Coronation Street dead baby storyline sparks backlash from fans and former stars who brand it ‘repulsive’
Corrie bosses are being slammed for their dead baby storyline featuring Toyah Battersby.
It was revealed last week that show writers have come up with the grim plot in which Georgia Taylor’s character had a secret baby after being raped in 2001.
The new storyline will detail how the child was stillborn and buried on The Red Rec after the sex attack by Phil Simmonds.
Toyah finds out the land is about to be dug up, and fears her secret will be discovered.
But the news has not gone down well with some of the show’s former cast, including Vicky Entwistle, who played her mum Janice Battersby in the Noughties.
Blasting the producers for meddling with the old storyline, she wrote on social media to Bruce Jones, who played her ex-husband Les: “We tried to make our moments as real as they could possibly be, didn’t we? I guess we failed.
“Who knew digging up dead babies would become the highlight of ITV’s teatime slot.”
Fans agreed, calling the new tale “repulsive”, “repellent” and “traumatic” and begging new show boss Kate Brooks to re-think the decision.
An insider revealed: “This is an incredibly dark and ambitious storyline, and some long-time fans may decide to pick apart the holes.
“The brutal attack and the aftermath all played out on screen, so for it to now transpire that she became pregnant from the rape and suffered a stillbirth has raised quite a few eyebrows.”
It is not the first time a former cast member has knocked new storylines.
This year, Jim McDonald actor Charlie Lawson dubbed the series “woke” and told us that he believes the late Tony Warren, who wrote the scripts in Corrie’s heyday, would be horrified.
He said: “I do know there are at least two long-term cast members who aren’t happy. In my day, in the Nineties, we didn’t have any woke issues, we didn’t have any political correctness, we had none of that s**t.
“We were able to tell stories and tell them properly.”
Remade in Chelsea
The latest recruits to Made In Chelsea will be bringing plenty of reality-TV pedigree to the new series – and futureproofing it for a new generation.
Former Love Island contestant Tina Stinnes is joining Sam Vanderpump, the nephew of the Real Housewives Of Beverly Hills favourite Lisa Vanderpump, on the E4 show.
It comes after MIC’s longest-serving cast member Olivia Bentley stepped back to make way for newcomers. She followed in the footsteps of Ollie Locke, who quit the show with hubby Gareth.
The new flock, some of whom were still in primary school when the original series aired in 2011, also includes singleton Julia “Muffin” Pollard, regular James Taylor’s younger brother Jack, and up-and-coming fashion stylist Zeyno Taylan. The 27th series, which arrives later this month, also welcomes back familiar faces including Dancing On Ice finalist Miles Nazaire and newly married Maeva D’Ascanio.
Write-off for Matt novel
Little Britain star Matt Lucas has hit a stumbling block as he tries to fulfill a new ambition of becoming a novelist.
He revealed it speaking just before the start of a special charity performance of fundraising play, Whodunnit Unrehearsed 3, at Park Theatre in North London.
Matt said: “I’m plotting a novel, it’s a novel I’ve been writing for ages and ages. I was telling my friend last night about the central conceit of the novel, and they said: ‘Oh that’s good, that sounds just like such-and-such.’
“And I went: ‘What!?’ and he even showed me a trailer that’s just come out for a film doing exactly my story.”
Later, as he took to the stage to play a shepherd with an Hungarian accent he harked back to his controversial Little Britain days remarking: “I hope I don’t get in trouble for doing another voice.”
To buy tickets visit www.parktheatre.co.uk.
Eurovision’s grand final will be shown live in cinemas across the UK next month. At the same time as it is broadcast from Sweden on BBC One, the action will be streamed on to big screens for the ultimate viewing party from 8pm on May 11. Tickets are on sale today at song- contestincinemas.com.
Dream’s a Reality for Ross
Ross Kemp is a soap great, has travelled the world with dangerous gangs and even fronts his own game show.
But he does not take any of it for granted. Instead, the former EastEnders actor, who kicks off a new Celebrity Bridge Of Lies series, thinks his younger self would be shocked he is still lining up telly gigs.
He tells The Sun’s TV Mag, free with the paper on Saturdays: “I’m going to be 60 this year. If you told the arrogant little twit that left drama school in 1985 that he’d still be employable, I’d have been quite surprised.
“I’d sort of prepped myself for a life of unemployment.”
Ross has his eye on a reality show, and said with a laugh: “Living With The Kemps, we’d make the Kardashians look like amateurs.”
EastEnders villain Charlie Brooks is heading to the stage as another baddie, in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang this summer. Charlie, who was Janine in the soap, plays the Childcatcher. Emmerdale’s Liam Fox also appears, as Grandpa Potts, in the UK tour starting in Southampton this month.