A former Coronation Street star has confirmed she will return to the soap - as a completely different character.
Gabrielle Glaister appeared on the Cobbles for 75 episodes back in 2000, playing Deborah "Debs" Brownlow. Debs turned up at the Rovers Return after working on cruise ships for a number of years, reuniting with sister Natalie Barnes - portrayed by Denise Welch.
Debs spent nine months living at number 6 and working as a hairdresser At Audrey's salon. She left the street after ending her relationship with Duggie Ferguson (John Bowe), running off with Natalie's ex-boyfriend Vinny Sorrell (James Gaddas).
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Now the actress will return to Weatherfield, in entirely different circumstances. And it's all part of a doppelganger plot.
Corrie's Bernie star Jane Hazlegrove came up with the idea of her character having a double after she and Gabrielle were constantly mistaken for each other. She mentioned the possible storyline to writer Jonathan Harvey and the Bernie/Fern mirror image plot was developed with Gabrielle cast as Fern.
Jane has revealed the pair look so similar some of their Coronation Street colleagues have even stopped Gabrielle in the corridor to chat thinking it was her.
She said: “I mentioned this idea to Jonathan a while ago. Gabby and I are constantly mistaken for each other with people saying they have seen one of us in something when it was the other one. We have often laughed about it together but then I started thinking it might be fun to have her in the show as Bernie’s secret twin or a doppelganger.
“I was so chuffed when they told me that they had devised this storyline and that Gabby was on board.
“Shortly after I had heard that we were doing the story, I was at the Soap Awards and someone who used to work with Gabby started talking to me thinking I was her. The actor was mortified when I pointed out who I was but of course I don’t mind being mistaken for Gabby, it is a huge compliment and secretly I was thinking ‘that’s brilliant, this storyline is going to work so well’.”
Gabrielle said: “Jane and I have been mistaken for each other for years and years .Me constantly denying that I was in Casualty, Jane insisting that she wasn’t in Brookside! Or people congratulating me on my performance in something I wasn’t in because it was Jane being brilliant. A very good friend of mine texted me last week to say he caught a bit of Corrie and thought I was very good. I pointed out that I wasn’t on screen yet!!
“When they approached me with the storyline It seemed like fate. What they’ve written is so clever and I’m having a ball working with Jane.”
The plotline begins on August 26, with a mix-up about a parcel collection. Bernie is collecting Joseph’s new school uniform when she is given a parcel for Fern by a shop assistant who mistakes her for the other woman.
Fern arrives at the house demanding her parcel and accusing Bernie of theft. The women are struck by how alike they are and the following week Fern offers Bernie a dodgy way of earning some money.
Coronation Street airs Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 8pm on ITV and the ITV Hub
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