Julie Carp
Encyclopedia
Julie Carp is a fictional character
from the British ITV
soap opera
, Coronation Street
, played by actress Katy Cavanagh
. The character debuted on-screen during the episode airing on 25 April 2008 and was originally introduced as a new girlfriend of established character Kirk Sutherland
and in a later storyline she was revealed to be Eileen Grimshaw's
half-sister.
(Andrew Whyment
) love interest. She was given more links to the serial when she moves in with him on Coronation Street. Her early time onscreen saw her looking after Chesney Battersby-Brown and being a good friend to Fiz Brown (Jennie McAlpine
). She soon secured a job as the supervisor at Underworld. In early 2009 producers of the show pushed her character to forefront of the show's storylines.
spokesperson revealed; “Kirk’s had a pretty tough time of late, but he’s finally found a kindred spirit in Julie.” That she is kind and caring, this is shown more so when she takes Fiz under her wing during her troubles with John Stape. During an interview with media website Digital Spy
, Katy spoke about the rise of her character into the main story lines during 2009 providing further insight to how her characters personality was panning out stating: "It's taken me a year but I've been quite lucky because I crept in at the back and pottered around for a bit, finding my feet. I was definitely ready to get my teeth into something. I'm so chuffed with it. I've loved it. It's nice to show a different side to Julie and discover what's behind her slightly manic positivity." During the same interview she also commented on her character being a lonely woman because of all the events of the past year.
In mid 2009 Kavanagh spoke about her character in more depth saying: "Three words to describe Julie - sparkly, romantic and sagacious" going on to say "I don't think anything irritates me about Julie, erm, I couldn't play her if anything irritated me, she does talk a lot so sometimes I'm completely knackered by the end of the day of playing Julie and I just want to go home and moan for an hour" and also that "My favourite quality about Julie is her sense of kind of fun and her irrepressible kind of joy, I love playing that".
(Ryan Thomas
) before learning he was her nephew, she seemed keen to take it further. Commenting on the character's keen attitude towards not being single actress Katy Cavanagh said: "She's lonely and I'm sure she'd rip the head off of any man that comes within five miles of her." Going on to say that although her character was no longer with Kirk Sutherland she also commented on their closeness and the fact they still live together so it is like nothing has changed.
(Sue Cleaver
) strikes up a conversation with Julie when they both ran outside after Maria Connor (Samia Smith
) crashes her car into Underworld. Julie and Eileen discover that Eileen had gone to school with Julie's mother. That night, while looking for Kirk in the Rovers, Julie runs into Eileen again and Julie says her mother has spent years working on a checkout at nearby supermarket Freshco's before going back to studies to become a primary school teacher. Julie says she isn't in close contact with her mother. She seems reluctant to discuss the subject, and quickly leaves.
On 13 February 2009, Julie says she is getting fed up of her partner Kirk, because he is unemployed and not doing anything about it. Julie's boss Tony Gordon
(Gray O'Brien
) puts her in an awkward position at work, as he tells her to sack one of the seamstresses, who are also her friends, though as supervisor, Tony feels it is necessary to step up to her role more effectively. Tony carries on bullying Julie into sacking one of her friends until she decides to stand up for herself. Tony then tells her she will be sacked unless she does the task in hand. She is later saved by newcomer Luke Strong
(Craig Kelly
) who tells her that her job was safe and undermines Tony.
In March 2009, Julie's relationship with Kirk begins to strain. She has a pregnancy scare, which is confirmed to be negative much to her delight but to Kirk's regret. It is evident that Julie has begun to tire of Kirk's childish nature and the fact that he is unemployed. On 3 April, she confesses to Hayley Cropper
(Julie Hesmondhalgh
) that she needs a real man and that she has fallen out of love with Kirk. She is later stunned when Kirk ends their relationship after seeing how they are drifting apart. Julie then moves out of the house.
Eileen continues to pester Julie by asking her about her mother Paula Carp (Sharon Duce
) because Eileen and her were friends at school. Following her split from Kirk, Julie begins to show an interest in Eileen's son Jason. On 27 April 2009, the pair get drunk in the Rovers and head back to Jason's for a night of passion, little knowing that they are blood-related.
At Colin Grimshaw's (Edward de Souza
) 70th party at the Rovers a few days later, Paula comes in drunk, urging Julie to stop seeing Jason. This leads to a row between mother and daughter and ends with Paula announcing that they can't be together because they are related. Colin tries to get her to leave before she says any more but Paula then tells the whole pub that Colin is Julie's father in an episode that was watched by a total of 8.61 million viewers. A few days later, Julie is horrified to discover that Colin has suffered a stroke. Determined to get to know her father, she goes to visit him in hospital. When he later dies of a heart attack, she is distraught, and devastated that she hadn't had a chance to know him.
