Find out more about the Coronation Street Weekly Updates and why they've been written for th'internet since 1995 at http://www.corrie.net/updates/weekly
Happy New Year and welcome to another Corrie weekly update.
Deirdre’s having problems with her eggs on a morning, what with Rob wandering round the house in his pants at breakfast and calling her “Dee”. Tracy wants Deirdre to let her and Rob move in to No. 1 to save on paying rent for Vicky Court, but Deirdre’s not keen: “No, I don’t like him!”, and so Tracy hatches a mad plan to get her mum to relent. Tracy and Rob stage a break-in at the Barlow’s, they chuck Deirdre’s hand-made ceramic pot (not the ceramic pot!) to the ground, trash the Christmas tree and make a right mess. Deirdre’s shocked and appalled when she sees the mess that the ‘burglars’ have made but when Rob’s story doesn’t stack up, Deirdre knows immediately it was Rob and Tracy who’ve done this to the house. Does Deirdre chuck the gruesome twosome of her house? No she does not. She lets them move in. Deirdre, you’re your own worst enemy, you really are.
Hayley’s news that she’s only got weeks to live filters around the Street after she and Roy agree that friends should be told. Roy takes his shopping bag and goes to break the news to Carla in the flat. Carla demands to see Hayley, barges into her bedroom and gets into bed with her for a cosy little chat. Meanwhile, back at Carla’s flat, Tina turns up, barge into the bedroom and gets into bed with Peter for a cosy little chat, and that. But Roy’s left his bag at Carla’s flat! He heads back and gives Peter palpitations when he hears the door go and thinks Carla’s returned. So it was a close shave for Peter and Tina. After they’ve done the sub-duvet shenanigans, Tina tells Liz who threatens Peter in the men’s loo at the Rovers to stay away from Tina. Tina’s all over the place, not knowing where is with Peter who declares undying love for Carla. As neither Tina nor Carla have known Peter Barlow for as long as some of us Corrie fans have, neither of them know better, but we all know he’s a lying, cheating, bigamist who should be left well alone, even if he is gorgeous to look at.
Roy asks Hayley when she intends to take her own life. “It won’t be today, it probably won’t be tomorrow,” she replies, unwilling to give Roy the answer he needs to know but dreads to hear. “When, then?” he asks her. “Soon,” she replies. Susie the humanist funeral celebrant pays Hayley a visit to discuss arrangements for the funeral and up in the flat the Croppers talk through Hayley’s wishes for her final send-off. They talk about Hayley’s character and she reveals she’s not the goody-two-shoes that everyone thinks she is, saying she once dropped a bacon slice on the floor in the café but kept it specially to serve up to the person who deserved it the most. “Tracy Barlow?” asks Roy. Hayley nods. “Good work,” he responds.
And finally this week, Jason’s dad Tony returns and no-one’s best pleased, not Jason, not Todd and it certainly hasn’t put a smile on Eileen’s face either, as you can imagine.
Julie Hesmondhalgh has played Hayley Cropper on Coronation Street since January 1998 and has very kindly taken up our challenge for a celebrity to write about their love of Coronation Street.
In return we're donating £25 to Julie's charity of choice which is the Pancreatic Cancer UK charity. And now, it's over to Julie..
"I was always a Corrie viewer. Growing up in '70s Accrington it was a way of life, like fish on Fridays and half day closing on Wednesday, something that just WAS. Our cat Frisbee used to go wild and climb the curtains whenever the familiar theme music came on. Perhaps some animal instinct told her just how important that theme tune would become to our family…
Later, I moved to London and went to a drama school with a lot of posh people, and Corrie became like a delicacy, a taste of home, a reminder of where I was from.
When I got cast as Hayley Patterson in the winter of 1997 it was a relief. Any actor born in the north will tell you it is the cross you have to bear, to be asked every day of your life, no matter what theatrical or even cinematic success you may be enjoying, “When are we going to see you on Corrie then?” I swear that’s why Ian McKellan did his time on the cobbles. How fantastic to be able to finally say “Next Wednesday 7.30”!
