously their niece would be a bit weird)!. Anyway, It looks like the lads are going to be interviewing some 'totty' instead. Bethany feeds this tidbit of information back to Shona and Leanne, and the Platt girlfriends are on the warpath.

At Liz's flat, a desperate Gemma pays a visit and pleads Jenny's innocence. Twocking Underworlds van from Paul, Gemma and her brother have a plan.

In court, it seems Jenny's case is going to be delayed as the star witness Liz, hasn't turned up. It isn't long before the police are on the street looking for Liz, just as Paul and Gemma leave the scene, in Underworlds van.

Norris calls Rita to give her the news that he's sold the Kabin, just as new owners Brian and Cathy, walk in.

Is Liz in the van? will totty be hired at the barbers? will Rita self-combust and beat new newsagent owner Brian, to a pulp?.

More from me later tonight, with your Coronation Street blog review of 8.30 pms part two!.

You can follow me @rybazoxo over on Twitter, your self-styled 'Cobbles Connoisseur'.

TA-RA!

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5 fab things about working at Coronation Street: The Tour

With me working at the Corrie Tour in Salford, I thought I'd compile a little list of 5 fab things about my weekends in Weatherfield. So here goes...

5. The look on their faces 
One of the best things for me is seeing how excited everyone gets as we turn the corner in the car park and the set is finally in full-view. Just the sight of Viaduct Street gets everyone buzzed before they've even stepped on a cobble!

4. Chatting Corrie
Without a doubt one of my favourite things is chatting about something I love, with someone who loves the same thing as me. It means I can stop boring my mum...

3. Recreating scenes!
After we've finished our touring for the day, there's nothing more that me and fellow guide Tabitha love doing than recreating a Corrie scene. Here we are doing our best "Kylie and David"!

2. Recalling storylines
My particular favourite story to chat about is the collapse of No. 7 in 1965. The amount of people who have forgotten that there wasn't a house there for 17 years is crazy!

1. An empty Street
Very rarely you find yourself all alone on Coronation Street. This is so surreal. I can't even put it into words. All of the pictures on this post I took whilst the set was empty.

Don't forget that if you want to visit the Street yourself, you can book tickets at coronationstreetthetour.co.uk. See you there!

You can follow me on Twitter, @MikeAdamsUk.

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Is Coronation Street stuck in the past?

One of the best things about Coronation Street, is, it pays respect to its history, sometimes characters may "forget" certain things, but it mostly stays true to its history.

The downside to this is that in the past 15 years, the show seems to have forgotten to move on as time goes by. It can sometimes seem like the show doesn't want to move with the times.

The show can sometimes tease that there is going to be a big change, such as someone wants to buy a certain shop or house on the street, something that could change the status quo, then as the weeks go by, the residents group together like the cult from The Wicker Man and throw the offender out of sight. Leaving the audience wondering what the point of the whole storyline was.

Back in 2011, when Norris reopened the old Kabin, it had a new name! At last, it felt like the tram crash had actually changed something on the street, but this was quickly changed when the residents of the street got angry about him changing the name of his own business, because Rita still works there.

Then, there is Tyrone's house, which feels like a shrine to Jack and Vera, more than it does a house, it's fine to have a small tribute to past characters in a house, but nothing has changed since the Duckworths passed away. Even more bizarrely, they teased that the house was to get a new look, when Tyrone was redecorating, only for him to make it look exactly the same.

Even now, with Underworld closed down, it feels as if, this time next year, it will be up and running again, just as it was, with Carla telling the staff that they need to get this order done, or they'll be out on their backsides, again. Which will leave recent events feeling rather pointless, if the recent storylines were all leading to everything being back to how it was.

With new areas being added to Weatherfield, we will finally see some changes, but the street will most likely remain the same. The street wasn't always like this, until the 90s, the cobbles changed a lot over time, especially the side which Underworld now sits, which changed massively over the decades.

