FANS’ HILL PLOY FOR FOOTIE BAN
Wendi Peters on life after Cilla
SHE tickled the nation as Corrie‘s bigmouth Cilla Battersby-brown – but it blighted her TV career.
Wendi Peters, now 50, says playing layabout Les Battersby’s wife left her so stereotyped in producers’ eyes, she is not offered the variety of TV roles she craves.
She says: “I love to play aristocrats, for example, but I don’t think on TV I would be seen for something like that.
“Sometimes people find it hard to look past Cilla and see me as something else.”
She is still stopped in the street by Cilla fans although it is 11 years since her character left Les – Bruce Jones – and kids Fiz and Chesney for Las Vegas.
“It’s crazy,” she says. “If somebody had said when I left that, 11 years on, people would still be stopping and asking me questions I would have said, ‘You’re mad.’
“It’s like a lifetime ago but Cilla was such an in-your-face character that people loved to hate that she is still remembered.”
Blackburn-born Wendi adds: “I loved all of the comedy too, like when Cilla went shoplifting on Blanche’s mobility scooter and I ended up in the canal. Silly things like that were great fun to film.”
Then there was the time huge dog Schmeichel joined her and Les in the bath – and they all crashed through a ceiling.
Wendi says: “Chesney and Fiz are still there so Cilla gets mentioned every now and then. I try to tune in when I can.”
She returned to Corrie for a few weeks in 2014 and wouldn’t rule out a longer comeback. “Never say never,” she says.
“If they phoned me with a lovely storyline I’d be more than happy to think about it.
“I think Cilla would still be causing trouble. She left with a bad back last time so she might even be in a wheelchair now, trying to rob people. I can’t imagine being HUNDREDS of England football supporters barred from a match in Croatia plan to watch it from a hill overlooking the stadium.
Croatia must play two home games behind closed doors as punishment after a swastika was mown into a pitch before a 2015 Euro qualifier against Italy. But in any other soap – but I live 20 minutes from Eastenders, which is very handy.” Maureen Lipman, 72, who played Lilian Spencer in Corrie in 2002, has just rejoined as Tyrone Dobbs’s gran Evelyn Plummer. “Good for her, what a wonderful character actress she is,” says Wendi. “Our soaps need more of that, more characterbased than drama-led storylines.” She was in Corrie with Ryan Thomas, who was accused of punching Roxanne Pallett on Celebrity Big Brother. Wendi says: “It was unfortunate but it’s what producers want to happen, isn’t it? He’ll be fine.” She is married to actor Kenny Linden and has an 18-year-old daughter Gracie, who is off to drama school soon. But she fears careers are harder for children of well-known people. “Gracie will have people watching her as my daughter,” she says. “I’m making her aware of jobs I did between acting – waitress, postwoman, barwoman, decorator – anything.”
Wendi is playing Lady Raeburn in a UK tour of the musical Salad Days. up to 500 England fans aim to get round being banned from the Uefa Nations League tie.
They will travel Rijeka hoping to watch from a hill as England get revenge for losing to Croatia in the World Cup semi-final three months ago.
The stadium, in Croatia’s third largest city, seats just 8,000.
Images taken from a nearby hill show the pitch can be clearly seen, prompting fans to take a gamble. Dave Taylor, 35, of Shrewsbury, Shrops, said: “I think about 500 fans will go to Croatia.
“I think the plan is to soak up the atmosphere.”
He said Croatia could have arranged an extra friendly before the October 12 game so the ban would have been over.
He added: “It’s unfair on the England fans.”
But Tihana Gorenc, a football supporter living in Croatia, warned fans will not be able to see anything from the hills. A Rijeka tourist office spokesman said: “We’d advise England fans to look around and explore the area. There are bars and restaurants where the matches are on.”
Up to one million British holidaymakers are thought to have visited Croatia this summer, including Dubrovnik and Split.
England started their Nations League campaign last night with a game against Spain.
They will play Switzerland in a friendly on Tuesday.