Geoffrey Hughes

The other week I was feeling thoroughly cheesed off at work (one of THOSE days!) when my mind did what I call a "retro lurch" and I heard a cheery scouse voice inside my head saying: "It's a lovely day for the race! What race? The human race!" My mind often experiences these retro lurches - they throw up all sorts of things from the past when I least expect them - visions of old fashions and ancient family occasions, prehistoric snatches of music and TV dialogue - you name it! The older I get, the more it happens. In this case, the lurch made me smile. The cheery scouse voice was that of Geoffrey Hughes in his role of Eddie Yeats in Coronation Street. It brightened my day a lot.

I was very sorry to read of the death of Geoffrey Hughes. Eddie arrived in the Street in 1974, was elevated to permanent character status in 1976, became a binman and moved in with the Ogdens in 1980, and met his wife-to-be on CB radio in 1982. He bowed out in late 1983, and popped back briefly in 1987. Today, we remember him as one of the Street's legendary characters. I loved Geoffrey as Onslow in Keeping Up Appearances, too.

God bless, Geoff. Thanks for all the viewing pleasure. You made me laugh and I'll always love Eddie and Onslow. Read our 1980s newspaper interview with Geoffrey here.

1983: Geoffrey Hughes On Eddie Yeats And Coronation Street

A slate loose? Eddie Yeats and Len Fairclough at Len's builder's yard in Mawdsley Street.

Geoffrey Hughes was hugely popular as petty criminal Eddie Yeats. Eddie contained echoes of a previous Street bad lad, Jed Stone (Kenneth Cope). Both characters were Liverpudlians, had a heart of gold, and wore distinctive headgear - Jed a flat cap and Eddie (in his early years) a shapeless woolly hat!

In 1980, Eddie turned over a new leaf - he took up full time employment with the local council's refuse department - becoming a bin man, and moved in as a lodger with his long-term pals Stan and Hilda Ogden at Number 13.

Interviewed in 1983, Geoffrey Hughes commented that his favourite Street story line occurred in 1981 - when the Ogdens' washing ended up at the local tip. Hilda had put the washing in a plastic bin liner, and Eddie, acting in his professional capacity, carried it away.

It was the real-life early 1980s craze for CB radio which led to Eddie finding himself a wife. Citizens' Band Radio had been invented in America way back in the 1940s, but usage had only been known in England (in a very small way) since the 1960s. The film Convoy in the mid-70s increased interest in CB radio and jargon, and in the late 70s illegal usage in England, although still very small, slowly began to rise. In 1980, the number of illegal CB'ers swelled enormously and in November 1981 CB was legalised.

CB radio had been illegally dallied with in England (on a very small scale) since the 1960s. The illegal usage of the equipment increased tremendously in 1980 and 1981 (the newspapers of those two years contain some hilarious stories of CB misuse!) and CB was finally legalised on 2 November '81. Leading to big changes in the life of Mr Edward Yeats in 1982.

In early 1982, Eddie Yeats began using a CB radio in his bin wagon (his handle was "Slim Jim") and made contact with a young lady called Marion Willis (handle "Stardust Lil")(played by Veronica Doran). The two had an "eyeball" and fell in love.

In 1983, Geoffrey Hughes announced his desire to leave Coronation Street. To accommodate his departure in the story line, Marion fell pregnant, she and Eddie married, and then Marion's mother fell ill, necessitating a move to Bury. Eddie visited The Street briefly in 1987, but apart from that never darkened those cobblestones again.

Below is an interview with Geoffrey Hughes from the Daily Mirror, June 16, 1983.

There's nothing Eddie Yeats likes better than a greasy fry-up followed by a bucket of beer at the Rovers.

And away from the set Geoff Hughes is just as fond of his food and drink.

"You don't get to be seventeen and a half stone by worrying about what you eat and drink," he says.

"I don't worry about my weight. I'm still very active and I feel fit."

His tastes are a little more refined than Eddie's, however.

"I don't drink as much beer as Eddie, but I love good wine and a few glasses of port."

Coronation Street food is barely edible, Geoff says.

"They cook it in the morning and leave it in a warming oven until we're ready to do the scene. It's nearly always cold and rubbery. So when you see me and Stan tucking into pie and chips with great big smiles on our faces, we're doing a good bit of acting."

The pints of beer Eddie knocks back at Annie Walker's bar are in fact shandy. Once he was ill through drinking in the line of duty.

He says: "We were doing a pram race when we had to stop off in every pub. This kept going wrong and I had to knock back four pints each in one gulp. I went greener and greener and the lads put a bath outside for me to be sick in. I needed it."

Geoff's first part in Coronation Street was in 1965 - not as Eddie but as bricklayer Eric Fairbrother.

He appeared in three episodes - and in one of them he beat up grumpy Albert Tatlock. For this he expected a few abusive letters.

"All I got," he recalls, "were two saying I should have killed him."

It was in 1974, when the show's happy-go-lucky layabout, Jed Stone, had to be replaced, that Eddie Yeats arrived.

Geoff says: "They brought me in for a couple of weeks and then offered me a six months contract. I wasn't sure I wanted to stay, so I took six months off to think about it. Then I came back, did a six-month contract then another one. I've been there ever since."

