UPS AND DOWNS
It’s sort of an odd feeling of looking backwards through time, watching episodes that aired sometime ago, and coupled with the fact that the current crop of new weekly eps is about to begin, plus Inside Soap’s been provided kindly by sister-in-law, it gives me a chance - I think - to look at Brookside from a different perspective, to study it and ascertain what, in my opinion, is working and what is not.
For example, before my hols, I had included in ALL my summaries an overt warning whenever a sociological public service announcement was about to be included in a programme - this chiefly incorporated lectures aimed at the mentally deficient population of Liverpool (most of Brookside’s viewing audience, probably) regarding the evils of smoking tobacco - which according to Brookside is infinitely more dangerous than being addicted to either crack cocaine or heroin. It also included a poorly-acted and even worse-scripted rant about the state of the National Health Service.
Well, I was more than pleased to read the end bit of the latest Inside Soap. The last page is traditionally a conglomeration of editorial snippets regarding the state of play on certain soaps - usually the Editor’s opinion of what’s working and what’s not on Corrie or Eastenders.
Reading his latest contribution, I felt vindicated. Not only has he joined the chorus of disapproval currently prevalent on the Eastenders’ official forum about the painfully over-the-top overexposure of the Slater Family, or certain members thereof, but he also mentions Brookside.
That editor bemoaned the fact that Eastenders has effectively wasted the entire summer, concentrating on a storyline that was scotched by the ‘illness’ of the actress featured in the plot - I’m speaking of the incessant Zo-eee and Ant-urgh-knee storyline. Few people, as the editor pointe out, were interested and even fewer cared. As for the Slaters, he bewailed the fact that many long-serving Eastenders’ characters had been back-burnered practically into non-existence in order to feed the then-executive producer’s fetish with Jess Wallace, her amazing boots and her thickening lager-filled waistline. How many months has it been since we’ve seen any of the Evanses? He asks. Not since the departure of Nathan, he reckons. The rest have been relegated to the statuse of incidental.
My bet is that now that a woman is in charge of the thing, we’ll see less of the Slaters, except possibly little Mo, who’ll become a Mitchell anyway. And I wouldn’t be at all surprised if we don’t see Michelle Ryan anymore and that one wrong-footed move by La Wallace will see her consigned to the depths of the make-up department from whence she came.
And on the subject of Eastenders, I also read that Trevor is leaving and it’s not at his request. Alex Ferns was philosophical about Berridge deciding that his character had been developed as far as it was reasonable to take him - and I agree with her there. Apparently, his leaving is going to involve a gun. Let’s hope Kat kills him and gets life.
And rumour has it that Dan Sullivan is about to return and buy the E20. Not before bloody time. Apart from Steve Owen, he’s the ONLY nemesis worthy of squaring up against Phiw Mitchell.
And Brookside, well, the editor waxed lyrical in his complaint about Brookside becoming a platform for party political broadcasts concerning the evils of smoking, the National Health and the Royal Family. The public want to be entertained, not lectured, the editor complained. Too right. I feel vindicated.
Also on the subject of Brookside, I note a lot of people have been complaining about the fact that the Imelda storyline is due to run until February. Over-long, yes, but think about this. Remember the Saskia storyline on Eastenders? Well, Saskia was killed on 14 February. The storyline, effectively ended the following January with the departure of Matthew Rose. Almost a year. That was the same year Brookside ran the drug rape storyline of Nikki Shadwick.
Why is it we watched Eastenders endlessly that year and it garnered all the gongs? Why were we bored with Brookside? Well, Eastenders has a larger cast and better writers and actors. Those people know effectively how to ‘rest’ a storyline and how to tease the audience with that resting by focusing on other characters and storylines (that year saw the wonderfully scripted exits of Bianca and Grant); with Eastenders we got 52 weeks of Suzanne Collins screaming, crying and acting drunk. We turned off.
It’s the same now. The repercussions of the domestic violence storyline are still reverberating on Eastenders, but we’re also about to be entertained by Laura becoming a bunny-boiling woman desperate for a baby (my money’s on her for the hate mail), Tom Banks’s mental wife, and Lisa’s departure. On Brookside, which has been coincidentally extremely unlucky in screening Imelda’s death, with the parallel real-life events, there is nothing going on sufficiently interesting with which to divert the audience’s attention.
The shots of the washing turning around in the Rogers’ washing machine symbolically said it all about the state of Brookside at the moment.
However, on the up side of Brookside --- I’m becoming a fan of the hapless Sean, I’m enjoying the way that TPTB have FINALLY come round to the idea of the way Tim O’Leary should be presented, and I think Stephen Fletcher has come on leaps and bounds as Plank. Of course, he’ll never amount to anything more than a hack on a soap, but he’s a decent hack at that.
Why not get rid of Jimmy?
Yet another day in paradise dawns on the Close, as Jimmy Corkhill steps onto his doorstep to retrieve his pintas left by the milkman. Standing up, he glances across the Close and sees Ray Hilton putting the wheelie bin into position for the dustman. Ray, seeing Jimmy, hunches his shoulders, ducks his head and turns back inside Number 7.
Next door at Sitcom House, Dire fusses over a clearly unwell Brigid.