I feel the show needs to start perhaps laying a few things to rest, Underworld feels like it has definitely run its course, we don't really need any more storylines about dodgy clients, or missed orders, or it going bankrupt, again. Tyrone and Fiz should really make their house more like their own, and less like a museum for the Duckworths.

Finally, they need to stop storylines which seem to propose big changes, only for said storylines to not really go anywhere, and for the show to act like it is The Simpsons and reset everything to how it was before the story began. It is a continuing drama, if the storyline doesn't change anything, it can feel like the audience has been cheated.

By Chewy, on twitter @WeatherfieldRec




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No more nasty Norris?

A year or so I wrote a blog post about how it seemed that Norris had gone from being a comedic busybody to a nasty piece of work.

I've noticed lately that we finally seem to be seeing the nicer part of Norris again. Especially concerning Roy and Hayley.

The Norris of 2012 would have likely made some dig in the Rovers when the news had broken about Hayley's death, but he came across as genuinely sad about her passing.

Tonight we saw him questioning Dennis how he usually does, but this time he came across as concerned for Rita, instead of just trying to cause trouble between Rita and Dennis.

With Dennis soon leaving, I'm hoping we get to see some more of the classic Norris and Rita scenes.

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Corrie fans vote Rita and Mavis as fave Kabin duo

Coronation Street Blog readers have voted Rita and Mavis as their favourite Kabin double act. 243 voted and 150 (61.73%) voted for Reet and Mave, who stood behind the counter between 1973 and 1997. 

 

93 (38.27%) voted for Rita and Norris, who have been behind the counter together since 1999.

 

Happy with the results? Who did you vote for?

 

While I love Rita and Mavis' partnership, I voted for Rita and Norris because they have had some fantastic comedy scenes and stories. But I do feel that the partnership has lost its way since 2007 when Norris proposed to Rita. They had a strong friendship and I think that the fact that Norris declared his love for Rita ruined that. Do you agree?

 

And if you haven't yet, you can vote for your favourite Corrie layabout here. Voting closes on Monday, 15th July.

 

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Corrie A-Z: K is for Kabin

Of all Corrie scenes, the Kabin ones top the lot for me – most are humorous and usually involve residents gossiping. And of course it’s where my favourite character Rita works and used to own.

This year, the Kabin as we know it celebrates its ruby anniversary. So a late happy birthday! Len Fairclough bought the newsagents from Walter Biddulph in 1973. Originally called Biddulph’s, it consisted of the main shop, a lending library and a café and was situated on Rosamund Street. Upon becoming owner, Len re-christened it The Kabin and installed his girlfriend Rita Littlewood as manageress, with a little flat above the shop for her. And for 40 years, Rita and the Kabin have been inseparable – only Betty’s 42 years stint as Rovers barmaid beats Rita’s long tenure behind the counter.

 

When Rita accepted her managerial post, she insisted on having an assistant to lighten the load. Despite an interview marred with hiccups, dithering and timid spinster Mavis Riley was taken on. Rita and Mavis would work together for 24 years. Rita had married Len in 1977 and when Len was killed in a car crash in 1983, Rita took over the ownership of the business.

Over the years, the ‘original’ Kabin saw many changes. The café closed in 1978 when baker Joe Dawson opened a café next door (that was later bought by Jim Sedgewick in 1980 and renamed Jim’s Café) and the lending library in time turned into a record library and then a video library which was run by Rita’s boyfriend Alan Bradley in the late 1980s.

 

In 1990, sensing it was time for a change Rita re-located the business to new premises on Coronation Street and moved into the flat above the shop. Now, the Kabin was central to street life and wasn’t in ‘nowhere land’ as ex-producer David Liddiment once said. The shop was still the same as Rita and Mavis were still behind the counter. The only difference was there was more floor space and they could sell more stock. During its early years, the ‘new’ Kabin was often robbed and Rita felt very vulnerable. A knight in shining armour came in the form of sweet salesman Ted Sullivan who Rita soon married but the marriage ended shortly due to Ted having an incurable brain tumour.

