Coronation Street has received a hefty amount of criticism from past and present stars of the show and now ITV boss John Whiston has defended the soap in a statement
A Coronation Street boss has defended the soap following recent criticism.
The ITV soap has come under fire from both fans and actors, while The Guardian claimed there was a “viewer fatigue” following an abundance of murders and crime plots in Weatherfield. ITV’s managing director of continuing drama John Whiston has now released a statement in response to the comments, saying the soap are still dealing with contemporary issues in an “engaging” way.
He said: “Coronation Street is, and always has been, a mixture of characters you love, earthy humour and stories that matter such as the current Liam bullying storyline or the Lauren grooming storyline.
“The show is proud to explore important contemporary issues such as these and our audience research shows that viewers really appreciate these stories and believe we deal with them in an engaging but responsible way. Which is why Coronation Street continues to be the most-watched soap on British TV.”
It comes after Bruce Jones, 71, slammed the soap’s writers for the amount of murders played out on screen. The actor, who played Les Battersby from 1997 until 2008, said: “I watched it from day one, but now my wife says it’s not worth watching.
“You can’t have that many murders on one street. It’s not the actors’ fault. They’re all doing a good job, but it’s the writers that have changed.”
The TV star-turned-wrestler continued: “I think we’ve lost that element of what Manchester life is all about. The writers we had were living Manchester city life.” Bruce added: “Get it back to what Coronation Street was… a community. The comedy was there and the tragedy came after.”
Maureen Lipman, who currently stars as Evelyn Plummer, also swiped at the show during an appearance on the Beyond the Title podcast. The 77-year-old said: “We’ve come to a point in Corrie now where people are getting murdered in knicker factories.
“We’re having domestic abuse… anything that ticks the box of social problems in the 21st-century is going to be in [it].”
Meanwhile Liz McDonald star Beverley Callard hit out at the soap back in 2022. The actress admitted on the How to be 60 podcast that she left the role of Liz after more than three decades because she felt “the scripts weren’t what they used to be”.