The screaming tweenie ‘Tim is gr8 ‘n fit’ brigade are tempted by Philip Olivier bouncing down the stairs into the lounge-kitchen area of Hotel Corkhill, where Emily stands at an ironing board in the kitchen. Tim’s a man with a mission and in a hurry. He impatiently asks Emily if he has any clean teeshirts, as he’s parading his torso about like a contestant in Mr Gay U K.
Emily patiently replies that she’s just ironing him a shirt. On the dividing counter are a pile of ironed and neatly folded clothes. Tim’s in a hurry, he explains to Jimmy and Emily. Plank Muddie’s been giving him the slip for the past couple of days and he wants to have a word with Plank before Plank leaves for work.
Glancing out the window, Jimmy tells Tim that he’d best hurry, because Plank is just leaving now. Plank is up to something, reckons Tim, as he hastily grabs a teeshirt from the top of the freshly-ironed pile and dashes out of the house and onto the driveway just as Plank’s X-reg (and when did he upgrade that?), van scoots off the Close.
As he runs from the house, Emily calls out to him.
He’s off, says Jimmy.
But he’ll be back, reckons Emily, confidently. The teeshirt he grabbed, she says, is one of hers.
Tim stands for a moment, bare-chested and bare-footed in the Corkhill drive, before swiftly jumping into his van and driving off after Plank.
Next door at Sitcom House, Dire and Marty Muddie stand in the sitcom kitchen, whilst Brigid, wearing a boa-feathered dressing gown and clutching her handbag, sits bolt upright on the sitcom sofa, looking pale and sickly.
Dire is dressed and ready for work. She whispers conspiratorily to Marty that she’ll be back to check on Brigid at dinnertime, and also to have a chat with Marty about Jan.
Marty glances at her, with a cold glint in his eye. (Neil Caple is so absolutely wonderful - a sheer professional, amongst a load of abject shite). There’s nothing TO discuss, he snaps.
Dire starts to say something, but she’s interrupted by Brigid’s voice booming imperiously from the lounge:
‘You’re not leaving this house, Diane McKenna!’ She scolds. ‘You know very well tonight’s a school night!’
Dire and Marty both rush into the lounge, Dire wondering aloud if she should even attempt to go into work. Marty reaches for Brigid’s arm, offering to help her back to her room, but Brigid pulls frantically away from him, clutching her bag to her chest, and allowing herself to be led from the room by Dire.
Stopped at a traffic light, Tim reaches beside him on the front seat of the van and pulls the teeshirt over his head. Once he’s got it on, however, he sees it’s one of Emily’s shortened variety - the Britney Spears sort only meant to barely cover the boobs, and emblazoned across the boob area with the words ‘Hot Babe’ in shocking pink. Tim gazes down at the logo with dismay and turns slightly green.
Pa Gordon must have the day off from organising lorryloads and lying to customers and brokers, because he’s planted like a giant spruce in the front garden of Bicker-Bicker House, gardening gloves on his giant mitts. Ma comes outside, dressed and ready for work. Pa asks her, with more than a hint of sarcasm in his voice, if Rabbity Ruth’s managed to surface from her hutch this morning.
Yes, mutters Ma, and she’s in a foul mood.
Pa shrugs off the remark. It’s not THEIR fault that the hapless Sean’s decided to change the locks on HIS home.
Oooh, whines Ma, twirling her snarly, poor white hair, the house is still half Ruth’s.
Hmph! Snorts Pa, derisively. SHE walks away from a marriage, commits adultery and thinks SHE’S the victimised one! (Three cheers for Pa Gordon and his good, sound Sarf London common sense! OK, he’s really from Ipswich, but then so’s Bob Hoskins).
Ma, however, continues to make clucking noises of sympathy. Ma has no morals, and she’s raised her children accordingly. Ma starts to leave, but suddenly Ray marches up to Pa, holding two traffic cones. He peremptorily asks Pa if he happens to know what these two objects are.
‘Student drinking hats?’ Pa sneers. Standing behind Ray, Ma starts to motion to Pa frantically that these were the cones that were stolen from the forecourt of the garage. Ray, noticing something out of the corner of his eye, turns to look at her, but she swiftly stops motioning and blows Pa a kiss before skulking away in true poor white fashion.
‘These are cones,’ huffs Ray, ‘intended to restrict illegal parking, which I’ve appropriated for that purpose.’
‘Wha’ abou’ yeller loins?’ Pa asks, derisively. ‘Doan vey work as wew? Or do you pay mo’ road tax van us?’
‘They’ve been appropriated, ‘ Ray explains, gradually turning into Norris Cole, ‘for the purpose of deterring your family and their fleet of vehicles from barricading the residents of this Close in their driveways.’
He turns briefly, as if to go, then adds that Pa is to tell his lads to leave other residents’ property alone and to get his family to park elsewhere. And another thing, Ray says, noticing Pa’s short ladder propped against the side of the house, that ladder’s too short for gutter work! And he departs in a huff, leaving Pa speechless. (So not only are the Gordons proving unpopular with the viewers, they are also unpopular with the characters in the soap, itself. Can they be axed, please? Let Bing and Molly move onto the Close.)