Into The '80s...

Coronation Street celebrated its 2,000th episode on 2 June 1980, and TV Times published a souvenir magazine to celebrate.

The landmark occasion was reached on the same day that Elizabeth II celebrated twenty-seven years as Queen. On the cover of the magazine were Ena Sharples (Violet Carson), Elsie Tanner (Pat Phoenix), Albert Tatlock (Jack Howarth), Ken Barlow (William Roache) and Tracy Langton (Christabel Finch). The souvenir included an introduction by Len Fairclough, a copy of the script of the very first episode, street party scenes and photographs of a trip to Singapore, featuring the producer and several cast members.

Ena Sharples made her final appearance in Coronation Street in April 1980. There was no big send-off as Violet Carson did not intend to leave at that point and several long absences during the 1970s had familiarised viewers with lengthy spells without the Hair-Netted One.

In the storyline, Ena threatened not to return, but she'd done that before!

Violet had not been in the best of health for years, and had at times seemed somewhat disenchanted with the character of Ena, but I remember reading a newspaper article headed something like I'll Be Back, Vows Ena, complete with a lovely photograph of Vi at home in Blackpool, revealing her determination to don that famous hairnet again.

Sadly, this was not to be. Violet died on Boxing Day 1983.

Tracy Langton is in the lead in the egg and spoon race - and rules are made to be broken! Look at the blatant egg-gripping going on!

"Ooh, flamin' nora - fellas!!" Party animal Mike Baldwin sleeps it off.

What was happening to Len Fairclough in 1980? Well, the year had begun badly with Rita lambasting him after he'd slipped off to Molly Coggan's New Year party with a few of the lads, leaving Rita high and dry at the Rovers.

Early in 1980, Rita walked out on him, seeking to take up her nightclub singing career again. Len hit her and she left for Blackpool.

Len begged her to return and she did, but she made two things plain - Fairclough's selfish ways and the pig sty they lived in would BOTH have to change.

Other happenings of 1980 included Eddie Yeats moving in with Stan and Hilda Ogden, Renee Roberts meeting a nasty end in a road accident, and Bet Lynch and Elsie Tanner clashing over womanising lorry driver Dan Jackson.

He wasn't worth it.

-Talking of Len, here's a newspaper advertisement from 1980. Video technology had been around for yonks, but domestic VCRs only a few years. In 1980, only 5% of UK households possessed a video recorder - they were far from cheap to buy outright at that point, and renting was a financial commitment many could do without in those hard-pressed times. The video revolution had to wait until a bit later in the decade to take hold.

The Magic of Coronation Street, Distant Memories - 1960-64.

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The very first Coronation Street video was released in late 1982 and was produced by Granada Video. It contained six full episodes, including the first, and specially filmed sequences with Doris Speed, Pat Phoenix and Peter Adamson in character as Annie Walker, Elsie Tanner and Len Fairclough. My family didn't have a video recorder at the time, nobody I knew did, but I thought video was the "coming thing", so bought the Coronation Street video.

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The Magic of Coronation Street later returned to the shops in different packaging - courtesy of Vestron Video - as two separate releases, each containing three episodes.

-This photograph from the Daily Mirror, 27/2/1982, shows an excited Hilda Ogden pointing at the new, under-construction, No 13 Coronation Street.

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Hilda had already experienced two new No 13 exteriors. The Ogdens arrived in the programme in 1964 and in those days the Street's exterior set was actually in the studio.

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In the late 1960s, an outdoor set was constructed - of lath and board - on the Grape Street lot near the studio. A single English winter played havoc with the flim-flam facade, and permission was granted for the Street's frontage to be built in brick. The back yards were added later.

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For reasons of space, the outdoor facade was built far smaller than life size, as had been the case with the original studio set. But few viewers noticed anything wrong as, when seen through the TV cameras, the Street looked much larger.

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In 1982, the Street was rebuilt, closer to life-size than it had ever been, and an entry was inserted between the Rovers Return and Albert Tatlock's bay window. For years, viewers had been writing in to say that the Rovers loo doors led directly into Albert's. They did, and the show's producer Bill Podmore used to joke: "Perhaps that's why he's always so grumpy!"

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So, with a little bit of extra space for the ladies' and gents' conveniences (though, outside of soap reality, probably not enough), 1982 was a happy year for Albert!

- 5 May 1982 - and there's some Royal visitors at the Ogdens! The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh visited the new exterior set and met members of the cast and production team.

The "Coronation Street" cast, all dressed in their characters' best clothes, waited to greet the VIP visitors by their respective front doors. Jean Alexander, in Hilda's best frock, was actually curler-less (yes, Hilda would take them out on special occasions!), Stan (Bernard Youens) wore his best cardie and jacket, but Geoffrey Hughes, as Eddie Yeats, was wearing a donkey jacket over his smart suit - as befitted Eddie's role as a binman.

Giggling, gap-toothed Scouser Eddie was a long-term pal of the Oggies, and became their lodger in 1980. He met his true love, Marion Willis (Veronica Doran), in 1982. The couple were caught up in the CB radio craze and carried the "handles" "Slim Jim" and "Stardust Lill". They met over the airwaves. In 1983, Marion and Eddie married and left the Street.