And here I am, 16 years on, no longer a part of that wonderful institution, but still on screen (for a few weeks at least) and still a Corrie viewer and fan. It’s always been a joke at work that I really belong at the gates with the fans and the autograph hunters…it’s like THEY LET ME IN!
I was still pinching myself right to the end, not being able to believe my luck, particularly when having the honour of filming with the Legends of the Street (Rita, Dennis, Deirdre, Liz, Betty, Becky, to name a few).
And to have these amazing storylines has been the icing on the cake. To see attitudes shift towards trans-people over the years as the Croppers’ love story endured, was the highlight of my career, but then the phenomenal response to Hayley’s long and painful goodbye has been one of the things I’m most proud of in my life.
Pancreatic cancer is a horrible disease, with a terrible survival rate that hasn’t improved in years. A petition calling for better funding had less than 5000 signatures when the storyline began and is now just shy of 20,000.
I have received hundreds of tweets and letters from people who have lost loved ones, who are fighting cancer themselves or are caring for sick relatives. Rather than switching off they’ve found some sort of comfort in seeing their experiences reflected onscreen. It has been a privilege to have people share their stories with me.
The Right to Die debate is a controversial and difficult one, but again I feel so proud to be part of the conversation. And that’s all I am…a part of it all. The researchers, the storyliners, the producers, directors, the fantastic writers and the crew are the unsung heroes, and without David Neilson as my partner I would not have come this far. He is as brilliant as you think. I’m looking forward to seeing what happens to all my friends, and what adventures await my darling Roy, once Hayley has gone.
That people invested so much in this off beat love story in the first place was miracle enough; to see how much they care now it’s coming to an end means the world.
Today is the 30th anniversary of Elsie Tanner’s final departure from Coronation Street. For some of you, you may be shocked that it was 30 years ago!
It could be said that Elsie’s departure was a milestone for Corrie in a sense that it was bidding a proper goodbye to a legend – and on-screen as well. While the characters of Martha Longhurst, Valerie Barlow and Ernest Bishop were well-loved and popular, they weren’t regarded as Corrie greats like Elsie, Annie Walker and Ena Sharples were. And also Corrie had never said a proper goodbye to its big characters before this. Jack Walker, Minnie Caldwell, Ena Sharples, Len Fairclough and Annie Walker had all been written out of the programme off-screen due to death, ill health or scandal. Pat Phoenix herself left the programme for the first time in 1973 without any notice and it was quickly written that Elsie had got a job in Newcastle. A decade later, the writers were given a chance to give a proper goodbye to Elsie and in my opinion; it’s one of the best exits in Corrie history.
Things had changed in Corrie in those ten years – those new characters in 1973 like Deirdre, Bet, Rita, Mavis and Alf were now very well established so the production team weren’t in a panic when Pat Phoenix announced that she was leaving in late 1983 – the show was in safe hands.
Viewers were left with two questions: why was Pat Phoenix leaving and how?
At the time, some believed it was the fact that Peter Adamson had been sacked and so Len Fairclough was being written out of the show. As you know, Elsie and Len had a close friendship and even though Len had tried many times to get Elsie to be his wife, she refused, saying she preferred him to be her friend rather than a husband. This close friendship sometimes caused tension between Len and wife Rita and between Rita and Elsie. And when Len married Rita in 1977, Pat Phoenix failed to attend filming of the wedding, stating that she felt that a part of Elsie’s character was disappearing with Len getting married.
As Adele Rose told Sean Egan in his book Coronation Street: The (Very) Unofficial Story: “The value of their relationship was always in the spikiness underneath the genuine affection they had for each other. It was far more profitable in terms of story and character to keep them with the love-hate relationship going on. He was the one who could say things to her that nobody else could and vice versa. If we ever brought it to any kind of conclusion, that would have been the end of both the characters' value to the show.” Many believed that Elsie and Len would be written out together, but producer Bill Podmore announced that Len’s exit had been written before Phoenix gave her notice.
