Bob Dylan offered chance of a lifetime ‘Coronation Street’ cameo
In 2022’s final act of absurdity, it would seem that Bob Dylan – perhaps the greatest artist in human history – has been offered the chance of appearing in his favourite TV show, Coronation Street. You really couldn’t write it, aside from the fact I just did.
The folk icon doesn’t do many interviews these days, but in his latest with the Wall Street Journal, he has confirmed that he is still quite possibly the funniest person in music, and he still has us all dancing to his tune. As Paul Simon once said: “Dylan, everything he sings has two meanings. He’s telling you the truth and making fun of you at the same time.”
Speaking with Jeff Slate in promotion of his new book, The Philosophy of Modern Song, the croaky 81-year-old folk star revealed his current TV viewing habits, Dylan said, “Two or three hours in front of the tube is a lot of binge watching for me. Too much time to be involved with the screen. Or maybe I’m too old for it.”
That seems all well and good, but the shows he watched really raised an eyebrow. I’ve binge watched Coronation Street, Father Brown, and some early Twilight Zones,” he said. “I know they’re old-fashioned shows, but they make me feel at home.”
Savvy producers have since taken the opportunity to offer him a cameo in the show, and I’m sure the writers will be waiting on bated breath at the concept of somehow weaving in the ‘Blowin’ in the Wind’ star into the show.
“To hear that Bob Dylan is a Coronation Street viewer blows my mind,” Producer Ian MacLeod told The Telegraph. “I would absolutely love the idea of him turning up in the Rovers Return one night. Maybe we could write in an open mic night and a mysterious singer could roll in out of the Manchester rain and do a turn.”
In fairness, that would have a very Greenwich Village feel to it. Furthermore, it is not a million miles away from how Dylan first appeared on our screens. In 1962, Dylan was actually invited across the Atlantic by the British TV executive Philip Saville. He had witnessed an early Dylan performance in a New York City dive bar and sought to bring him over to the growing London scene to perform on the drama, Madhouse on Castle Street.
Therein, Dylan recalls: “I ran into some people in England who really knew those [traditional English] songs. Martin Carthy, another guy named [Bob] Davenport. Martin Carthy’s incredible. I learned a lot of stuff from Martin”
When he arrived, his manager Albert Grossman and one of Dylan’s early heroes, Odetta, were already acquainting themselves with the frosty London scene. Dylan checked in Mayfair Hotel and later broke his performative duct in the Madhouse on Castle Street playing an early incarnation of ‘Blowin’ in the Wind’ which aired on January 13th, 1963.
Thus, it’s not out of the question for him to accept the offer once more. As MacLeod concluded: “Both he and Coronation Street established their reputations in the 1960s, both have championed working class voices and causes, both tell stories with a particular sensibility and sense of humour.”
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