Eileen Derbyshire is to appear on ‘Coronation Street’ this month for the first time since January 2016.
The 87-year-old actress will be seen as her character Emily Bishop on the episode that airs on ITV on Wednesday October 9.
Emily will send a video message to her long-time friend Ken Barlow to wish him a happy 80th birthday.
The Weatherfield pensioner is not the only character making a return to help Ken – played by Bill Roache – celebrate his landmark birthday as her former lodger Norris Cole (Malcolm Hebden) will be a surprise guest at his birthday party in the Rovers Return pub.
Actor Malcolm, 79, had to take almost two years off from the soap after undergoing major heart surgery but he returned briefly as Norris in May 2019 stepping onto the cobbles with his fiancé Freda Burgess (Ali Briggs) and to announce to the residents that Emily’s former home No 3 had been sold to the Bailey family.
‘Corrie’ producer Iain MacLeod previously revealed that bosses on the show are in regular contact with Eileen and insisted the door is always open for her to return to the role of Emily, who she began playing back in 1961 a year after the programme began.
Emily departed Weatherfield in a storyline which saw her travel to Peru to help her nephew Spider Nugent (Martin Hancock) with his charity work but then she returned to live in Edinburgh to care for her niece Freda Burgess.
Eileen Derbyshire makes Coronation Street return
