Episode 10831/32 (25th December 2022)
The mood is right, the spirit’s up and Wonderful Christmastime by Paul McCartney soundtracks a Christmas Day morning montage on Coronation Street. Ding dong, ding dong. At the Platt household, Gail Rodwell’s festive tune of choice is of an older vintage as she sings The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting By An Open Fire). It’s possible to establish a tenuous link between Macca and Gail because Helen Worth, who plays the cobbles veteran, was married to actor Michael Angelis. Michael’s brother Paul Angelis provided the voice of McCartney’s fellow Beatle Ringo Starr in the 1968 animated Yellow Submarine film.
Bertie Osbourne seems to be coping pretty well without a Neutron Man. His dad Daniel ponders Bertie’s stoicism by quoting from Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s 1943 novella The Little Prince: ‘What is essential is invisible to the eyes.’ Also invisible to the eyes is Fiz Stape, who isn’t in the kitchen when Tyrone Dobbs walks in – singing Going To The Chapel Of Love by The Dixie Cups – with the intention of telling her about their surprise Christmas wedding. Fiz is driving to a turkey farm to buy Christmas dinner, but her car breaks down in the middle of nowhere as the radio is playing It’s The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year by Andy Williams.
Unaware of Stephen Reid’s penury, David Platt ladles on the sarcasm like gravy and labels his uncle Elon Musk after he gives him a cheap gift. David also goads Max Turner that he doesn’t imagine Griff Reynolds has much truck with Christmas, ‘with Jesus coming from the Middle East and being Jewish’, although he concedes Griff will be dreaming of a white Christmas.
As the guests wait for Fiz to turn up for her wedding, Ed Bailey explains that his wife Aggie is working at Weatherfield General and can’t make it. He says the hospital is like London’s legendary Windmill Theatre because it never closes (not because everyone is naked, as Evelyn Plummer suggests). Evelyn thinks a clandestine wedding was a bad idea, declaring it’s commensurate with Pearl Harbor when it comes to surprises. Speaking of surprises, Eileen Grimshaw is less than impressed when she learns that George Shuttleworth mistakenly bought her a dollhouse sofa instead of a full-size one. ‘Who do you think we are?’ she asks. ‘The flaming Borrowers?’
Back at the wedding, Fiz eventually walks down the aisle to the strains of You’re Still The One by Shania Twain. ‘Looks like we made it,’ indeed. After Daisy Midgeley announces her engagement to Daniel Osbourne on social media she gets a compliment from follower ThisCharmingMan, who has taken his name from the 1983 song by The Smiths.
George recounts a cautionary tale about a fellow undertaker who was cheering a Harry Kane goal for England at a funeral. And was the elderly man who helped Fiz get to the wedding really Father Christmas? He did wear a red coat, his name was Chris Pringle and he was whistling Here Comes Santa Claus, but that would be stretching credulity too far – although not as far as Fiz managing to find a telephone box that still worked.
Coronation Street episode 10831/32. Originally aired 25th Dec 2022.