Another possible reason for her departure was the fact that she didn’t want to enter old age on the show. She feared that Elsie would morph into Ena Sharples or Annie Walker, and she didn’t want that! She also wasn’t happy with the stories that were given to her. Despite being in her fifties, she still wanted to be involved with young, attractive men but it wasn’t reality. In fact, when she announced she was leaving, it felt it was at the right time. It felt the character was coming to an end.
As for how she’d leave, leaving with Len was out of the question. What about Dennis or Linda returning for their mother’s exit?
But as it turned out, the writers and production team had worked out a plausible exit storyline. Elsie’s old flame from 1961 Bill Gregory returned to the street to visit Rita after Len died in a car crash in December. Thinking Elsie was still in Newcastle with hubby Alan Howard, Bill was shocked when the neighbours told him that she was back at N°11. They reunited after 13 years (Elsie had rebuffed Bill for Alan in 1970) and Bill tells her about his wonderful life in Portugal as asks her to join him. Although she refused at first, Bill failed to back down and Elsie agreed in the end. She did a moonlight flit and took her photographs of Linda and Dennis and wrote a few letters and put her keys through the Barlows’ letterbox. She then reminisced about her catfights with Annie Walker and Ena Sharples and telling off Dennis. It was a great piece of writing! When the cab driver asked her when she’d be returning, Elsie gave a knowing smile and said: “Ah, now there’s a question!”.
Elsie never did return. Any chances of her returning were dashed two years later when Pat Phoenix announced she was dying of cancer. There have been rumours that she left the programme because she knew she had cancer. But who knows? Twenty seven years after last appearance, we found out about Elsie’s fate post-cobbles. She married Bill and they lived a very happy life in the Algarve. They both died in 2004 when their car flew off a cliff and were holding each other’s hands when they were found. A Hollywood ending for a woman who led a Hollywood lifestyle!
And there we are, the story of the departure of a classic Corrie character – the first siren and femme fatale. She’s not remembered for any accessory like Hilda or Bet but for her love life and the kind of storylines that we crave for these days!
Mrs Tanner, we salute you – a true Corrie and TV icon!
And to keep you entertained during the wet weather, why not sit down and watch this classic episode from the 4th of January 1984 below. Did you watch it first time round? What did you think when Pat Phoenix announced her departure? Let us know - we'd love to hear!
Fresh in from CBC, (ask and ye just might get the information you want! Thanks, CBC!) ...
Here's the schedule for Coronation Street during the Winter Olympics as we know it now. These times could change but if we find out, we'll let you know.
Feb 6
Regular time Atlantic (19:30/7:30 pm)
18:30/6:30 pm Rest of the country time zones aside from Atlantic/Windsor/MT North
17:00/5:00 pm Windsor
17:00/5:00 pm MT North
Feb 7-21
19:30/7:30 pm Maritimes
20:00/8:00 pm Newfoundland
18:30/6:30 pm Man/Sask/Quebec/Ontario minus Windsor
17:00/5:00 pm Windsor
15:30/3:30 pm Alberta
15:30/3:30 pm MT North
14:30/2:30 pm BC
Deirdre’s having problems with her eggs on a morning, what with Rob wandering round the house in his pants at breakfast and calling her “Dee”. Tracy wants Deirdre to let her and Rob move in to No. 1 to save on paying rent for Vicky Court, but Deirdre’s not keen: “No, I don’t like him!”, and so Tracy hatches a mad plan to get her mum to relent. Tracy and Rob stage a break-in at the Barlow’s, they chuck Deirdre’s hand-made ceramic pot (not the ceramic pot!) to the ground, trash the Christmas tree and make a right mess. Deirdre’s shocked and appalled when she sees the mess that the ‘burglars’ have made but when Rob’s story doesn’t stack up, Deirdre knows immediately it was Rob and Tracy who’ve done this to the house. Does Deirdre chuck the gruesome twosome of her house? No she does not. She lets them move in. Deirdre, you’re your own worst enemy, you really are.