 

Mavis left her assistant post in 1997 when she became widowed and moved to the Lake District. Rita struggled alone in the shop and hired various assistants like Leanne Battersby, Blanche Hunt and Sharon Gaskell (who briefly owned the Kabin!).

Rita finally found her perfect assistant in the shape of nosy Norris Cole and they have now worked together for over 12 years. Like Mavis before him, Norris often gets on Rita’s wick but they care deeply about each other, with Norris even proposing marriage in 2007 – Rita gently declined. I don’t think Norris has ever forgiven her for that! In 2006, Rita made Norris a partner in the shop and in 2009 she sold the business to him when she decided to retire and went on a world cruise. But when she returned, she admitted that retirement wasn’t for  her and she’s returned to be behind the counter but as Norris’ assistant. But she still rules the roost.

The Kabin was refurbished in 2000 and a sub-post office was installed but rarely got used. When the shop was damaged in the tram crash in 2010 the post office sign was removed and the Kabin returned to just being a newsagents and tobacconists.

Over the years, many people have done stints behind the counter including Lucille Hewitt, Deirdre Langton, Emily Bishop, Ken Barlow, Audrey Roberts, Judy Mallett, Derek Wilton, Sally Webster, Tina McIntyre, Mary Taylor and Dennis Tanner. Paperboys have included Chesney Brown, Keith Appleyard and Ramsay Clegg.

 

Who’s your favourite Kabin double act? Rita and Mavis or Rita and Norris? Vote below!

And if you haven't yet, you can vote for your favourite gossip here. Voting closes at midnight.

 

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Minnie Caldwell's last Corrie appearance

As I was browsing through the series of posts about the original characters, I looked at Margot Bryant's profile and noticed that someone (I think Flaming Nora) had inserted a link with Minnie's final appearance.

The video was uploaded only two days ago and it is a pearl. Let's hope that Ena Sharples' and Albert Tatlock's last scenes are also uploaded soon.

In her last scenes, Margot Bryant did have trouble remembering her lines and had to disguise her script behind her handbag or, as in this scene, on the shop counter.

If you're wondering why Rita's rude with her, Elsie Howard had just returned to the street after a three year hiatus and was staying with Len Fairclough. Rita was jealous of their friendship and so she wasn't in the mood for Minnie's dithering over Easter eggs.

Enjoy and let's remember that Corrie legend Minnie Caldwell!

If you want to know about the life and times of Margot Bryant, click here.

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40 years of Rita on Coronation Street - a tribute

Today marks the ruby anniversary of flame-haired Rita's first appearance as a permanent character on Coronation Street. Although her very first appearance was in December 1964, she didn't become a regular until 1972. And apart from a gap between February and April 1972 and from October 2009 to March 2010, Rita has been a constant presence on the cobbles. Over the years, she has gone from a saucy songstress to Duchess of the Street and despite nearing 80, she's still as beautiful, youthful and smart as she was in the 70s and 80s.

I've made a tribute to her above using photos of her over the years and thanks goes to Sam Taylor, moderator of Facebook's Corrie4ever (great page!) for showing me how to do so. In the tribute we see the young Rita in the clubs and then as Queen of the Kabin. Also, the significant men in her life - true love Len Fairclough, evil bully Alan Bradley and sweet Ted Sullivan who died of a brain tumour after three months of marriage. She's been out with about 15 other men as well over the years! Rita's main regret has always been that she never had children but she has mothered many over 40 years - John Spencer, Sharon Gaskell, Jenny Bradley, Sally Webster and Tina McIntyre. And also the many hairstyles she's donned over the years - but one thing's been constant - the redness.

