Coronation Street in 2002

2002 was Coronation Street's forty-third year.

Changing of the guard
Kieran Roberts had taken up the position of producer in December 2001, two months after the removal of Jane Macnaught as executive producer and six months after Roberts left Emmerdale, which he had produced for three years. Granada's drama controller Carolyn Reynolds had been responsible for the day-to-day running of Coronation Street in the immediate aftermath of Macnaught's departure and remained exec producer during Roberts's reign to enable a smooth transition. The duo were first credited in their roles with Episode 5228 on 8th March.

To lure back lapsed viewers, producers adopted a back-to-basics approach, playing to Coronation Street's traditional strengths such as comedy and avoiding the issue-led storylines favoured by Jane Macnaught. The changes began in the writers' room. Roberts believed that writers weren't being given enough freedom over scripts, resulting in the programme becoming too plot-driven, and ordered a change to lessen the influence of the storyliners. Meanwhile, Reynolds re-hired writers Ken Blakeson, Jan McVerry and John Stevenson, who had resigned after clashing with Macnaught in 2000, and in order to affect the desired stylistic changes to the programme, five of Macnaught's key writers - Mariam Vossough, Jo O'Keefe, Phil Ford, Julie Gearey and Susan Wilkins - left the team, allowing an influx of new talent in the form of Carmel Morgan, Debbie Oates, Stephen Russell, Chris Parker and John Fay.

The now customary cast cull followed. At a two-day story conference, Reynolds, Roberts and the writers discussed the future potential of each character and from those analyses it was decided to write out Duggie Ferguson, Bobbi Lewis, Evelyn Elliott, Molly Hardcastle, Sam Kingston, and Matt and Charlie Ramsden. The Ramsdens left in April, deciding to fight for their marriage and put Matt's tryst with Maxine Peacock behind them, despite the fact that Maxine's son Joshua could be Matt's and not Ashley's. Duggie was dramatically killed off during an argument with Richard Hillman at The Ridings, a flat they were re-developing; Duggie leaned against a shoddy bannister which gave way, causing him to fall two flights to his death. Richard's never-ending financial problems continued for the rest of the year, with him taking ever more desperate actions - including murdering his ex-wife Patricia and trying to kill Audrey Roberts and Emily Bishop for their money - in order to provide for oblivious wife Gail and the children. Richard's storyline was a key factor in restoring Coronation Street's success and the programme's ratings rose the longer it went on.

The glorious past
In taking Coronation Street back to its roots, writers gave more screentime to the senior cast members, engendered a greater sense of community spirit, and included more allusions to the past - both the programme's and the characters'. In August, the residents marked the centenary of the Rovers Return, and in June, to mark Queen Elizabeth's Golden Jubilee, the programme showed an episode in which the characters re-enacted an historical Weatherfield battle. In August, the 2002 Commonwealth Games, held in Manchester, was written into storylines, with Norris Cole working as a volunteer and Les Battersby putting up two Australian girls in exchange for a "Sydney Sandwich" (which turned out to be a real sandwich).

In April, Sally's Hardware in Victoria Street burned down, which led to Kevin and Sally Webster reconciling and re-marrying five years after they first split up. The hardware shop premises lay empty until 2005.

Producers were eager to bring back a major character and in January, Julie Goodyear signed to return full-time as Bet Lynch after a seven-year absence from the main programme. On-screen, Bet visited to Coronation Street ostensibly to attend Betty Williams's retirement party at the Rovers but in actuality she was there to testify against her former lover, Phil Bennett, who had stolen money from her. The plan was for Fred Elliott to persuade Bet to run the Rovers for him, but Goodyear struggled with the hectic filming schedule and after recording eight episodes she took three weeks off, citing exhaustion. She never returned to filming. The storyline was re-written with Bet losing her court case and leaving Weatherfield off-screen, and Lillian Spencer, an Annie Walker-type character played by Maureen Lipman, taking over the pub in her place. Lillian was meant as a stop-gap character while writers decided the future of the Rovers and in July barmaid Shelley Unwin ascended to landlady. Following the high-profile failure of Goodyear's return, no other old cast members were brought back.

New and old faces
The first new character to arrive in 2002 was undertaker Archie Shuttleworth, played by comedian Roy Hudd. Other newcomers included Jonathan Wrather as ex-con Joe Carter, former boyband singer Keith Duffy as smooth-talking Ciaran McCarthy, and Iain Rogerson as cleaner Harry Flagg.

Betty's retirement storyline (although she subsequently returned to work) was also notable for featuring a brief appearance by a recast Gordon Clegg. Geoffrey Leesley played the role both in 2002 and 2004 in the absence of Bill Kenwright.

Cast changes in the latter half of the year included the full-time return of Prunella Gee as Maxine's mother Doreen Heavey, the arrivals of cabbie Patrick Tussel, PC Mick Hopwood and florist Lucy Richards, and the departures of Chris Bisson as Vikram Desai and Jennifer James as Geena Gregory. In November, the Nelson family moved into No.6. Comprised of dad Tommy, mum Angela, and teenagers Katy and Craig, the "Nelsons" were in fact the Harrises who had been placed in Weatherfield as part of a witness protection scheme. After their initial storyline played out, the Harrises reverted to their true surname and continued in the programme. The last new face of the year, first appearing on Christmas Day, was Kate Ford as a recast Tracy Preston. For her return - the first time Tracy had appeared regularly since 1995 - Tracy was turned into a more antagonistic character and man-eater.

