Reception
ITV describe Betty as a "lynchpin" of the soap opera, stating that: "She’s as much a part of Coronation Street as the cobble stones." Former executive producer, Brian Park, suggested in 1997 that characters such as Betty "are essential ingredients. They're like the big clock on the mantelpiece." Park elaborated on his opinion of Betty when he left the serial as producer in 1998, saying, "I don't mean it disrespectfully but people like Betty Driver, who plays Betty Williams are what I call the mantelpiece ornaments. She'll probably never hold down a major storyline but she's part of the weave."
The character is one of the longest-serving in British soap, coming third behind Ken Barlow and Emily Bishop in a 1998 survey assessing character episode appearances in Coronation Street's history. In 1999, when Betty was celebrating 30 years on-screen, Alison Boshoff of the Daily Mail praised the character's never changing style: "for 30 years, one favourite fixture of Coronation Street has remained exactly the same barmaid Betty Turpin. With her neatly-set hair, comfortable, bustling manner, and brilliant smile, she has been dispensing homespun advice – and, of course, those celebrated hotpots – at the Rovers Return for more than a generation." Commenting on her 30th anniversary with the show, Betty Driver said, "It is just amazing that I've been here for 30 years. I suppose I have never really counted up the time I've been with the show, because I still enjoy it so much and am always looking forward rather than back. Really, it has been a wonderful experience and I feel very glad I was able to stick around for so long."
In 2007, Coronation Street bosses told The Sun newspaper that there were no plans to retire the character of Betty, despite actress Betty Driver being 87 at the time, the oldest cast member in the soap. The character was described as "highly valued", with executive producer Kieran Roberts saying, "She is still going strong and enjoying the role. Betty is one of the Street’s great traditional characters who seem to have been there forever. It’s always been our aim to keep a great mix of contemporary stories with older, more traditional characters. Comedy and tragedy combined with very clever writing has always been a trademark of the Street." Actor Rob James-Collier, who played Liam Connor in the soap, has deemed Betty to be one of Coronation Street's two best characters, alongside Jack Duckworth (Bill Tarmey). He explained: "Betty Driver, who plays Betty can have no more than a couple of lines in a scene, but she’ll steal it off all the other actors with just a comedy reaction. It’s simple, and also fantastic."
Driver was awarded a lifetime achievement award at The British Soap Awards in May 2010, to honour her role as Betty who had, at that time, featured in Coronation Street for 41 years. Due to illness, Driver was unable to collect the award in person, but she recorded a video message thanking everyone at ITV.
Read more about this topic: Betty Williams (Coronation Street)
Famous quotes containing the word reception:
“To the United States the Third World often takes the form of a black woman who has been made pregnant in a moment of passion and who shows up one day in the reception room on the forty-ninth floor threatening to make a scene. The lawyers pay the woman off; sometimes uniformed guards accompany her to the elevators.”
—Lewis H. Lapham (b. 1935)
“Aesthetic emotion puts man in a state favorable to the reception of erotic emotion.... Art is the accomplice of love. Take love away and there is no longer art.”
—Rémy De Gourmont (1858–1915)
“Satire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally discover everybody’s face but their own; which is the chief reason for that kind of reception it meets in the world, and that so very few are offended with it.”
—Jonathan Swift (1667–1745)