Max Turner is distracted from his new hair-sweeping job at the salon because he keeps messaging Lauren Bolton. He tells David Platt he’s worried about his ex-girlfriend, but David reckons she should be ‘as happy as Larry’ after getting off with a caution for trashing the salon. The everyday saying was first used towards the end of the 19th Century in reference to an undefeated Antipodean boxer called Laurence Foley. A newspaper article reported that the crowd shared his joy after a major victory, thereby coining the phrase.
Eliza Woodrow has a bone fracture in her arm after being hit by a car. She’s worried it might affect her guitar playing, but her grandfather Stu Carpenter reassures her that some of the greatest musicians have known pain and used it in their music. He could have added that some not-so-great musicians have also inflicted a fair deal of pain with their music. Meanwhile, Roy Cropper is holding a summit at his cafe with Tyrone Dobbs, Evelyn Plummer and Cassie Plummer in an attempt to resolve their familial differences. Roy tries to use the riddle of the fox, the chicken and the bag of grain (as famously used in the classic group-bonding episode of The Office) to navigate a path through the mess, but everyone just argues about who represents what in the riddle. Against the odds, they finally reach a compromise on who’s going to live where. ‘What about Count Spatula?’ asks Evelyn, disrespectfully referring to catering goth Nina Lucas. At least she didn’t call her Buffet The Vampire Slayer.
Courtney Vance tells Aadi Alahan that trying to avoid her husband Darren’s business dinner is like something out of a Jane Austen novel. It’s possible Dom Everett has also been boning up on his Austen – specifically her 1817 novel Persuasion – as he tries to talk Stu into giving him ten grand for staying out of his daughter Eliza’s life. At the salon, David shares his theory about men’s hair. He declares there are 12 categories of hair and every man has a spirit animal that corresponds to a category. He says his own coiffure is The Puma, Max’s hair is The Funky Gibbon (presumably a nod to the 1975 song by The Goodies), Ken Barlow’s age-defying mane is The Lion King and Kevin Webster’s barnet is The Angry Badger. Enter Roy, who David welcomes as ‘my favourite Silverback’. Fortunately, Roy is oblivious to the meaning.
Coronation Street episode 11055/11056. Originally aired 11th Sept 2023.