The Kabin has been a constant thread in Rita's troubled life and she ran the newsagents for 36 years before selling to Norris but she's still working there and in June next year, The Kabin and Rita will be celebrating 40 years of business and, God willing, she will still be there dishing out lemon sherberts. But Rita couldn't run the business alone. For 24 years, she had faithful assistant Mavis at her side and they had a very close friendship despite being chalk and cheese. They were a brilliant double act and one can smile thinking about Mavis dithering and Rita rolling her eyes heavenwards! After Mavis left the street, Rita was lost without her and hired Leanne and then Blanche as her assistants but the chemistry wasn't there. Enter Norris. Rita had found someone as eccentric as Mavis. For over a decade, Rita and Norris have become a classic double act and provide the comic relief against the now more sensational Corrie. And although he now owns the Kabin, Rita still reigns supreme. Norris has a soft spot for Rita and did propose to her in 2007.

While Mavis and Norris are her closest friends, Rita is a popular member of the community and can mix with the younger and older residents of the street. Her other main friends over the years have been Emily, Bet, Alf, Audrey and Ken. She was also friends with Elsie but due to Elsie and Len's romantic past, Rita was always jealous over their closeness. I'm sure Len saw a lot of Elsie in Rita - the red hair and fiery personality: a siren!

Rita also has a musical talent - she can sing. In her early years she was regularly seen in the Capricorn Club or the Gatsby singing Shirley Bassey numbers and she also sang at the Ogdens' ruby wedding party. That was the night Len was killed and Rita vowed never to sing publicly again. But she has done - she sang at the Millennium party, she sang at Fred Elliott's wake and recently sang in the Rovers on Christmas Day.

So here's to Rita Littlewood/Bates/Littlewood/Fairclough/Sullivan! Congratulations on 40 years on Corrie! And also thanks to Barbara Mullaney/Knox on her brilliant portrayal of an iconic character!

Are you as big a Rita fan as me? Have you got a favourite Rita moment? Leave a comment!

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What do you make of 'Norris's News'?

Last night we got our first look at Norris's News, first thought? "Shouldn't that be Norris' News?" Second thought? "Poor Rita" though you can't blame Norris for wanting to put his own stamp on the place. He wouldn't have thought Rita would have minded, but she did, Mary on the other hand wouldn't have cared either way.

Anyway, I'm glad they dropped the whole Post Office brand from the place anyway, since the post office counter was never really used. The inside looks a lot tidier and modern, in fact it reminded me of Emmerdale's cafe/post office set a little, I hope Norris decides to change it back to 'The Kabin', it feels wrong without it there.

Rita Sullivan - Kabin Extraordinaire

I love Reet I do, she's warm, she's bright, she's sunny and she reminds me of my grandma. She's got morals, she's got love and best of all, she's got sweets! Corrie's been a bit short on Rita lately, but her one appearance tonight brightened up the whole episode for me, giving Sophie some advice (as she always does).

I hope The Kabin reopens soon (as I lamented on here), because without Rita, the show feels that little bit emptier. Of course, Rita is good by herself, but she's fantastic with Norris, always tutting at his nosy remarks and his little complaints, but I think deep down they love each other really.

Every street should have a Reet.

Return of The Kabin

I can't wait until The Kabin finally reopens, I've just begun realising how I missed all the little scenes between Norris, Mary, Emily and Rita in there. Norris and Mary have their Porta-Kabin, but we haven't actually seen that since Christmas day, and we've been rather low on appearances from the foursome since then.

I wonder what Norris will find to complain about in the new Kabin? Will Mary go crazy with her chainsaw? (I still want to know what happened there!) Will Rita buy earmuffs to block out the noise of Norris' voice, and will Emily be able to buy something for once, without being drawn into a debate between Rita and Norris?

Check out my small history of The Kabin over on my Weatherfield Recorder blog

New Kabin and Corner Shop exteriors revealed

Picture from @craiggazeyfans on Twitter

Pictures of the exteriors of Coronation Street's Corner Shop and The Kabin have surfaced on the internet.

The Kabin has dropped its Post Office branding by the looks of things (about time too, since I can't remember the last time we saw the Post Office counter in there), so The Kabin is once again a newsagents, just like it used to be.

The Corner Shop has taken a more realistic look than the last Corner Shop, by looking more like you'd expect a Corner Shop to look. I have to say I like the windows - a good way of hiding the fact that the interior set isn't actually inside there.

