The Road to Coronation Street the character of Annie Walker, and Lynda Baron played the role of Violet Carson, who played one of "Coronation Street"s most iconic characters, Ena Sharples. John Thomson and Michelle Holmes, who had previously been members of the Coronation Street cast, appeared as H.V. Kershaw and Harry Elton's secretary respectively. The drama achieved a peak of 852,000 viewers on its first transmission, making it the second most popular programme in BBC Four's history, behind 2008's "The Curse of Steptoe" at 1.41m viewers. Sam Wollaston, a critic for "The Guardian", gave a positive review, stating ""The Road to Coronation Street" is fond,
Coronation Street soaps which often used straight-to-video films to cover more contentious plot lines that may not be allowed by the broadcaster, "Coronation Street" has largely used these films to reset their characters in other locations. In 1995, "Coronation Street: The Cruise" also known as "Coronation Street: The Feature Length Special" was released on VHS to celebrate the 35th anniversary of the show. ITV heavily promoted the programme as a direct-to-video exclusive but broadcast a brief version of it on 24 March 1996. The Independent Television Commission investigated the broadcast, as viewers complained that ITV misled them. In 1997, following the controversial