As Ray’s been talking to Pa, we see Bev and Josh enter the Close in the background and ring the doorbell at Number 8. Jacqui answers and Bev asks her if Mike’s about (although Mike now lives next door at Number 7).
Jacqui answers that Mike and Rachel are at the hospital visiting Ron. Bev remarks that Mike had promised to babysit Josh that morning, as Josh wails that his cast is itching again.
Jacqui invites them to come in and wait for Mike, as she’s got baby Beth at the moment.
Tim, wearing his ‘Hot Babe’ teeshirt follows Plank’s van through the Liverpool traffic.
Emily opens the door of Hotel Corkhill to admit Ray, who’s arrived with his plumber’s kit. Nikki mentioned before leaving, he said, that there was trouble with the Hotel Corkhill kitchen sink, and by the way, is Helen here?
No, Emily replies, and the sink seems better now.
Still, Ray continues, pushing past her into the kitchen, no harm in having a look.
Emily asks him what time Jessie was due back from her holiday today; Ray tells her Jessie’s due back at half one. He was going to pick her up, but her mate Rita offered to give her a lift back to the Close.
Emily says good-bye to Ray and leaves, just as the Sage emerges from his lair in the extension, eyeing Ray warily.
Ray immediately starts to stammer nervously, explaining to Jimmy that he’s only come around to have a look at the kitchen pipes.
This doesn’t fool Jimmy, who accuses Ray of hoping to bump into Sylvia Morgan. He knows from Ray’s panic the day before that there was some big secret he was trying to hide from Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen.
The kitchen table in Chateau Farnham Deux, is overflowing with children - Harry, Emma and Beth. Bev and Josh are ensconced on a sofa nearby, as Jacqui busies herself in the kitchen. Max is booted and suited and trying to leave for work. He’s indignant that Jacqui’s been put upon by Rachel to mind Beth this morning.
That’s bloody typical, he moans. Rachel’s paid to mind their kids and they end up looking after Beth.
It’s only whilst Mike and Rachel visit Ron at the hospital, Jacqui tells him, calmly. Max pours a glass of orange juice and takes a gulp. Immediately he tastes it, he makes a sour face. That’s awful! He exclaims. What kind of stuff is this? He looks at the name on the carton and frowns as Jacqui looks too.
Soddy, she apologises lamely. Rachel must have got the wrong kind ... Again.
More ‘two for the price of one’ cheapies, Max mutters, as Bev pokes her head into the kitchen and asks Jacqui if she has a knitting needle or something similar so Josh can scratch his cast.
Jacqui jokes by asking her what a knitting needle is, but then laughs and says that she thinks that they have some chopsticks that might do the trick.
As Jacqui turns to search out the chopsticks, Max follows on her heels, talking up the virtues of hiring a full-time nanny. Jacqui sighs. It’s not Rachel’s fault that Ron’s in the hospital, she reminds him. Besides, Rachel’s good with the kids.
Too good, mutters Max. When they’re with Rachel, they get too many sweets and too much TV. And now it looks as though they were about to be saddled with Josh for the day.
Only until Mike returns from hospital, Jacqui says evenly.
Max reminds her that Harry will be four in September, and next year he’d be starting school. Kids the age of Harry and Emma were already being exposed to computers and learning games. They didn’t want Harry to end up in the slow stream at school. A regular nanny would see that he didn’t fall behind.
But, Jacqui protests, Rachel IS the children’s auntie. She’d be much happier with Rachel watching the children, instead of some stranger.
But the right nanny becomes a part of the family, argues Max, obviously forgetting about the fiasco of Nanny Anna and the fact that he and Patricia were worried about Thomas obtaining a Mancunian accent from Margaret.
Jacqui holds out. She’ll just have to have a word with Rachel about being stricter with the kids, she says. Anyway, once the Health Centre creche is up and running, they’d have even more options.
As she follows Max into the dining area, where the kids are noisily eating breakfast, Bev rises and excuses herself, but she’s due at work. Could she just leave Josh here until Mike arrives?
Jacqui obliges.
Why open a creche, Max quips, when they seem to be running one here?
Tim stops as Plank parks his van briefly. Tim watches closely, but Plank returns to the van and is off again.
Ray’s nervously finished the plumbing job at Hotel Corkhill, watched all the time by the suspicious Sage.
‘Yer shoulda seen the waste in them pipes,’ he witters to Jimmy. Ray had to remove all that waste, himself.
Jimmy growls that Ray needn’t think he’s about to hang around Hotel Corkhill on the offchance of seeing Sylvia Morgan.
Ray stops and starts rubbing the back of his head. He wants Jimmy to know that he’s not proud of the way things worked out with Helen.
The last thing the Sage wants, says the venerable Sage, is for Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen to be hurt. He doesn’t want either Ray or Sylvia Morgan to spoil Helen’s life anymore. (Er, sorry, but the only thing that MIGHT spoil Helen’s life is her association with Jimmy, which was how she got mixed up with Sylvia in the first place).
The doorbell rings, and Ray, on his way out, answers it. He’s faced with Sylvia Morgan on the doorstep. She doesn’t recognise him at first.
Ray shouts a greeting. ‘Sylvia! You haven’t changed a bit!’