In 2010, Julie starts to work with Eileen's boyfriend Jesse Chadwick (John Thomson) in his child entertainment venues, however, when a paranoid Eileen finds out, she forbids him to see Julie, even though they briefly still work together secretly before calling it quits. After a strain in Eileen and Jesse's relationship, Jesse kisses Julie saying he has feelings for her. A guilty Julie later tells Eileen about this in the Rovers and both sisters chase him out of the Rovers and away from the Street. Julie and Eileen then bond and promise to make a fresh start on their new-found relationship.
In October 2010, Julie meets John Stape
(Graeme Hawley
)'s ex-colleague Brian Packham and they are both instantly smitten. John however, who is afraid that Brian seeing Julie will uncover his lies to cover up an identity theft, decides to do all he can to split them up. When dining in a fancy restaurant, John and Fiz quickly join them; as Julie and Brian go to the bathroom John calls Brian's wife (who according to Julie he has separated from) to tell him what he's doing. After Fiz and John leave, Brian's wife comes in and tells a broken-hearted Julie that they are still married before she storms off. Later that evening, Brian turns up at number 5 as his wife kicked him out and Julie is still insistent that she and Brian are meant for each other. Meanwhile, John claims that Julie once had a restraining order for stalking a man who didn't return her texts. This scares Brian when Julie later turns up at the house; after Brian finally reconciles with his wife and leaves, Julie turns up at John and Fiz's with a bottle of wine before breaking down.
In January 2011, Julie helps Eileen break in Owen's builder's yard to obtain his dodgy accounts and documents, to use as a counterblackmail against Owen's threats towards Eileen who cashed a £10,000.00 cheque for Owen into her own account.
Fictional character
A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...
from the British ITV
ITV
ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...
soap opera
Soap opera
A soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...
, Coronation Street
Coronation Street
Coronation Street is a British soap opera set in Weatherfield, a fictional town in Greater Manchester based on Salford. Created by Tony Warren, Coronation Street was first broadcast on 9 December 1960...
, played by actress Katy Cavanagh
Katy Cavanagh
Katy Cavanagh in North Shields, North Tyneside and grew up in Bolton, Greater Manchester and educated at Canon Slade School is an English actress, best known for her appearances in Coronation Street in the role of Julie Carp since 2008....
. The character debuted on-screen during the episode airing on 25 April 2008 and was originally introduced as a new girlfriend of established character Kirk Sutherland
Kirk Sutherland
Kirk Sutherland is a fictional character in the UK television ITV soap opera, Coronation Street. The character first appeared onscreen during the episode airing on 22 May 2000, played by an uncredited actor ....
and in a later storyline she was revealed to be Eileen Grimshaw's
Eileen Grimshaw
Eileen Grimshaw, is a fictional character in the UK television ITV soap opera, Coronation Street. Portrayed by Sue Cleaver, the character first appeared onscreen during the episode airing on 3 May 2000....
half-sister.
Character creation
The character of Julie Carp was first introduced as Kirk Sutherland'sKirk Sutherland
Kirk Sutherland is a fictional character in the UK television ITV soap opera, Coronation Street. The character first appeared onscreen during the episode airing on 22 May 2000, played by an uncredited actor ....
(Andrew Whyment
Andrew Whyment
Andrew "Andy" Whyment is an English television actor, best known for comedy roles, including his roles as Darren Sinclair-Jones in The Royle Family and Kirk Sutherland in the soap opera Coronation Street.-TV career:...
) love interest. She was given more links to the serial when she moves in with him on Coronation Street. Her early time onscreen saw her looking after Chesney Battersby-Brown and being a good friend to Fiz Brown (Jennie McAlpine
Jennie McAlpine
Jennie Elizabeth McAlpine is a British television actress and comedienne. She is best known for her role as Fiz Stape in the well known British soap opera Coronation Street.-Early life:...
). She soon secured a job as the supervisor at Underworld. In early 2009 producers of the show pushed her character to forefront of the show's storylines.
Characterisation
A Coronation StreetCoronation Street
Coronation Street is a British soap opera set in Weatherfield, a fictional town in Greater Manchester based on Salford. Created by Tony Warren, Coronation Street was first broadcast on 9 December 1960...
spokesperson revealed; “Kirk’s had a pretty tough time of late, but he’s finally found a kindred spirit in Julie.” That she is kind and caring, this is shown more so when she takes Fiz under her wing during her troubles with John Stape. During an interview with media website Digital Spy
Digital Spy
Digital Spy is a British entertainment and media news website. According to Alexa Internet traffic statistics, as of February 2011, Digital Spy is the 93rd most popular website in the United Kingdom, with an overall Alexa ranking of 2,088....
