Coronation Street's Gail bids farewell after 50 years

Coronation Street's longstanding, long-suffering character Gail will bid farewell to Weatherfield on Christmas Day, after 50 years on the cobbles.

Actress Helen Worth has stuck with the character through thick and thin since 1974, and fans have seen Gail weather many domestic dramas, romances, bust-ups and even prison.

The ITV soap announced in June that she would depart with "a major storyline for the Platt family", and her exit is set to be a typically eventful affair.

The 73-year-old actress has said she felt "truly blessed" about her long Corrie career.

In her penultimate episode on Tuesday, Gail was seen looking troubled on the eve of her seventh wedding - this time to Jesse Chadwick, with whom she is set to move to France.

If they do tie the knot on Christmas Day, she'll equal the record as the Street's most married character, alongside Street Cars stud Steve McDonald.

Viewers might recall that in 1979, Gail Potter (bonus points if you remembered her maiden name) married Brian Tilsley (Christopher Quinten) for the first time.

Brian divorced her following her affair with Ian Latimer because he wasn't sure whether he was really the father of their daughter, Sarah.

The couple reuntied and remarried in 1988, but it didn't end happily. Brian died after being stabbed in an alley after a night out.

In 2000, Gail was shocked to receive the news that Sarah (Tina O'Brien) was pregnant at the age of 13.

She'd taken the teenager to the doctor simply for being sick and not eating, before the baby bombshell was dropped.

"You can't be pregnant if you've not had sex," declared Gail to her tearful daughter.

Shock slowly spread across Gail's face as the reality dawned on her.

Recalling how she felt at the time as a young actress, O'Brien this week told BBC News that Worth "literally held my hand throughout" the experence.

"We were expected to do press [interviews] and I was quite a young girl and quite self-conscious and shy, and she was just so kind and wonderful with me."

It turned out all right in the end, with Sarah's on-screen daughter Bethany being all grown up herself now (played by Lucy Fallon) and still on the show.

After suffering several heartbreaks - due to the murder of her first husband and then the infidelities of second spouse Martin Platt (Sean Wilson) - Gail appeared to have found happiness in 2002 when she married Richard Hillman (Brian Capron).

But to her horror, it transpired her new beau had murdered not only his ex-wife but also Maxine Peacock (Tracy Shaw), as well as attempting to kill Gail's own mum Audrey Roberts (Sue Nicholls) and neighbour Emily Bishop (Eileen Derbyshire).

Gail, with a now legendary line, branded Richard as "Norman Bates with a briefcase", a reference to the serial killer in classic Alfred Hitchcock film Psycho.

She then ended the marriage, which led to Richard kidknapping her, her son David, Sarah and Bethany with the intention of killing them all.

An audience of more than 19 million watched the story reach its climax as he drove her and her family into a canal... killing only himself.

Christmas Eve's episode ended with Gail receiving a visit from a certain ghost of Christmas past.

In 2004, angry at how Todd Grimshaw (Bruno Langley) was treating her daughter Sarah, Gail found herself embroiled in a fight with his mother Eileen (Sue Cleaver) that spilled out on to the street.

Having yelled at both Todd and Eileen, Gail goaded the latter into slapping her, before all (hair-pulling) hell broke loose.

When Eileen's other son Jason (Ryan Thomas) arrived on the scene from work, still wearing a hard hat, Gail declared: "Here they are, the rest of the Village People!"

As the decades rolled on, the feud continued - but for a respectful ceasefire - with each woman aiming digs at the other about their respective love lives.

It exploded again properly in 2015 when the pair argued over the affections of Gail's fifth husband Michael (Les Dennis).

Cleaver confirmed to the BBC that they had "never pulled each other's hair" or "punched or slapped each other" in real life, and had in fact been good friends for many years.

"I think there's going to be a huge hole left by Helen leaving," she said. "We've finished filming and you can feel her absence.

"You're just so used to seeing her, that twinkly-eyed little lady who's just a ball of joy, she's going to be hugely missed.

"I mean, that character - she's such an icon. She's one of the last greats."

Eileen was not the only Weatherfield woman to be on the receiving end of Gail's anger when defending her family.

In 2010, the tempestous but loyal Gail had an aggresive food fight with Deirdre Barlow (Anne Kirkbride) after Deirdre was found to have kissed the partner of Gail's mum, Audrey.

"Ken, do something!" exclaimed a cake-splattered Deidre.

In 2010, Gail got married again, this time to Joe McIntyre (Reece Dinsdale).

This one wasn't any happier in the end, though, as he decided he was going to fake his own death due to debts.

But he accidentally drowned for real on a boat trip, leading to his new wife being arrested for murder after witnesses said they'd seen the couple arguing (about his aforementioned plan).

In prison, troublemaker Tracy Barlow (Kate Ford) lied that her cellmate Gail had confessed to killing Joe.

Luckily for one of the street's most downtrodden characters, Gail was found not guilty and released.

Gail had her troubles with son David (Jack P. Shepherd) as well, once accusing him of delibrately causing "fear and misery to everyone in this family".

"We've had sleepless nights," she added dramatically. "I'm on pills, for God's sake!"

By 2016, David was a married man himself. However, that came to a tragic end when his wife Kylie (Paula Lane) was stabbed to death, dying in David's arms.

Gail's motherly advice was for him to be honest with his own children about what had happened.

In a heart-rending, tear-filled scene, she recalled the day she had struggled to tell her eldest son Nick (nowadays Ben Price) the truth about his dad Brian being killed, explaining that the boy had been left scarred.

"It was just about the worst conversation of my life," Gail told David, with a wry laugh to break the tension. "And it's had some competition."

Price told the BBC that while his on-screen mum's big storylines "were great", he would miss the "beautiful bits in between" with her the most.

"For me, it's being welcomed into the Platts' [house] in the morning, or having a cup of tea, or going, 'Don't worry mum'.

"Those moments, for me, were Corrie and were gold.

"They make me smile."

In 2018, Gail powerfully expressed the shock and grief of Weatherfield residents following the devastating suicide of factory boss Aidan Connor.

In an emotional monologue, she reflected on the fact you don't really know what's going on in each other's lives, as footage switched between different characters being told the news.

It was originally meant to be a silent sequence, but writer Jonathan Harvey told BBC News: "It felt like it needed the gravitas of one of our longest-running characters to pass comment on the community that, when the programme started, was close-knit, looked out for each other and knew everybody's business. That's the cliche of what soaps are.

"And yet [she was saying], if you did know everybody's business then you would have seen this coming."

The powerful scene was nominated for Bafta's Must See Moment award.

Speaking of Worth's final scenes, Coronation Street's executive producer Iain MacLeod confirmed she won't die. "It didn't feel like killing her off would be right," he told the Daily Star.

"Gail has had a hard life. She had a difficult childhood and disastrous marriages. So, we thought what viewers really want is a happy ending for her, so that's what we're doing."

Coronation Street is on Christmas Day with an hour-long episode from 19.00 GMT on ITV.

Additional reporting by Lizo Mzimba.