Sylvia peers at him for a moment. ‘Ray Hilton, is it?’ She says at last. ‘You have!’
As Sylvia enters the house, glaring accusingly at Ray, Jimmy remarks sarcastically that the two of them seem to have a lot to catch up on.
Moving to sit down on the Corkhill sofa, Ray blandly states that he’s thought about Sylvia a lot.
‘A guilty conscience, I suppose,’ drawls Sylvia, laconically. ‘I gather you’ve spoken to Helen and left out the important bits.’
‘Look,’ interjects the omnipresent Sage, ‘what is it with you two? Whatever it is, yer’d better get it sorrrrrted before H arrives!’
Ray hunkers back in his chair. ‘It’s best not ter bring oop the past,’ he mutters.
‘Best for WHOM?’ Asks Sylvia pointedly.
Tim is parked at another red light, sitting behind the wheel wearing his ‘Hot Babe’ tee, when an obviously gay, blonde bloke, who looks oddly like Tom Parker Bowles strolls past. He spots Tim sitting in the van with the tee and doubles back to take another look, making eyes at Tim. (Another gay allusion to Tim).
Tim glares back and tells the bloke to ‘do one’.
Suddenly, he spies Plank’s van ahead, and as the light changes, he speeds off.
Jessie, arriving back onto the Close, opens the door to Number 7 and calls out for Ray. Emily is returning home at this moment, and dashes into the house, hugging her grandmother. Jessie comments on how much she missed the girls, but says that she managed to see something of the real Spain (in Tenerife?). Where’s Ray? She asks.
Oh, Emily says uneasily, the last she saw Ray, he was fixing the kitchen sink in Hotel Corkhill. Er, soomthink she had ter tell her Nan too ... That Helen one’s real moom, that Sylvia Morgan, she’s showed oop.
Oh? Replies Jess, feigning indifference. And has Ray seen her?
He may have by now, says Emily, as Sylvia’s car has mysteriously re-appeared.
Christy Muddie is allowed entrance to Sitcom House, by a surreptitious Dire. What’s with the mystery phone call? He asks her, as she motions him to silence.
Well, Dire hisses, as Christy knows everything, she wants to know what he knows about Marty’s police record, for the time he hit Jan.
Marty hit Jan? Asks Christy, genuinely surprised. That’s the first he’s heard of that!
Dire can’t believe it. Christy knows absolutely everything.
Marty’s heard coming down the stairs and Dire whispers frantically to Christy to see if he can get Marty to talk about it. She’s wuddied about this past revelation and the increasing interest the bizzies are taking in Marty in relation to Imelda’s disappearance. In the meantime, she’d see about fixing them some tea and dinner.
Marty enters the lounge and glares at Christy accusingly.
Across the Close, Pa Gordon stands in the front garden of Bicker-Bicker House, arms akimbo, feet apart and back to the pavement, surveying the guttering on his abode in the manner of Colossus astraddle the earth. As he measures his inadequate ladder against the height of the guttering, a voice, sounding oddly like that of the dear, departed Flint Moffatt squeaks behind him:
‘Yer’ll need a bigger ladder fer them gootters.’
Turning, Pa sees the hapless, hunch-shouldered Sean, standing humbly behind him.
Pa grunts. ‘You’re takin’ yo’ loife in yor’ands comin’ round hyeah, ent’ya, boy?’ He asks, all pretence to manner of Scousism now forgotten as this actor consciously auditions for Eastenders, in hopes that Louise Berridge might be watching the show.
The hapless Sean shrugs dejectedly. Pa continues. ‘Roof’s well wound up abaht you changin’ them locks.’
Well, what did Pa expect? Cries the hapless Sean. There was no way Sean was having that ‘beaut’ live in his house. (Hmm ... That could apply to Dan the Man was well as Rabbity Ruth, n’est-ce pas?)
Pa Gordon warns the hapless Sean that, as a result of him changing the locks, Rabbity Ruth was not prepared to allow him to see Luke the bunny. Hmph! Pa snorts. In his opinion, there was no difference in the hapless Sean and Rabbity Ruth. One was as bad as the other.
Please, the hapless Sean begs, trading more on his Gareth Gates appeal rather than the Sid Vicious side of him. Couldn’t Pa Gordon do anything to help him?
Pa thinks, in true Sarf London style. ‘Wew,’ he begins, ‘vat depends.’
On what? Sean wants to know.
‘On you no’windin’ Roof up,’ Pa decrees, and then adds with a twinkle that would warm the cockles of his East End granny’s heart, ‘and on you lendin’ me one o’your big ladders.’
The hapless Sean gormlessly smiles and toddles off to get a ladder from his van, as Pa Gordon murmurs: ‘Good lad!’
(Er, anyone have any inkling of an idea as to what the hapless Sean does for a living? A window-cleaner, perhaps?)
Meanwhile back at the Muddies, Marty tries to put on a hard face for Christy. Attempting to walk past him into the sitcom kitchen, after hearing Dire’s last remark, Marty asks Christy sarcastically why he always seems to skulk around on the promise of some scram?
Christy answers the question with another question. Has Marty heard anymore from the bizzies?
Marty flops wearily onto the sitcom sofa next to Christy. They want him in for another interview, he sighs.