, Katy spoke about the rise of her character into the main story lines during 2009 providing further insight to how her characters personality was panning out stating: "It's taken me a year but I've been quite lucky because I crept in at the back and pottered around for a bit, finding my feet. I was definitely ready to get my teeth into something. I'm so chuffed with it. I've loved it. It's nice to show a different side to Julie and discover what's behind her slightly manic positivity." During the same interview she also commented on her character being a lonely woman because of all the events of the past year.
In mid 2009 Kavanagh spoke about her character in more depth saying: "Three words to describe Julie - sparkly, romantic and sagacious" going on to say "I don't think anything irritates me about Julie, erm, I couldn't play her if anything irritated me, she does talk a lot so sometimes I'm completely knackered by the end of the day of playing Julie and I just want to go home and moan for an hour" and also that "My favourite quality about Julie is her sense of kind of fun and her irrepressible kind of joy, I love playing that".
Relationships
As the character entered the show her main ties were with Kirk, their relationship provided Julie with her early storylines in her first year with the show. She was described as Kirk's kindred spirit and they spent nearly a year together, moving in with him after only a short while. After their break up she had a brief one night stand with Jason GrimshawJason Grimshaw
Jason Grimshaw, is a fictional character in the UK television ITV soap opera, Coronation Street. Portrayed by actor Ryan Thomas, the character first appeared during the episode airing on 25 December 2000, when he comes looking for mother Eileen at the Battersbys' home.Jason is very much the...
(Ryan Thomas
Ryan Thomas
Ryan James Thomas and is an English actor who is currently starring as the character, Jason Grimshaw on ITV's Coronation Street.-Career:...
) before learning he was her nephew, she seemed keen to take it further. Commenting on the character's keen attitude towards not being single actress Katy Cavanagh said: "She's lonely and I'm sure she'd rip the head off of any man that comes within five miles of her." Going on to say that although her character was no longer with Kirk Sutherland she also commented on their closeness and the fact they still live together so it is like nothing has changed.
2008–present
Julie's early storylines mainly revolved around her relationship with Kirk. She is also catalyst in many of the factory girls' storylines. In January 2009, neighbour Eileen GrimshawEileen Grimshaw
Eileen Grimshaw, is a fictional character in the UK television ITV soap opera, Coronation Street. Portrayed by Sue Cleaver, the character first appeared onscreen during the episode airing on 3 May 2000....
(Sue Cleaver
Sue Cleaver
Sue Cleaver is an English actress. She is best known for her regular role in Coronation Street.She studied at the Manchester Metropolitan School of Theatre and her first television appearance was a small part in an episode of A Touch of Frost...
) strikes up a conversation with Julie when they both ran outside after Maria Connor (Samia Smith
Samia Smith
Samia Maxine Ghadie , is an English actress best known for playing Maria Connor in the ITV Soap Coronation Street.-Early life:...
) crashes her car into Underworld. Julie and Eileen discover that Eileen had gone to school with Julie's mother. That night, while looking for Kirk in the Rovers, Julie runs into Eileen again and Julie says her mother has spent years working on a checkout at nearby supermarket Freshco's before going back to studies to become a primary school teacher. Julie says she isn't in close contact with her mother. She seems reluctant to discuss the subject, and quickly leaves.
On 13 February 2009, Julie says she is getting fed up of her partner Kirk, because he is unemployed and not doing anything about it. Julie's boss Tony Gordon
Tony Gordon
Anthony "Tony" Gordon was a fictional character in the itv soap opera Coronation Street, portrayed by actor Gray O'Brien. The character first appeared on screen on 16 September 2007 and making his final appearance on 9 June 2010 after deciding to sacrifice himself in the Underworld fire. He is a...
(Gray O'Brien
Gray O'Brien
Gray O'Brien is a Scottish television and film actor, best known for his portrayal of the villainous Weatherfield businessman Tony Gordon in the popular British soap opera Coronation Street from 2007 to 2010, and as Dr Richard McCaig on Casualty from 1996 to 1998.O'Brien was born in Stewarton,...
) puts her in an awkward position at work, as he tells her to sack one of the seamstresses, who are also her friends, though as supervisor, Tony feels it is necessary to step up to her role more effectively. Tony carries on bullying Julie into sacking one of her friends until she decides to stand up for herself. Tony then tells her she will be sacked unless she does the task in hand. She is later saved by newcomer Luke Strong
Luke Strong
Luke Strong is a fictional character in the UK television ITV soap opera, Coronation Street. Portrayed by actor Craig Kelly, the character appeared throughout 2009. Luke took over Carla Gordon's share of the Underworld factory with Tony Gordon...
