Coronation Street star confirms why major villain won’t return
"I don't like to overdo things."
Will Mellor has confirmed he won't return to Coronation Street following his latest stint as villain Harvey Gaskell.
The Mr Bates vs The Post Office star most recently featured in episodes of the ITV soap as the imprisoned drug lord between January and March, following previous appearances in 2021 and 2022.
Though he insisted he had "really enjoyed" playing Harvey, Mellor told The Mirror that he doesn't expect to return to the cobbles any time soon.
"I don't like to overdo things," he explained.
Mellor added that he'd originally expected his original Corrie tenure in 2021 to be a one-off but that he was intrigued enough by the character's 2022 comeback plot to revisit the part.
In October 2021, viewers saw Harvey kill Natasha Blakeman (played by Rachel Leskovac) in a case of mistaken identity, with Natasha's son Sam Blakeman (Jude Riordan) visiting Harvey in prison the following year.
The character returned one final time this year for a storyline involving his younger half-brother Damon Hay (Ciarán Griffiths)."They said 'we want him to come back for a bit' so I looked at the storyline and it was about [Sam] wanting to ask questions why [Harvey had] killed his mum and why he behaved the way he behaved," Mellor said.
"I thought that was really interesting. It was like this tough exterior guy and he gets unpacked by this young kid, and he makes him look at himself.
"This kid got under his skin. I thought it was really interesting through those scenes, but I think I've done everything I need to do with it and sometimes you can do too much and keep going back. And it sort of weakens the character and weakens the storyline, and I don't want to do that. Sometimes it's better to leave it where it is."
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Morgan Jeffery is the Digital Editor for Radio Times, overseeing all editorial output across the brand's digital platforms. He was previously TV Editor at Digital Spy and has featured as a TV expert on BBC Breakfast, BBC Radio 5 Live and Sky Atlantic.