Christy tells him not to wuddy, but Marty tells Christy that he thinks the bizzies are onto something.
AND THEN THE PIECE DE RESISTANCE ...
‘Oh, aye,’ Christy gives an ironic nod, ‘the CARETAKER KILLER!’
(THIS IS FROM THE EPISODE BROADCAST ON THE 16TH AUGUST. FROM WHAT I KNOW, LESS THAN FIVE HOURS LATER, IAN HUNTLEY WAS ARRESTED FOR THE MURDER OF HOLLY WELLS AND JESSICA CHAPMAN. OK, I KNOW BROOKSIDE WASN’T PARTY TO ANY POLICE INFORMATION REGARDING THAT INVESTIGATION, BUT THEY COULD, THE NEXT WEEK, HAVE OFFERED A CODICIL APOLOGY FOR THE CIRCUMSTANCES. THERE HAVE BEEN TWO MAJOR FAUX PAS COMMITTED BY THE BROOKSIDE WRITERS THIS YEAR, AND BOTH WERE RATHER TACKY AND TACTLESS - THE FIRST CONCERNED DIPPY NIKKI SHADWICK LIKENING HERSELF TO THOSE POOR SOULS WHO THREW THEMSELVES OFF THE WTC LAST SEPTEMBER WHEN SHE LOST HER JOB AT THE BAR, AND THIS IS ULTIMATELY THE SECOND. HOW BROOKSIDE CAN CONTINUE WITH THIS STORYLINE IS BEYOND ME. IT’S COLD, HEARTLESS AND CHEAP TO DO SO.)
Marty warns Christy that the situation appears to be getting serious. Christy argues that Marty has nothing to worry about.
Maybe, Marty concedes, doubtfully, but the bizziese have been trawling over things that happened at the old house, things between him and Jan, things from the time when he and Jan were having their problems. In fact, Christy says, there was one occasion when he hit Jan.
Come on, exclaims Christy in disbelief, beating women was never Marty’s style.
That’s not what the police think, quips Marty. They’re trying to build a profile of him as the potential killer of Imelda.
Christy dismisses everything Marty’s said. Marty’s paranoid, he maintains. Oh, Christy knew Jan had form and all, but -
‘Will yer stop tryin’ ter reassure me?’ Marty shouts. ‘I’m in deep trooble here, Christy!’
Tim has followed Plank’s van to a big house in an expensive neighbourhood. He’s still barefoot as he parks his van, still wearing the ‘Hot Babe’ teeshirt. Parking a safe distance away, he watches as Plank looks surreptitiously to the left and right, then scurries up a long driveway. Tim catches a glimpse of a feminine arm opening a door from within and Steve scuttles inside.
‘Aye-aye,’ Tim laughs to himself, ‘soombody’s gettin’ a good serrr-vicin’.’
At Hotel Corkhill, the diplomatic Sage, who also has negotiation skills of the highest degree, is refereeing the impasse that has occurred between Ray and Sylvia Morgan, who still sit, uncomfortably facing each other, in the Corkhill lounge.
Jimmy tells them that he knows that they’re holding back soomthink that Helen should know about. Poor Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen has had the truth kept from her for too long - which probably accounts for her flatulence. Helen de-SERRRVES ter know what really happened! Jimmy bullies. (Well, yer see, Jim, it was like this. Me wife, Reenie, was a cold fish and I was really horny. Sylvia was oop fer it, and it didn’t matter none that I was a maddied man, like, so we shagged, and the rest is history- er, Helen. And she gets her flatulence from me, mind. Never could stand a spicy cuddy).
This is Ray’s an dSylvia’s one chance ter let Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen know the truth!
Ray protests that he’s told Helen the truth.
‘With one small oversight!’ Snorts Sylvia.
‘I was a maddied man!’ Ray protests vehemently, rising slightly from his chair.
‘And I was a single woman who had to go it alone!’ Cries Sylvia. ‘And I wanted my baby to live!’
There’s a deep, albeit momentary silence for a few long seconds, before Jimmy comprehends, in true Sage fashion, the meaning behind Sylvia’s words. He looks at a shame-faced Ray in horror. ‘You wanted her ter have an aBORRRRtion!’ He exclaims. (So? Jimmy killed Tony Dixon and Frank Rogers whilst under the influence of drooks, AND he sold bad smack to Shane the Aussie, which resulted in his death. Who’s the bigger sinner, Jimmy? My money’s on you!)
As Jessie unpacks in the lounge of Number 7 (where else?), Emily examines the modest top her grandmother has brought her as a souvenir of Tenerife. That’ll cost dooble what Jess paid for it in one o’them designer shops! She points out to Emily. Emily thanks her Nan and tells her that they’ve received a post card from Nikki from Prague.
Oh, I kno-ow, oozes Jess, trying to do an impersonation of Sybil Fawlty. Nikki sounded joost SO excited when she managed to call Jess at her hotel in Tenerife. (Sounds as though the ever-increasingly dippy Nikki is spending all her dosh in phoning various and sundry people the world over.) Then Emily asks her grandmother if she wants Em to nip across the Close and tell Ray that his wife had returned.
