Frank Tate (Emmerdale) Frank Tate (Emmerdale) Frank Tate is a fictional character from the British ITV soap opera, "Emmerdale", played by Norman Bowler. He made his first appearance on 21 November 1989 and remained a regular for almost eight years, before Bowler opted to quit in 1996, leading to his character’s exit the following year. Introduced as the patriarch of the new Tate family, who were brought in as part of the show’s rebranding, in 1989, many of Frank’s storylines revolved around his volatile relationship with his wife Kim Tate (Claire King). During his time in the programme, Frank and Kim divorced and
Scheduling of Emmerdale was broadcast at the same time as the BBC's soap "EastEnders"; this was unusual, as the main terrestrial channels in the UK usually schedule their soap operas to avoid clashes like this. On 8 July 2009, ITV announced that they were to revamp their schedule yet again. This time, "Emmerdale"'s Tuesday hour-long episode was reduced back down to 30 minutes, and replaced with a second Thursday episode. "Emmerdale" and "EastEnders" ratings have improved thanks to this, with "Emmerdale" getting 7.7 million, its highest in over 6 months, on 1 October 2009. Old episodes of "Emmerdale Farm" were repeated in the