Right up my Street: TV Guide deputy editor Chris Bush takes a walk down Coronation Street.
During a visit to the set of Coronation Street in Manchester, TV Guide deputy editor Chris Bush and his wife (below) unexpectedly found themselves featuring in a scene on the soap. To mark the 60th anniversary of Coro, Chris recalls the highlight (so far) of his international acting career.
If it’s true that everyone has at least 15 minutes of fame, I used up a few seconds of my time in 2007 in an episode of Coronation Street.
Most viewers would not have even noticed my wife and I strolling casually past the takeaway shop and Roy’s Rolls, as we carried pizza boxes, in the background of a wider shot. But to us, watching on TV months later, we stood out like two freshly poured pints on the Rovers Return bar.
For us it was a personal highlight of Coro Street’s past 60 years.
It was perhaps the unexpected nature of our international acting debuts that added to the memory and impact of the occasion.
My wife and I were on holiday in Britain and, as long-term Coronation Street fans, wanted to visit the set of the long-running soap while we were in Manchester.
Previous tours of the set had been closed to the public but through TVNZ Publicity contacts in my role as TV Guide deputy editor, a set visit was organised for us.
I was hoping to be able to do a few interviews as well but I was thrilled just to have the chance to visit the set of one of the shows that has been a constant backdrop to my life. Yes, Coronation Street has been around longer than I have.
During our tour of the Coronation Street set, guided by publicity manager Alison Sinclair, we had the chance to stop and chat with many of the stars of the Street.
I was delighted to talk to Anne Kirkbride (Deirdre, who has since died), Simon Gregson (Steve McDonald), Michael Le Vell (Kevin Webster), Jack P Shepherd (David Platt), Samia Ghadia/Smith (Maria), Antony Cotton (Sean Tully) and Beverley Callard (Liz McDonald), who brazenly lifted her leg to show us a tear in her fishnet stockings while laughing uproariously with Anne Kirkbride about the inventiveness of the Coro Street wardrobe department.
As we were ambling along the famous cobbles and watching the filming of a scene nearby, the production director, who was already aware that two New Zealand visitors were on the Street that day, asked us whether we would like to
be in a scene. Would we ever. That would be brilliant.
The instructions were clear. We had to emerge from the takeaway premises (now the kebab shop) and stroll arm in arm along the pavement and past Roy’s Rolls while carrying pizza boxes. (The boxes were empty but we had to give the impression we had just bought a couple of pizzas and were heading home.) We could appear to be chatting, but could not say anything.
In the foreground, Maria Connor and her husband Liam (who was later to be killed off) were chatting and walking together with their dog Ossie while Roy Cropper was busy sweeping up outside his shop.
I’m not an egotistical thespian, but I must admit we performed our roles perfectly from the start.
Even the words of the production director before our first take didn’t put us off.
“There’s no need to be nervous,” he yelled with faux encouragement. “You’ll only be seen by 20 million viewers throughout the world.”
Nevertheless, we had to walk that same route out of the takeaway shop at least a dozen times, with retake after retake. But it was nothing to do with us.
Rob James-Collier (Liam Connor), who went on to play the footman Thomas Barrow in Downton Abbey, kept fluffing his lines. After the fourth or fifth retake, Rob apologised profusely to us. We told him not to worry. We were happy just absorbing the whole experience.
In between takes, we chatted to David Neilson (Roy), who told us about the fantastic campervan trip of New Zealand he had enjoyed a few years beforehand.
In another break, David and a cameraman, after talking about David’s holiday home in Spain, had a quick-fire volley of Spanish words and their meanings with David announcing that ‘zorro’ means ‘fox’ and ‘tonto’ is the word for ‘fool’. With each retake of our pavement stroll, our acting confidence grew and a little bit of swagger entered our pizza-carrying meandering.
However, it didn’t take long for the Manchester weather to reveal its tempestuous face and bring us back down to earth. The skies which had been threateningly grey all morning finally gave way to a squally shower.
Almost immediately, assistants rushed on set with umbrellas in hand. They quickly raced over to protect David, Rob, Samia and Ossie from the pesky showers. They were the stars of the show and were treated as such.
Umbrellas for us? They were nowhere to be seen. It was a stark reminder that my wife and I were just a couple of ordinary cobbles in life’s well-worn street.
However, that day we didn’t mind in the slightest. Despite the vagaries of the Manchester weather, the sun really had smiled upon us both that day. It is a memory we will treasure for ever.