Jess hesitates a moment, then confidentially tells Emily that she’d best not do that. Ray would return in his own good time, she assures the girl.
‘Boot, aren’t yer jealoos?’ Emily asks her grandmother. ‘If Tim was across the way with one o’his exes, I know I would be.’
But Sylvia Morgan is more than just an old girlfriend, Jessie reminds Emily, knowingly widening her eyes. They have Helen, remember? Still, Jess muses, Ray must have thought an awful lot of Sylvia. People didn’t have affairs off the cuff in those days, not like now, she adds. Ray risked a lot in that affair.
That doesn’t sound like the Ray Hilton Emily knows, Em says.
‘It was a totally different Ray Hilton then,’ Jess mutters, grimly, as the green-eyed monster rears its ugly head.
Inside the cauldron that is Hotel Corkhill, Ray is reduced to begging the omnipotent Sage, the Lord God Almighty of Brookside Close, not to tell Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen of the dreaded secret that her natural father wanted her aborted (although looking at this tub of lard forty years later, he’d be instantly forgiven for wanting that in the first place).
The Sage, however, stands firm and tall. Jutting his Hapsburgian chin out truculently and folding his arms, he stoutly maintains: NO MORE SECRETS! (Really, is this any of Jimmy’s business? Why don’t these people just tell him to but out in a big way? Memo to self: Ask this question on the Official Forum and wait for an asinine, smartarse remark from that idiotic coxyboro, another specimen who should have been drowned at birth).
‘No, indeed,’ Sylvia forcefully agrees with the Sage. ‘No more secrets. After all, Helen believes that I abandoned her and SHE blames ME. I made the decision to give her away, true, but that was for the best. Why don’t YOU tell her that YOU wanted the baby aborted?’
Poor Ray winces as though someone has struck a blow to his heart.
Jimmy then immediately rounds on Sylvia, ticking her off for trying to assuage her own ego (which is every bit as big as that of Jimmy’s). He simply won’t have Helen hurt anymore.
Good old Sylvia’s more than a match for the intellectually pretentious Sage, and she fires a volley right back at him. Christ, the Confederacy would have won the War with this woman!
‘Why not?’ She snaps. ‘After all, it was Helen who brought the whole sordid affair up in the first place!’
Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen only wanted ter know who her REAAAAAAL padents were! The Sage maintains, somewhat simplistically.
But how would it look now if Helen were to find out she was unwanted? Ray stutters. Idiot! I would have thought that she had already ascertained that the moment she found out she was adopted. But she should have thought, although she was unwanted by someone, another couple wanted her desperately. But she didn’t think that, did she? Why? Because she’s too self-centred and ignorant.
Sylvia taunts Ray, accusing him of being afraid to tell Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen the truth because it would make him look bad.
Ray protests. He only wants Helen to forgive him for what he did. (Er, isn’t it the Sage’s domain to dispense forgiveness?)
Oh, so Ray wants Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen to hate Sylvia, then, does he? Rounds Sylvia, spitefully.
‘No, n-n-no!’ Protests Ray. ‘Why, I told Helen everything about you, how you didn’t have a choice-’
‘But I DID have a choice!’ Replies Sylvia, smugly.
The doorbell rings suddenly. Without even looking out the window, the omniscient Sage just KNOWS that it’s Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen ... Or maybe he smelled her farts as she wafted up the drive.
As the Sage drifts toward the foyer to answer the door, he turns briefly and - in the manner of a severe schoolmaster - warns the recalcitrant Ray and Sylvia not to hurt Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen.
As he answers the door, Ray mumbles to Sylvia that he sincerely wishes things could have worked out differently for them.
‘So did I,’ Sylvia rejoinders. ‘Once.’
Happy Smiling Helen bounces into the room, causing the floor to quake under the weight of her fat arse. She’s wearing another tight top which shows how much lager and curry she’s been drinking of late. The buttons are nearly popping. She stands for a moment, smiling and bobbing her head annoyingly. It’s a wonder she doesn’t give Sylvia Morgan a headache - or maybe she does.
Well, she begins, attempting to be bright and breezy (not good for someone with flatulence), she’d often imagined how this scene would be - the three of them all there together.
Ray’s woebegone face betrays the fact that something is amiss. Sylvia begins by apologising that everything had gotten off to such a bad start between them all.
Condescending to notice the serious gobs on all in the room, Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen’s smile fades into that particularly sullen, spoilt brat look she’s begun to wear when she doesn’t get her way. Hmph! It’s not exactly the happiest of family reunions, is it? She mutters.
Sylvia’s all Hattie-Jacques- ship-shape-and-Bristol-fashion. ‘Well, what did you expect?’ She huffs. ‘Hugs all around?’ (Great line, that! Puts the fat bitch in her place!)
Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen’s lower lip quivers slightly and she pokes it out and mumbles that all she wanted was to know who her parents were.
Sylvia, quite rightly, isn’t taking any of this guilt-trip nonsense. ‘But you KNOW who your parents were,’ she urges her, forcefully. ‘They were the people who brought you up. It’s got nothing whatsoever to do with Ray or me.’ (And this is exactly what Tim said. Good, common sense - but of course low-lifes and scum of the earth like Helen and Jimmy wouldn’t see it that way, would they?) ‘There was absolutely no reason on earth for you to look for us,’ Sylvia concludes.
