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Anorak News | Streets Behind

Streets Behind

by | 10th, May 2004

‘IS it true that in France soap awards take place only once a year? Say what you like about European enlightenments, but we Brits like our soaps to be rewarded regularly and often.

‘Pets win ruddy prizes, more like’

It might only have been a few days since Anorak held its own awards – and Leslie Grantham scooped the lot, winning awards for Best panto villain in a chatroom; Best off-screen row; and Most aroused male (over 50s category) – but the weekend saw another set of gongs dished out.

Naturally, after that recent peak, there was no need for Grantham to attend the Best British Soap Awards.

In fact, the Star says the man who put the filth in Dirty Den looks to have decided to quit on a high, planning to leave the show and return to obscurity and, perhaps, a room above the garage where he keeps his computer.

But others did attend, and the Express has a full list of the winners of such career-turning awards as Best Actor Playing Himself (Shane Richie – EastEnders’ Alfie Moon); Best Performance As A Drudge By A Young Actor (Natalie Cassidy – EastEnders’ Sonia Jackson) and Soap Bitch Of The Year (Kate Ford – Coronation Street’s Tracy Barlow).

All worthy winners, we think you will agree. But Sexiest Female: Jessie Wallace? We’ll run that by you one more time. Sexiest Female: Jessie Wallace!

If only she were, then Grantham might have demurred from logging onto a BBC PC and got his jollies peering at the heavily-painted EastEnders harridan instead.

But there was an award yet more contentious than that. In light of the decision by the public and a shadowy unnamed panel of soap experts to award the Best Soap Award to EastEnders, the Sun says that the soaps are “AT WAR”.

So bad was it that Bruce Jones, Corrie’s Les Battersby, stormed out of BBC TV Centre where the awards were being dolled out.

Julie Hesmondhalgh, who plays Corrie’s Hayley Cropper, moaned: “We were robbed. We are miles better than EastEnders. We are. That is just the way it is.”

So confident were the Corrie actors of getting the prize that they were already out of the seats and on the way to the stage when the category was announced.

“We walked down the steps as they said ‘the award goes to…’ and they said ‘EastEnders’. It was very humiliating,” says Hesmondhalgh.

Happily, the Corrie troupe will have the chance to get over it at next week’s soap awards.’



Posted: 10th, May 2004 | In: Tabloids Comment | TrackBack | Permalink