(Craig Kelly
Craig Kelly (actor)
Craig Kelly is a British actor, best known for his role as Vince Tyler in the Channel 4 television series Queer as Folk and as Luke Strong in Coronation Street.-Biography:...
) who tells her that her job was safe and undermines Tony.
In March 2009, Julie's relationship with Kirk begins to strain. She has a pregnancy scare, which is confirmed to be negative much to her delight but to Kirk's regret. It is evident that Julie has begun to tire of Kirk's childish nature and the fact that he is unemployed. On 3 April, she confesses to Hayley Cropper
Hayley Cropper
Hayley Anne Cropper is a fictional character in the UK television ITV soap opera, Coronation Street...
(Julie Hesmondhalgh
Julie Hesmondhalgh
Julie Hesmondhalgh is an English actress.Hesmondhalgh was born in Accrington, Lancashire. As a teenager, she was moderately interested in acting, but wished to become a social worker. She applied to drama school to be with her friends, and studied at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art...
) that she needs a real man and that she has fallen out of love with Kirk. She is later stunned when Kirk ends their relationship after seeing how they are drifting apart. Julie then moves out of the house.
Eileen continues to pester Julie by asking her about her mother Paula Carp (Sharon Duce
Sharon Duce
Sharon Duce is a British actress, .Her biggest role was alongside Ray Brooks in the BBC comedy drama Big Deal .She has also appeared in:*Wycliffe,*The Royle Family*London's Burning,...
) because Eileen and her were friends at school. Following her split from Kirk, Julie begins to show an interest in Eileen's son Jason. On 27 April 2009, the pair get drunk in the Rovers and head back to Jason's for a night of passion, little knowing that they are blood-related.
At Colin Grimshaw's (Edward de Souza
Edward de Souza
Edward James de Souza is a British character actor and graduate of RADA with ethnic Portuguese Indian and English origins.-Early life:...
) 70th party at the Rovers a few days later, Paula comes in drunk, urging Julie to stop seeing Jason. This leads to a row between mother and daughter and ends with Paula announcing that they can't be together because they are related. Colin tries to get her to leave before she says any more but Paula then tells the whole pub that Colin is Julie's father in an episode that was watched by a total of 8.61 million viewers. A few days later, Julie is horrified to discover that Colin has suffered a stroke. Determined to get to know her father, she goes to visit him in hospital. When he later dies of a heart attack, she is distraught, and devastated that she hadn't had a chance to know him.
In 2010, Julie starts to work with Eileen's boyfriend Jesse Chadwick (John Thomson) in his child entertainment venues, however, when a paranoid Eileen finds out, she forbids him to see Julie, even though they briefly still work together secretly before calling it quits. After a strain in Eileen and Jesse's relationship, Jesse kisses Julie saying he has feelings for her. A guilty Julie later tells Eileen about this in the Rovers and both sisters chase him out of the Rovers and away from the Street. Julie and Eileen then bond and promise to make a fresh start on their new-found relationship.
In October 2010, Julie meets John Stape
John Stape
John Stape is a fictional character from the British soap opera, Coronation Street, played by actor Graeme Hawley. He made his first on-screen appearance during the episode airing on 6 May 2007. The character departed on 3 June 2011 after four years on the show...
(Graeme Hawley
Graeme Hawley
Graeme Hawley is an English actor known for his role as John Stape in the British soap Coronation Street.-Career:He graduated from Manchester Metropolitan University in 1996 with a degree in Drama before beginning his acting career in the theatre.He started his career off by performing on stage at...
)'s ex-colleague Brian Packham and they are both instantly smitten. John however, who is afraid that Brian seeing Julie will uncover his lies to cover up an identity theft, decides to do all he can to split them up. When dining in a fancy restaurant, John and Fiz quickly join them; as Julie and Brian go to the bathroom John calls Brian's wife (who according to Julie he has separated from) to tell him what he's doing. After Fiz and John leave, Brian's wife comes in and tells a broken-hearted Julie that they are still married before she storms off. Later that evening, Brian turns up at number 5 as his wife kicked him out and Julie is still insistent that she and Brian are meant for each other. Meanwhile, John claims that Julie once had a restraining order for stalking a man who didn't return her texts. This scares Brian when Julie later turns up at the house; after Brian finally reconciles with his wife and leaves, Julie turns up at John and Fiz's with a bottle of wine before breaking down.
In January 2011, Julie helps Eileen break in Owen's builder's yard to obtain his dodgy accounts and documents, to use as a counterblackmail against Owen's threats towards Eileen who cashed a £10,000.00 cheque for Owen into her own account.