How Northern is Coronation Street?

How Northern is Coronation Street?

Its been more than 50 years since the first episode of Coronation Street aired on our TV’s. Before it had even begun it wasn’t expected to last more than a few weeks. Well, they sure proved the neigh-sayers wrong. In the early years, Coronation Street used its northern location as a main centre point behind the show. Nowadays, in the years of ratings and viewers, competition with its BBC opponents is getting higher and higher. Eastenders vs Coronation Street has a somewhat strong link to the North vs South debate as both are somewhat seen as representing their locations. So lets look at Coronation Street. As a Mancunian it has always been a staple of my families viewing. What grabbed me at a young age was the fact that everything was more relatable to me as locality was important in the show when I was growing up. Now I’m older I wonder if its retained that locality.

In its early years, Coronation Street had northern actors, with northern accents using northern dialect within northern storylines. Take for example the character of Ken Barlow. He has been a centre piece of the show since the 1960’s and his storylines have varied in context massively over the decades. In the 1960’s, a lot of his storylines focussed on his resentment of his northern, working class background where by the other characters on the show were seemingly proud of the background. Coronation Street at that time was filled with northern matriarchal woman that were all larger than life and all distinctively easy to locate where they were from. Although it was deemed quite gritty for its time, it couldn’t really get away with much and thus the storylines were quite basic and didn’t really tackle the viewer. It wasn’t until the late 1960’s that storylines started to push boundaries.

Come the 1970’s and everything changed for Coronation Street. A lot of their central characters ended up having to be written out throughout the decade due to both onscreen and offscreen issues. Ratings started plummeting at a time when two new regional soap operas appeared on ITV. Crossroads was set in the midlands and focussed on middle class characters and was a lot less community focussed being that is was set in a fictional motel. Emmerdale was another northern soap introduced but was much more ‘rural’ being set in the countryside. An influx of southern characters came into Coronation Street such as the long serving Mike Baldwin character. With them came more hard hitting storylines with more controversial deaths and tragedies. A lot of its northern routs still remained with some of the 1960’s stalwarts re-introduced and new strong northern characters introduced and built up such as Bet Lynch. Storylines and scenes within the warehouse were especially ‘local’ to me.

The 1980’s were a massive decade for Coronation Street. Pretty much all of the original cast were gone apart from Ken Barlow and new characters had to fill their shoes. The Duckworths moved onto the fictional street in the early 1980’s and were a huge hit for the show. The two characters were a huge throwback to the 60’s northern characters and they consistently appeared in both comedic and dramatic roles throughout the years. When Channel 4 was introduced in the 1980’s so too was its flagship soap Brookside. Brookside was quite similar to Coronation Street in someways. Both northern, both working class and both with huge boundary breaking storylines bringing in ratings. Brookside emphasized its Liverpool setting heavily, possibly more so than any other soap. Coronation Street towards the end of the decade had a huge range of characters from all over the UK and with distinct accents and personalities. The 1990’s followed suit much like the 1980’s. Seeing older characters depart and the newer ones introduced in the 1980’s step up into more central roles. The 1990’s also brought with it completely new boundary breaking characters like transsexual Hayley Cropper. The soap was now no longer a regional hit but a national mainstream powerhouse that represented people from all over the UK with all sorts of different backgrounds.

Into the new millenium and Coronation Street is very much up there with the dominating Eastenders on BBC1. The show had become very storyline driven with serial killers, affairs and teen pregnancies a plenty but it was no different from the other soaps. However, Coronation Street still retained its northern character mainly through its northern characters. Even today new working class characters such as Becky and Beth are brightening up the screens and are seemingly very popular with viewers.

One of the big factors in retaining its northern character is the fact Coronation Street regularly acknowledges its surrounding geography. Constant references to Manchester both verbally and via imagery such as the tram have a big part in emphasizing the soaps regional importance. The scenery of rows of terraced houses on cobbled streets is very much still a part of Manchester onscreen and offscreen however its becoming a rarer sight as years go on. I always love seeing a black Mancunian cab and I love it when they name drop local places.

The conclusion I'd come to is that it has retained its northern spirit and character, however that's not to say it may not be dated. What Coronation Street does better than any other soap is maintain the right balance for its viewers. It has a great balance of comedy and drama but also a great balance of charactures and characters. Let me know what you think!

Who's Bagged the Better Movie Star?

Who's Bagged the Better Movie Star?

When it comes to new actors and actresses joining soaps, you very rarely get a big screen star coming into British small screen soaps. Recently, both Eastenders and Coronation Street have managed to add to their respective cast lists two actors that have big hits (and utter flops) on their resume. The thing is, the addition of two big cast members doesn't not mean clear sailing ratings or quality wise. They might not fit in, they might not take it seriously and worst of all, they might be misused.

So far I've really enjoyed the new Carter family on Eastenders. The balance within the wider unit has been fantastic with something for everyone in my opinion. Their comedic attributes have been perfectly fine and doesn't overshadow the serious aspects of their family dynamic. Centering the family around the established charatacter of Shirley was a great idea, as the character and actress has the prowess to maintain being the glue that stabilizes the new influx of characters. The stand out character of the new crew is Mick, played by Danny Dyer. Realistically Danny Dyer is the quintessential typecast movie character. The majority of roles he's played, its always Cockney geezer, give or take a certain amount of 'hardness'. This role isn't too different from his previous. So far he's maintained a lighthearted approach both on and off screen but has eluded to a certain mystery behind what we've seen already. Don't get me wrong, he's shown glimpses of 'tough' so far but I get the feeling there's a lot more to come from that angle and we'll see it later this year. What I find strange is his ongoing role as 'agony uncle' he keeps finding himself playing. I'm interested to see if that continues and becomes a key part of the character, if so, I fear it's just the same way Coronation Street use Stella so often these days, constantly involving herself in going arcs (although to be fair to her, less so recently).

Over on Coronation Street, we have Kal played by Jimi Mistri. Much like Danny Dyer, Jimi Mistri finds himself trapped in similar characters. East is East is one of my favourite films so when he came into Coronation Street I was intrigued into how and where he'd fit in. There's a few issues I've had so far since he's appeared. Firstly, I understand the link with Dev however to bring in the rest of his family already and his career investments seems rushed story line wise. A bit more development would've gone perfect as unlike Danny Dyer's character on Eastenders, he doesn't have a character as strong as Shirley to work with. On top of that, the character itself seems very on the fence. I'm not going to judge too much yet but I would like to see a bit more edge of his character. There's a big possibility that the incoming family may be the trigger to real development of the character but only time will tell.

Neither actor has really had too many roles which gained them massive praise so I assumptions can be made that they were brought in for their fans. However, looking at each actor, would their fans truly translate to new viewers. Danny Dyer is popular with a lot of women but so is Eastenders...Jimi Mistri...any female readers would have to tell me. I can't imagine any of Danny Dyer's 'hardman' fans tune into Eastenders each week but Jimi Mistri's fanbase is more broad so there's more a chance they do. Despite that, even if new viewers are gained by each soap, they have to keep them watching with good, quality television, which realistically, neither is showing at the moment.

All in all, I'm favouring Danny Dyer's character at the moment but a lot of that is down to the whole accompanying family and their dynamic. It will be interesting to see how each develops and I'm interested to see how long-term each role turns out to be. What do you think about the two? Do you have a preference? I love reading your comments so please feel free!

See you next time!