Jack P Shepherd has revealed how a decision by the Coronation Street actor prevented his fan-favourite character David Platt from being killed off in the soap.
From 1990 to 2000, Gail Platt’s son David was portrayed by Thomas Ormson in the ITV show until Jack took over at the turn of the millennium.
He has since gone on to be involved in some of Corrie‘s biggest storylines, from his destructive, criminal behaviour as a teenager, pushing Gail down the stairs in their home, his emotional rape storyline with Josh Tucker, and struggles following Kylie Platt’s death.
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But during the live show An Audience with Coronation Street at Salford’s Lowry Theatre, Jack revealed that David was meant to be “killed off” as a teenager.
“They were going to kill me off because I’d done bad things, and it’s like anything, each character goes through bad scenarios and if they keep doing bad things, they have to get rid of them, don’t they?” he told host Sharon Marshall (via Manchester Evening News).
“I found out at a writer’s meeting that they’d just killed me off. They’d just decided to.”
However, during an emotionally-charged scene he shared with Gail actor Helen Worth, Jack managed to turn his character’s fate around.
He explained: “What changed their minds was that I did a scene where I blamed Gail about Richard Hillman, and I think the scene was typically written where David would lash out at his mum and storm upstairs, slam the door, like a usual teenage soap scene.
“I played it a little differently, and I was just very matter-of-fact and was a bit more sincere with what he actually believed and thought.
“And that’s when they went, ‘Oh, maybe he’s alright, and maybe there is a way back for his character. Maybe this lad’s quite good and we’ll try and keep hold of him’.”
It comes after the actor addressed his response to not winning an award at this year’s National Television Awards, with viewers claiming the actor was annoyed live on air.
Speaking on his podcast On the Sofa with Colson, Jack and Ben, Jack said he knew he had not won the Best Serial Drama Performance gong before it was announced, which went to EastEnders‘ Steve McFadden.
“Everyone who’s nominated, you have cameras [facing you]. And then they went, ‘And the winner is…’,” he said.
“All the cameras turned away from me and went to Phil Mitchell. So it was like, there’s obviously not a camera on me, just to give you a clue that I’ve definitely not won this.”
On his ‘loser’s face’, Jack added: “Usually, I do the ‘massively pissed off’ look because it makes me laugh. But this year, because I had no camera on me, I didn’t do anything, but they had a little sniper camera.
“So I was in shot and my reaction was, ‘I’m just watching the NTAs’. I genuinely wasn’t pissed off.”