All that is left to reopen now is the Joinery, and of course, No.13 still needs to be rebuilt, as it's still sat there in its burnt state.

See more pics of the set here on @katkellyfans fan page.

Behind the scenes pics from the Corrie set

Recently, Digital Spy member markyboy35 got a tour of the Coronation Street set and even managed to get a sneak peek at the new D&S Alahan's Mini-Market set and the new Kabin!

The Kabin looks roughly the same, with just a little sprucing up, the Corner Shop however looks to have doubled in size, and now looks more like what you expect a modern day shop to look like.

The exterior street set looks a little different as there is a distinct mix of old red brick and new red brick in several places, the Corner Shop's new frontage no longer looks to follow the old red and beige colour scheme (then again, neither did 2004's short lived red and blue colour scheme.)

Take a look at the gallery of pics here (Thanks to markyboy35 for sharing the pictures with us!)

Fireworks in The Kabin

Back in 1973  Mark Hillkirk was injured after a spark from the bonfire on the Red Rec landed in a box of open fireworks. Since then Rita has refused to sell them. She had a huge row about it with Sharon Gaskell many years later and Sharon told her that as the Kabin now belonged to her, she'd sell whatever she liked. It looks like now the Kabin is Norris's, then he'll sell whatever he likes too but I can't believe Rita would have been so happy to sell those fireworks to Peter tonight.

I'll get my anorak.

50 Years Of Corrie In 50 Days – 1973

Day 13 of our 50 day countdown of Coronation Street - written by blogger Sunny Jim.

In 1973 Len Fairclough bought Biddulph’s, a run-down newsagent cum café cum lending library at 16 Rosamund Street and installed his lover, Rita Littlewood as manager. Rita wasn’t much impressed by the place at first, calling it ‘a grotty little hole’ but was won round when the upstairs flat was thrown in as well. Rita wanted to call the place Rita’s but was overruled by Len who decided upon ‘The Kabin’. Rita soon realised that she couldn’t run the shop single-handed and despite suffering from a severe bout of hiccoughs during her interview, Mavis Riley was taken on as her assistant.

The following year, Len tried to sell The Kabin when he received an offer of £5000 from developer Douglas Wormold but when he’d originally bought the shop, he’d put it in Rita’s name and she refused to allow the sale to go through. In 1978 the café area was closed down after the authorities were alerted to its inadequate toilet facilities by Joe Dawson who was opening a café next door. Eventually the lending library became a record library, which in turn was closed down too when Alan Bradley persuaded Rita to let him run a video library instead.

In 1990 Rita closed down the Rosamund Street premises and relocated The Kabin to Coronation Street itself and moved into the flat above the shop. Two years later the business brought romance into her life when she was wooed by confectionery salesman Ted Sullivan. The pair married but the marriage was short-lived as Ted had a brain tumour and only had months to live. In 1999, Rita’s long-term foster daughter, Sharon Gaskill returned and in an attempt to keep her in Weatherfield, Rita gave her The Kabin, working there as her assistant. When Sharon was reunited with her fiancé, Ian Bentley, he forced her to sell the shop so they could buy a house together. Rita swallowed her pride and bought the shop back from Sharon for £40,000.

In 2000, Rita and her new assistant Norris Cole underwent training to open a sub post office. As Norris became more and more involved with the running of The Kabin, Rita agreed to him becoming a full partner in the business. In 2009 after the death of Norris’s brother Ramsay, Rita decided that life was too short to spend so much time working behind the counter of a backstreet newsagent and sold her remaining share to Norris who had been left £172,000 in his brother’s will. After going on a cruise, Rita returned to the Street and started working at The Kabin again.

Also in 1973: Elsie and Alan Howard move to Newcastle; Alf becomes mayor; Joanna Lumley appears as Elaine Perkins; Ken visits the twins in Scotland and returns with a wife; Tricia Hopkins makes her first appearance; Deirdre Hunt starts working at the builders’ yard; Mavis Riley starts dating Jerry Booth.