Tony Warren was a young writer for Granada and persuaded producer, Canadian Harry Elton, to let him write about what he knew, the North. The tv-movie is the story about that and casting the show, right up to the night it was aired live.
This week the program is released in Canada on DVD. Amazon has the release date as April 12 and lists it, at the moment, for $20.99 plus tax. You really should get this, whether you order it or find it in a shop. It's most definitely worth it. I have seen it and it's nearly guaranteed to bring a tear to your eye.
The casting is superb and surprising in at least one respect. Eastenders' Jessie Wallace (Kat Slater Moon) plays Elsie Tanner! You might think that's a bit of a stretch but I'm telling you she was amazing! William Roache's son, James, played him, that is, the son played the father as a young man. Not just trick casting, either, he had him down pat!
Even more edited to add: How remiss of me not to mention that the show was written by the amazing Daran Little! Daran has written many books about Coronation Street and was the show's archivist for years. He has written for the show as well. He has a great affection for it and it most certainly shows in a drama like this!
I wrote about it on my UK Corrie blog after I watched it. There are a number of links in that post as well to some media interviews and other related things that make great reading. Dp check this dvd out, though we can always cross our fingers that CBC shows it sometime, too!
Edited to add: A commenter on this post (thank you!) pointed out that the Road To Coronation Street is available for viewing on CBC! Check it out here.
5 comments:
CBC has it on their web-site. I watched it last week. I loved it!
Oh excellent, i didnt' know that! I'll add that into the post, thank you!
Thanks for posting the info and the link - just finished watching it and REALLY enjoyed it, which I wasn't really expecting. I remember Elsie, Annie, and Ena from when I was a young feller - nice to see how they 'found' Violet Carson, Doris Speed, and Pat Phoenix. And some young fella named William Roache who seemed to think it was just for a couple of weeks before his real film career launched... Love it! Florizel Street - just doesn't have the same ring, does it?!
It was really really good and i also must edit that to add that the writer was the amazing Daran Little
Yes, right at the start when I saw that Daran Little had written it, I thought immediately better about spending an hour of my life watching it! I've always liked it when I see his name as the writer for a show :-)
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