Sunday 30 December 2012

Craig Charles on bringing the first black family to Coronation Street

I'm a huge fan of Craig Charles, not just for his acting on Coronation Street as Lloyd, but for his passion for music on the Craig Charles Funk and soul show on BBC 6. Awooga! Awooga! Awooga! It's the radio highlight of the week in our house.

Anyway, more power to the fella.  In a great interview with The Voice, Craig talks about bringing a black family into Coronation Street for the first time.


He says: “I have enjoyed having a black family in Coronation Street. It is the first ever in its history and I am quite shocked at that fact. It’s great to be involved with something that is quite iconic. It will always be the first black family, and after 50 years it’s about time really.”

Craig says it was his idea to bring in Corrie's first black family. “I actually suggested (bringing a black family to Coronation Street) to the script writers, I said, ‘look, there’s never been a black family, you’ve got me as a character, why not build one around me?’ We were trying to get it together for the 50th year anniversary but I had to film Red Dwarf so I took a lot of time off. Any street like Coronation Street, in Manchester will have a lot more than one black family on it. If you’re gonna do a show which is reflective of the community to do that you have to include everyone and Manchester is such a multicultural society. It’s who we are as a nation.”

He added: “We’ve come so far from the days when I was first on television and I’m quite chuffed it’s happened on Coronation Street, because Eastenders has had black families for years and Manchester’s not different from London.”

Craig also reveals that Lloyd's new family will have some explosive story lines. “I’m working really hard on Coronation Street at the moment, I have a daughter and an ex Mrs. and it’s all set to kick of, there’s gonna be a lot of crazy things happening to test Lloyd.”


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