‘I’m glad she came looking fer me,’ Ray pipes up.
‘Only for your own sake,’ Sylvia quips, over her shoulder, ‘so you could hide your guilt. At least I’m being honest with the woman. You should try it.’
Being honest? Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen winces puzzlingly. About what? What is this secret they’re keeping from her?
Before anyone can open their mouths, the eminent Sage takes it upon himself to inform Helen that when Sylvia Morgan was pregnant with her, Ray panicked and wanted Sylvia to have an abortion.
Helen cuts a loud and redolent fart.
Tim sits in the van parked along the side of the posh street where Plank appears to be entertaining a resident. As Tim sits there, an elderly woman walking a small dog approaches from the opposite side of the street. She stops and stares suspiciously at Tim, who - after a bit - becomes aware of the woman’s stare. He turns and matches her stare for a moment before simply saying, ‘Well?’
The woman, intimidated, scurries off.
Back at Hotel Corkhill, confronted with the terrible secret surrounding her conception and birth, Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen wails that no one wanted her and no one wanted her to live.
That’s hardly fair, the Sage suddenly argues.
Unfair? Cries Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen. Unfair? It’s unfair to be lied to all one’s life, she says. It’s unfair to let her find out like this! (Er, sorry, but didn’t Helen initially open this can of worms?) Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen says spitefully that EVERYONE thinks they know what’s best for her, but they don’t! Well, she’s had enough of them - all of them!
She lets one loud fart and barrels from the room, the house shaking in her wake.
As Tim continues his stake-out, he suddenly sees Plank, looking sexually satiated, leave the big house with a smile on his face , whilst putting on his jacket. Tim smiles wickedly and darts from the cab of the van, padding barefoot down the street.
He quietly approaches Plank from behind and pokes a finger in his back, growling ominously: ‘What are yez doin’ shaftin’ me wife?’
Plank jumps about a foot in the air and turns to face a laughing Tim. He’s not amused, until he sees that Tim is barefoot and still wearing a midriff-baring woman’s teeshirt emblazoned with ‘Hot Babe’ in pink letters.
‘The state o’yez!’ He exclaims to Tim. Plank maintains that he is out on a job.
Yeah, sure, says Tim, and he can imagine just what sort of job too. And speaking of jobs, Tim’s got a nice little earner laid on for the pair of them - a bank job.
Plank tries to push past Tim to his van. He doesn’t want to know, he says.
Well, maybe Tim needs to do a bit of customer survey in this area, Tim jokes.
OK, OK, Plank says.But hurry up, because he has another job in Childwall.
‘Yer insatiable,’ Tim says, shaking his head in wonder.
‘Fixin’ soomone’s spark ploogs,’ says Plank defensively.
Glancing right and left, Tim lowers his voice and demands that Plank loan him the use of his jacket.
Plank obliges, laughing, and tells Tim that the teeshirt suits him, blowing him an air kiss.
The Sage dashes out of Hotel Corkhill in the wake of Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen’s departing fat arse. He calls out to her, and catches up with her on the pavement outside. She can’t face this anymore, Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen cries out.
Well, what did she expect when she went about tracing these people? She continues in exasperation.Some fairytale ending?
Jimmy pleads with her, suddenly feeling insecure. They’ve got the rest of their lives together, he says, desperately. He doesn’t want any future they have spoiled because of this.
As he’s speaking, Ray and Sylvia scurry quickly from the house. Jimmy notices them out of the corner of his eye and turning, shouts at the couple to sling their hook. Sylvia approaches Jimmy tentatively. She says she’s sorry for all this. Ray chips in to say that Helen deserves better that this.
‘She deserves better than US,’ remarks Sylvia pointedly.
Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen weeps that it’s too late for ‘sorries’, as Jess plods grimly across the Close in the direction of Ray. She greets him, wanting to know why he wasn’t on hand at home when she arrived from Spain.
Ray admits that he forgot Jess was due to arrive, then he suddenly remembers his manners and introduces her to Sylvia. Jess greets her coldly, as Sylvia excuses herself and says good-bye. As she leaves, Jessie bluntly suggests that Ray come home.
Happy Smiling Fatarsed Fartarsed Helen is crying. She tells Jimmy that she needs to be by herself for a bit. She promises lamely that she’ll call him. She bounces off, blubbing, as Jimmy cries after her, pleading for her not to take this out on him. (As per usual, Jimmy always thinks about nothing but Jimmy).
Dire comes into the sitcom lounge from upstairs. She tells Marty and Christy that Brigid’s temperature is up and that her mother is disoriented. Christy offers to call an ambulance. Dire demurs. She’ll call that NHS Direct number again, she says. What does Marty think?
Marty thinks a lot of things, but Brigid is low on his priority list at the moment. He’s clearly distracted and Dire shouts at him to demand what he thinks again.
Right, he says, jolted from his reverie of worry. He’ll get that NHS Direct number for Dire.
As he marches off, Dire asks Christy what’s wrong with Marty (as if the dumb bint didn’t know - geesh, what a script!).
Christy unconvincingly says nothing is wrong with Marty.
