Coronation Street reached a low of eight million in February 1973, when Pat Phoenix quit as Elsie Tanner, Violet Carson (battleaxe Ena Sharples) was written out for most of the year due to illness, and Doris Speed (haughty landlady Annie Walker) took two months' leave due to bereavement. The audience of ITV's other flagship soap opera "Crossroads" increased markedly at this time, as its established cast, such as Meg Richardson (Noele Gordon), grew in popularity. These sudden departures forced the writing team to quickly develop characters who had previously stood in the background. The roles of Bet Lynch (Julie Goodyear), Deirdre Hunt
The Road to Coronation Street The Road to Coronation Street The Road to Coronation Street is a British drama first broadcast on BBC Four documenting the journey of "Coronation Street", the UK's longest-running television soap opera, from conception to its first transmission in December 1960. Set mainly at Granada Studios, Manchester in 1960, the 75-minute-long programme follows the true story of Tony Warren, a struggling scriptwriter who creates a vision of a television programme depicting normal life in a Salford street of terraced houses. "The Road to Coronation Street" was written by Daran Little, a long-time archivist on "Coronation Street" who became a scriptwriter. At