LIZ EYES A PLAY WITH THUNDER

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CORONATION Street legend Beverley Callard has revealed she will be leaving the cobbles to star in a play.

The actress, who plays Liz McDonald, admitted that she is usually forced to turn down scripts because she is contracted to the ITV soap.

But she pleaded with her producer at Corrie to be allowed a break so she could take part in a new play.

She will have a lead role in the all-female production Thunder Girls.

Feisty

She said: “This script came to me and I said to my producer at Coronation Street, ‘I can’t say no to this, please let me do this’.

“It’s a new play with four grown-up women in it of an age.”

Beverley, 61, who has been playing feisty Liz for 30 years, says she will be returning to the hit soap after the temporary absence from the show.

The play, based on a novel and due to open next year, is about a girl band who are re-forming but have many old wounds left to heal.

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FANS of Coronation Street branded the English Defence League “scum” after soap chiefs were forced to scrap tours today to make way for a farright march.

Viewers who bought tickets to visit the ITV show’s set weeks ago were devastated to find their bookings cancelled as organisers could not guarantee their safety.

Angry soap fans tore into the extremists on social networking sites.

EDL supporters are set to descend on MediaCityUK in Salford, Gtr Manchester, from 2pm today to protest against the BBC.

An ITV source said fans had been offered the chance to switch their bookings.

A spokesman for Continuum – which runs the tours – said fans were informed of the decision.