Shock 'suicide plot' for Corrie's Jack Duckworth

Shock 'suicide plot' for Corrie's Jack Duckworth
Shock 'suicide plot' for Corrie's Jack Duckworth

Coronation Street legend Jack Duckworth will beg his girlfriend to help him commit suicide after being diagnosed with terminal cancer, say reports. According to the News Of The World the dramatic storyline will occur later this year when Jack - played by actor Bill Tarmey - discovers he has deadly non-Hodgkins lymphoma. However his screen partner Connie Rathbone - played by actress Rita May - refuses to do so, leaving Jack to move back in with his "adopted" son Tyrone. Bosses originally planned to kill off Jack in the disastrous tram crash planned for the show's 50th anniversary in December. It is thought several characters will lose their lives or be injured as a result of the accident. However he will now succumb to his illness instead - but not before he spends his last days secretly carrying out kind acts for the residents of Weatherfield. "Bill's been such a huge part of the show for so long that we wanted to give him a fitting send-off," a show insider told the paper. The actor is leaving the soap after 31 years in order to spend more time with his family.

Patrick McLennan

Patrick McLennan is a London-based journalist and documentary maker who has worked as a writer, sub-editor, digital editor and TV producer in the UK and New Zealand. His CV includes spells as a news producer at the BBC and TVNZ, as well as web editor for Time Inc UK. He has produced TV news and entertainment features on personalities as diverse as Nick Cave, Tom Hardy, Clive James, Jodie Marsh and Kevin Bacon and he co-produced and directed The Ponds, which has screened in UK cinemas, BBC Four and is currently available on Netflix. 


An entertainment writer with a diverse taste in TV and film, he lists Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The Chase, The Thick of It and Detectorists among his favourite shows, but steers well clear of most sci-fi.