Additionally, Adam Rickitt made a short return as Nick Tilsley at the time of Gail and Richard's wedding, and William Tarmey took time off between July and October to undergo a bypass operation.

Recording upgrades
With Episode 5191 on 7th January, Coronation Street was broadcast in 16:9 widescreen aspect ratio, which had become the industry standard. A new title sequence was introduced in the same episode. This sequence used CGI to integrate shots recorded on the outdoor set with others shot on location in Salford, allowing for Coronation Street to be shown surrounded by other terraced houses for the first time.

The end credits underwent a change with Episode 5370 on 28th October. Beginning with this episode, the credits switched to an ITV standardised full-screen with blue background, matching other ITV programmes of the time.

Coronation Street continued to experiment with showing five episodes per week; some weeks in the first third of the year had additional episodes on Tuesday, and up to July there were four instances of two episodes being shown on the same day. Beginning on 9th September, when a major storyline was playing two episodes would be shown on a Monday night, at 7.30pm and 8.30pm. These episodes had a single title sequence and combined end credits roll at the end of the second episode.

Viewing figures
The new system adopted by BARB whereby the ratings for each showing of an episode were counted separately makes it impossible to compare 2002's ratings with those from 2001, which include the omnibus' figures. However, while the year started with ratings 2.5 million down on 2001's aggregated figures, the gap narrowed as the year progressed, with October and November less than 200,000 viewers down on 2002 and December's ratings were up on the same month in 2001. Except for January-April (where the gaps are wider), all months were 2-3 million viewers down on 1990 which was the previous year to 2002 for which all first-showing ratings are available. The average for 2002 was 12.97 million viewers.

The highest-rated episode of the year was Episode 5383 on 17th November, which was a four-hander in which Audrey tries to convince Archie Shuttleworth that son-in-law Richard is trying to kill her. The episode drew an audience of 15.01 million viewers.

34 episodes reached number one in the ratings - a massive increase from the three episodes which did so in 2001. No episodes fell outside the top twenty.

Storylines
To be added.

Who lives where
Coronation Street
 * Rovers Return Inn - Fred Elliott (from January). Eve Elliott (January to April). Geena Gregory (May to October). Lillian, Danielle and Timothy Spencer (all July only).
 * 1 Coronation Street - Ken Barlow. Deirdre Rachid. Blanche Hunt. Tracy Preston (from December).
 * 2a Coronation Street - Bobbi Lewis (until April). Maria Sutherland. Toyah Battersby (from June). Fiz Brown (from August).
 * 3 Coronation Street - Emily Bishop. Norris Cole.
 * 4 Coronation Street - Ashley and Maxine Peacock. Joshua Peacock (from April). Doreen Heavey (from July).
 * 5 Coronation Street - Les Battersby. Toyah Battersby (until February). Kirk Sutherland (from June).
 * 6 Coronation Street - Matt Ramsden (until March). Charlie Ramsden (until April). Tommy Nelson. Angela Nelson. Katy Nelson. Craig Nelson (all from November).
 * 7 Coronation Street - Curly Watts. Emma Watts. Ben Watts.
 * 8 Coronation Street - Gail Platt/Hillman. Sarah Platt. David Platt. Bethany Platt. Richard Hillman (from February). Nick Tilsley (July and August).
 * 9 Coronation Street - Jack Duckworth. Vera Duckworth. Tyrone Dobbs.
 * 10a Coronation Street - Rita Sullivan.
 * 11 Coronation Street - Eileen Grimshaw. Jason Grimshaw. Todd Grimshaw.
 * 12 Coronation Street - Steve McDonald and Karen McDonald.
 * 13 Coronation Street - Sally Webster. Rosie Webster. Sophie Webster. Kevin Webster (from August).
 * Corner Shop flat - Sunita Parekh.

Victoria Street
 * 14a Victoria Street - Duggie Ferguson (January to February). Janice Battersby (from February). Toyah Battersby (February to June).
 * 15a Victoria Street - Vikram Desai (until December). Sam Kingston (mid-January to June).
 * 16a Victoria Street - Roy Cropper. Hayley Cropper. Ciaran McCarthy (from December).
 * 17a Victoria Street - Kevin Webster (until August). Molly Hardcastle (until May). Martin Platt (April to July).
 * 18a Victoria Street - Martin Platt (January to April and July onwards).
 * 19a Victoria Street - Peter Barlow. Shelley Unwin (from February). Ciaran McCarthy (August only).

Others
 * 23a Balaclava Terrace - Sam Kingston (until mid-January).
 * Chapman Street - Janice Battersby. Dennis Stringer (both January only).
 * 5 Grasmere Drive - Audrey Roberts (until November). Bet Lynch (June only).
 * 37 Hillside Crescent - Betty Williams
 * No. 4 Montreal House, Weatherfield Quays - Mike Baldwin
 * No. 6 Montreal House, Weatherfield Quays - Dev Alahan. Geena Gregory (until May).
 * Nightingale Terrace - Harry Flagg
 * 5 Tile Street - Archie Shuttleworth.

Awards and nominations
BAFTA National Television Awards
 * Best Soap Coronation Street (Nominee)
 * Best newcomer Brian Capron (Nominee)
 * Most popular serial drama Coronation Street (Nominee)