Manx-born Verity MacLeod tells us about her dream job as assistant producer on Coronation Street - and about her favourite storyline.

’I’ve worked for Corrie since 2005 so I’ve seen all the crises.

’I thought I’d been there and done it all at Coronation Street but then Covid hit and we’ve had to face some serious challenges,’ says Verity.

Verity was educated at Laxey School then the Buchan and King William’s College. She studied English Literature at Kingston University then, having ambitions to be an actor, she did a one-year drama course in Stratford-Upon-Avon.

She says: ’It was absolutely brilliant but it really sharpened my focus, showing me that what I really liked was working behind the scenes, on the scripts and the story.’

Returning to the island, Verity worked at the Villa and the Gaiety: ’Then I was really lucky to get a week’s work experience at Corrie in 2005. And I never really left.’

After doing holiday cover in various departments and, including as a runner and making coffee, she got a job as a production secretary and began to learn all about the production side of the show.

’I never, ever thought I would end up as assistant producer. I was just really happy working there,’ she says.

She then started working on the editorial side of the show as a script secretary, dealing with script changes.

She says: ’That was the start of my real career and it was really great. Then, in 2007, I was made first assistant script editor and a few months after that, progressed to script editor.

’I loved it, working with writers, producers and actors and I really found my stride. Then Corrie went to six episodes a week and I went to script producer, taking charge of the script team.’

Verity had married Ian MacLeod who also worked on the show and, after leaving to have a baby, returned in 2019 just after he had been made the show’s producer. Six months later she was made assistant producer.

Looking back on her career so far she says: ’I was just really lucky to get that foot in the door.’

So, after 16 years at Corrie, what has been Verity’s favourite storyline?

She has no hesitation in picking the show burn coercive control story about Geoff and Yasmeen, told over two years, with most of it filmed under the restrictions of Covid. The story culminated in Geoff’s death, falling from a roof. The episode was aired on December 9 last year, which was also Coronation Street’s 60th Anniversary.

Verity says: ’The story was shown during lockdown, when domestic violence went up. Women’s Aid, who we consulted with on the story, told us the number of calls from women increased after it was shown.

’Often women who are victims of coercive control are so worn down they often don’t know it is happening to them. By watching our story they understood that they were being controlled.’

Covid restrictions gave them all sorts of headaches during the filming: people couldn’t be closer than two metres, which also meant they couldn’t get all of their cameras onto the set.

And they couldn’t go and film at locations outside the studio. When the Yasmeen and Geoff storyline called for a court scene, they couldn’t go and film in a courtroom, they had to physically build one on set.

Verity says: ’So it was also my favourite because we did it under the hardest conditions we’ve ever had to work under.

’It wasn’t just that the storyline was massively important socially, it was also a triumph for everyone involved.’