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“Your perm wasn’t that bad…”

Posted By Matthew Rudd On Sunday, March 25, 2007 @ 11:09 pm In blog | Comments Disabled

Tracy Barlow’s trial is about to start on Coronation Street and so, in final preparation for an event on which the soap is pinning so much hope, we got a rare beast for the Street tonight – a two-hander.

Deirdrie’s suspicions finally came to fruition when, amidst insults about loyalty and bad motherhood, Tracy spilled every bean from the tin. The truth will always out when the viewer already knows what it is – those who believe soap should reflect fairness more than reality dictate this rule – and so now the emphasis will be on Deirdrie to get Tracy off the hook for Charlie’s murder, rather than Clare, David or even Tracy herself.

It was one for the fans too – we got references to Tracy’s biological dad Ray, that memorable combination of perm and glasses (“Sexy Specs”) from Deirdrie’s heyday, and the unconvincing Ecstasy storyline which led to Tracy getting Samir’s kidney after the Moroccan monotony (“He could barely string a sentence together” – was that a dig at the acting or just the character?) got clubbed over the head (though not by Tracy, natch). All we needed were digs about baked beans, tape-playing and buggering off to Newcastle with just a teddy bear because you weren’t allowed to have a dog. I’m almost disappointed Tracy didn’t scold her mum for letting a truck drive into the Rovers Return frontage sometime in 1977 while she was near the front door in her pushchair.

Anyway, the acting was terrific (if rather loud; Heaven only knows how the supposedly sleeping Ken, Blanche, Amy, Adam and Peter didn’t overhear) and the idea paid off.

Two questions; was the almost idle (and truncated) reference to Deirdrie saying that Samir was the “only man she ever lov…” a little indication of where Tracy might take this with Ken if her mother fails to star in court? And when did Corrie last do a two-hander?

It was excellent. Now for the trial.


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