Crossroads : Back With A Vengeance! (Crossroads)

Member Name: karenuk

Product:	Crossroads
Date:	07/03/01 (323 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: interesting, good cast, has already grabbed my attention

Disadvantages: has to shrug off the old series

I vaguely remember Crossroads from my childhood. Somehow it never captivated me in the same way as Coronation Street has always done. I recall some of the characters – that dippy Benny with the tea-cosy hat, the ginger haired bloke in the wheelchair, the imposing headmistress-like Meg played by Noelle Gordon. But overall, I think of Crossroads, and picture cheap sets and caricatured roles – blame my memory for anything you disagree with here.

However, it must have had some kind of charm, because I was pleased to hear it was coming back in 2001. Admittedly, I do like soap operas and faithfully follow EastEnders, Coronation Street and Brookside. I have even tried to get into Emmerdale, but apart from being mesmerised by any scenes with the McGann brother in, the rest of it seems pretty bland. But I thought I’d give Crossroads a go and tuned in to last night’s omnibus edition on ITV at 9pm. Within five minutes, I realised I was into it.

The characters are believable, the cast are impressive and the storylines grabbed me. It is a nice mixture of old, familiar faces and new talent too. Three of the original stars are back to reprise their roles – Kathy Staff as Doris Luke, Tony Adams as Adam Chance and Jane Rossington as Jill Harvey. Add to this Jane Gurnett (Real Women, Casualty) as Kate Russell, the General Manager of the Crossroads hotel and Sherrie Hewson (Coronation Street) as the receptionist, and already a very talented core. But I was even more impressed by the others, especially the youngsters.

The hotel itself seems to have expanded and is much posher than I thought it was. They also seem to hire more staff, which of course leads to more storylines. The only character I did not warm to was Ray Dobbs (James McKenzie) who is an annoying Australian barman, but it’s early days.

Not surprisingly, the first episodes have been introducing the characters. So far, we know that Jake Booth (Colin Wel
ls), Deputy Manager and Kate’s son, is handsome, but a real rat, as he frequently cheats on his perfectly attractive wife, Tracey (Cindy Marshall-Day).

Billy Taylor (Gilly Gilchrist) is a temperamental chef (Aren’t they all?), Beena (Rebecca Hazelwood) is a beautiful waitress about to turn eighteen, the Russell’s daughter – Nicola - is rather wayward and the new young porter – Phil – has some kind of secret past, but is rather cute!

Add to this, plenty of tensions amongst the owners themselves and then Jill turning up, declaring she is not selling her share, thereby scuppering the Russell/Booth families’ dream of owning the hotel between them. Jake then discovers Jill’s credit card is worthless and shames her in front of the staff – followed by Jill revealing that Jake got off with a bridesmaid at the wedding hosted there – and all on Jake and Tracey’s 12th wedding anniversary too! Well I never.

So that’s got you all updated on what has happened so far – well, most of it anyway. There have only been three episodes of the new Crossroads so far, so there is plenty of time to catch up, if you would like to watch it. It is on ITV, weekdays, at 1:30pm and repeated at 5:05pm – so if you need an excuse to stop watching Neighbours, you’ve got a great one now!

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