As Sergeant Catherine Cawood, she has tens of millions of viewers on tenterhooks forward of this Sunday’s Blissful Valley finale.
And for Sarah Lancashire, the gritty function in BBC1’s crime drama has marked a change of tempo from the characters that made her a family title.
The Oldham-born actress, 58, is probably nonetheless greatest identified for taking part in barmaid Raquel in Coronation Avenue, however has had a various profession since leaving drama faculty.
Her first main function, as a magnificence contestant in swimwear and excessive heels, was on stage in 1986 in Manchester Library Theatre Firm’s The Magnificence Recreation.
Stage function: Sarah Lancashire (centre) in The Magnificence Recreation in 1986
Street to fame: Lancashire with Invoice Tarmey as Jack Duckworth in Coronation Avenue in 1986
Actor: Lancashire with Mark Wingett in The Invoice in 1991 and again within the Rovers as Raquel in 1994
She then had a fleeting look in Coronation Avenue as Jack Duckworth’s potential lodger, and in addition in an episode of The Invoice, earlier than returning to Corrie as Rovers Return barmaid Raquel, turning into one of many ITV cleaning soap’s best-loved characters.
Her character left the Avenue in 1996, strolling out on hapless husband Norman ‘Curly’ Watts. Ms Lancashire mentioned that quitting was ‘like leaping off a cliff at midnight’ however her want to pursue other forms of appearing led to roles as a nurse in ITV’s The place The Coronary heart Is, as a manufacturing facility employee in BBC1 drama Clocking Off and as a lawyer within the BBC comedy sequence Chambers.
She signed a take care of ITV value a reported £1.6million, which noticed her star in an adaptation of D H Lawrence’s novel Sons And Lovers. A return to theatre noticed her seem within the West Finish in musicals Guys And Dolls and, in 2011, Betty Blue Eyes.
Versatile: With James Fleet and John Chook in Chambers in 2000, and with Rupert Evans in Sons And Lovers in 2003
Expertise: On stage in Betty Blue Eyes in 2011 and in Final Tango in Halifax in 2014
Cooking up a cliffhanger: As a TV chef in Julia in 2022 and as cop Sgt Catherine Atwood in Blissful Valley
Ms Lancashire then starred in BBC1 comedy drama Final Tango In Halifax, which might run till 2020. It was written by Sally Wainwright, who additionally created Blissful Valley, which first aired in 2014.
Earlier than filming the ultimate sequence of the crime drama, Ms Lancashire, who’s married to TV government Peter Salmon and has three youngsters, started taking part in TV chef Julia Baby within the HBO sequence Julia.
Blissful Valley has gained a cult following within the US by way of Netflix. Followers there and within the UK are gearing up for an explosive last episode, with a trailer suggesting a fiery showdown between Sgt Cawood and villain Tommy Lee Royce, performed by James Norton.