As Pa Gordon and the hapless Sean chat whilst they finish with the guttering. Pa Gordon tells the hapless Sean that all this bickering between him and Rabbity Ruth is bad for Luke the bunny.
The kid not seeing his dad is bad for Luke, the hapless Sean says. What kind of effect will that have on him, eh?
Pa agrees with him, but the hapless Sean’s current antics, such as changing the locks on the house, isn’t helping his cause.
Well, what does everyone expect him ter do? Wails the hapless Sean. Sit back and watch Luke with his new dad? Watch while Rabbity Ruth shacks up with this flake who could take off at anytime?
Pa Gordon hesitates a moment. ‘Roof seems,’ he begins, querulously, ‘CLOSE to Dan.’
‘Now maybe,’ observes Sean, who’s clearly smarter that he looks, ‘boot Dan’ll get bored and leave, and that’ll be anoother disrooption fer Luke. It’s not right, and you know it!’
If the hapless Sean divorces Rabbity Ruth, he can’t expect to dictate Rabbity Ruth’s life, Pa warns the hapless Sean.
Sean points out that he can still have a say in his son’s life.
At that moment, Ma Gordon arrives back on the Close, just as the hapless Sean packs his ladder in his van and leaves.
What was he doing here? She asks Pa, indignantly.
Pa sighs wearily, as do most of the men resident on Brookside Close and The Parade. Sean was here, he tells her, to see his son; and Pa can’t say that he blames him.
Well, whines Ma, she blames him and so does Rabbity Ruth. In fact, Ma thinks Rabbity Ruth shouldn’t have to put up with that sort of abuse.
Well, Pa finalises, he disagrees ... Because no matter what Rabbity Ruth has to say about her NEW life, the hapless Sean still has a right to see his son.
Josh lies, bored, on the Farnham sofa, his broken leg extended into the air, whilst he scratches it furiously with chopsticks. Max enters his house and glances curiously at Josh, before entering the kitchen to greet his wife. Jacqui kisses Max and tells him that Mike says that Ron is doing well, but that he looked awful.
Max is more concerned with wanting to know what Josh is doing still here.
Well, Jacqui whispers, Mike couldn’t take Josh to the hospital this afternoon, so Jacqui told him that Josh could stay until Bev came for him. She’s due any moment.
‘Why open a creche,’ Max moans again, ‘when we’ve already got one here?’
Christy approaches Marty clandestinely and asks him what’s going on with this police business? Marty hisses back that he can’t explain right now.
Dire clocks the the whispering and demands to know what’s going on, but Marty lies and tells her that nothing’s going on.
Suddenly Brigid appears in the lounge wearing her dressing gown and nightgown under her overcoat and carrying her bag. Dire had better get her coat, she advises her daughter, or else she wouldn’t feel the benefit.
Dire tries to get Brigid to return upstairs, but Brigid protests that she thought they were all going out. Then as soon as she’s said this, she faints. Dire screams to Marty to call an ambulance; Brigid might be having a stroke or something.
Bev arrives at the Farnhams’ to collect Josh. She thanks Jacqui profusely for allowing Josh to stay for the afternoon.
As Max grimaces in the background, Jacqui explains that it was the least she could do, as Rachel hadn’t got back from the park yet.
Josh whines that he wants his cast off, and Bev urges him to return the chopsticks to Auntie Jacqui and Uncle Max. Max hastily tells Josh to keep the chopsticks.
‘Awwww,’ coos Bev, ‘say "thank you" to Uncle Max.’ They leave, Bev telling Jacqui that she’ll see her later at work.
When they’ve left, Max asks Jacqui if she’s managed to speak to Rachel, but Jacqui says she hasn’t as Rachel was off out to the park.
Then Max will speak to Rachel tomorrow, he promises. Max implores Jacqui to listen to him. Harry is nearly four years old. Children his age normally get structured play and are being introduced to computers. The Farnham kids get endless television and the benefit of Rachel’s intellect, he practically spits the last word. (Proof positive that the Brookside writers read these summaries, the Soapbox and Brooksider).
Jacqui laughingly tells Max not to be nasty, but Max continues his reasoning. When Harry starts school, Max says, he doesn’t want their son to be behind the rest of the kids. Now it’s nice for the children to be looked after by their ‘Ant-eh’, he says, mimicking Rachel’s Mancunian accent, but they need stimulation, not pacifying.
The ambulance arrives and the men lift Brigid, still wearing her overcoat, onto the gurney. Marty gazes down at her and gently assures her that the hospital will sort Brigid out. Dire just wants to know what’s wrong with her mother.
Tim and Plank have met up again later on, and Tim has led him to a vast derelict area near the docs, as the Royal Liver building can be seen in the background. They walk along the area, Tim asking Plank about his servicing the rich woman’s engines. Tim jibes Plank about being the ‘mechanic of luurrve’.
Plank just wants to know what this big job Tim has planned is. Tim blandly asks Plank how he fancies robbing a bank.
What bank? Scoffs Plank.
Tim opens his hand and stretches his arm out. There, in front of them, stands a derelict, old bank building.
Roy Boulter wrote this. It was AWFUL, to say the least.
Summary © 2002 Marion Watts
Brookside and all related materials are © Mersey Television 1982-2002