Coronation Street’s Gail says goodbye: 7 of her best bits

Coronation Street’s long-standing, long-suffering character Gale will bid farewell to Weatherfield on Christmas Day after 50 years.

Actress Helen Worth has stuck with the character through thick and thin since 1974, and fans have seen Gale’s season in several domestic dramas, romances, bust-ups and even prison.

The ITV soap announced in June that she would be departing with “a major storyline for the Platt family”, and her exit would normally be a major event.

The 73-year-old actress has said she feels “really blessed” about her long Corrie career.

Ahead of his festive double-episode finale, here’s a look back at seven of the most beloved character’s most memorable moments.

**SPOILER ALERT** This article contains details of the Christmas Eve episode.

In its penultimate episode on Tuesday, Gale was seen fretting over her seventh wedding – this time to Jesse Chadwick, with whom she is about to move to France.

If they tie the knot on Christmas Day, they will tie Street Cars stud Steve McDonald’s record for the most married Street character.

Viewers will recall that in 1979, Gail Potter (bonus points if you remember her first name) first married Brian Tilsley (Christopher Quinton).

Brian divorced Ian Latimer after her affair because she wasn’t sure if he was really the father of their daughter Sarah.

The couple remarried and remarried in 1988, but it didn’t end happily. Brian died after being stabbed in an alley after a night out.

In 2000, Gail is shocked to learn that Sarah (Tina O’Brien) is pregnant at the age of 13.

She only took the youngster to the doctor for being sick and not eating, before the baby bomb was dropped.

“You can’t get pregnant if you haven’t had sex,” Gail told her sobbing daughter.

Shock slowly spread across Gail’s face as the reality hit her.

Recalling how she felt as a young actress, O’Brien told BBC News this week that Worth “literally held my hand” during the experience.

“We were expected to press. [interviews] And I was quite a young girl and quite reserved and shy, and she was very kind and wonderful to me.”

In the end it turns out just fine, Sarah’s on-screen daughter Bethenny is now grown herself (played by Lucy Fallon) and is still on the show.

After several heartbreaks – the murder of her first husband and then the infidelities of second spouse Martin Platt (Sean Wilson) – Gail found happiness in 2002 when she married Richard Hillman (Brian Capron).

But to his horror, it is revealed that his new beau has not only killed his ex-wife, but also Maxine Peacock (Tracy Shaw), as well as Gale’s own mother, Audrey Roberts (Sue Nichols). And also tried to kill neighbor Emily Bishop (Elaine Derbyshire). .

Gale, with a now-legendary line, referred to Richard as “Norman Bates with a briefcase,” a reference to the serial killer in the classic Alfred Hitchcock film Psycho.

She then ends the marriage, which leads Richard to kidnap her, her son David, Sarah and Bethany with the intention of killing them all.

More than 19 million viewers watched the story reach its climax when he dumped her and his family in a canal… only to take his own life.

The Christmas Eve episode ends with Gale meeting a certain ghost of Christmas past.

In 2004, angry at how Todd Grimshaw (Bruno Langley) was treating his daughter Sarah, Gail finds herself embroiled in a fight with her mother Elaine (Sue Cleaver) that spills over into the street.

After yelling at both Todd and Elaine, Gale forces the latter to slap her, before (hair pulling) all hell breaks loose.

When Elaine’s other son Jason (Ryan Thomas) arrives on the scene from work, still wearing a hard hat, Gale announces: “Here they are, the rest of the village!”

As the decades passed, the feud continued – but for an honorable truce – with each woman aiming to dig the other about their respective love lives.

It exploded again in 2015 when the pair argued over the affections of Gail’s fifth husband, Michael (Les Dennis).

Cleaver confirmed to the BBC that they “never pulled each other’s hair” or “punched or slapped each other” in real life and had in fact been good friends for many years.

“I think Helen’s departure will leave a huge hole,” she said. “We have finished filming and you can feel his absence.

“You got used to seeing her, that twinkly-eyed little lady who was just a ball of joy, she will be sorely missed.

“I mean, that character — he’s such an icon. He’s one of the last greats.”

Eileen wasn’t the only Weatherfield woman to face Gale’s wrath while defending her family.

In 2010, the tempestuous but loyal Gail had an aggressive food fight with Deirdre Barlow (Anne Kirkbride) after Deirdre kissed Gail’s mother, Audrey’s partner.

“Ken, do something!” Deidre said as she sprinkled the cake.

In 2010, Gail remarried, this time to Joe McIntyre (Rhys Dinsdale).

It wasn’t a very happy ending, though, as he decided he was going to fake his own death due to debts.

But he accidentally drowns on a boat trip, leading to his new wife being arrested for murder after witnesses say they saw the couple arguing (about his aforementioned plan). ).

In prison, troublemaker Tracy Barlow (Kate Ford) lies that her cellmate Gale has confessed to killing Joe.

Fortunately for one of Glee’s most despicable characters, Gale was found not guilty and released.

Gail also has problems with son David (Jack P. Shepherd), once accusing him of deliberately causing “fear and distress to everyone in the family.”

“We’ve had sleepless nights,” he added dramatically. “I’m taking pills, for God’s sake!”

As of 2016, David himself is a married man. However, it comes to a tragic end when his wife Kylie (Paula Lane) is stabbed to death, dying in David’s arms.

Gail’s motherly advice was to be honest with her children about what happened.

In a heartbreaking, tearful scene, she recalls the day she struggled to tell her eldest son Nick (now Ben Price) the truth about his father Brian being killed, and Stating that the boy was left scarred.

“That was just about the worst conversation of my life,” Gail told David with a slow laugh to break the tension. “And he had some competition.”

Price told the BBC that while his on-screen mother’s big stories were “great”, he would miss the “lovely things in between” with her the most.

“For me, it’s being welcomed at Platts. [house] In the morning, or having a cup of tea, or going, ‘Don’t worry mum’.

“Those moments, for me, were pure and gold.

“They make me smile.”

In 2018, Gale expressed the shock and grief of Weatherfield residents following the devastating incident. Suicide of factory boss Aidan Connor.

In an emotional monologue, it reflected the fact that you don’t really know what’s going on in each other’s lives, as footage is exchanged between different characters in the news.

It was originally supposed to be a silent sequence, but Author Jonathan Harvey told BBC News: “It felt like it needed the gravitas of one of our longest-running characters to comment on the community that, when the program started, was close, seeing each other and everyone’s business. Knew there were soaps.

“And yet? [she was saying]If you knew everyone’s business, you would have seen it coming.”

The powerful scene was nominated for BAFTA’s Must See Moment Award.

Speaking about Worth’s final scenes, Coronation Street executive producer Iain McLeod confirmed that she will not die. “It just didn’t seem right to kill him,” he told the Daily Star.

“Gail has had a difficult life. She had difficult and disastrous marriages as a child. So, we thought what viewers want is a happy ending for her, so that’s what we’re doing.”

Coronation Street is on Christmas Day on ITV from 19.00 GMT with an hour-long episode.

Additional reporting by Lizo Mzimba.