'Our den became party central; everyone from the local would come to ours till 3am'

The little festival of six playets known as JB Shorts is becoming something of a tradition in Manchester. This is the fourth year in which a group of writers and actors from TV soaps get together to do the kind of work that they wouldn't be allowed to do on the telly but which was what brought them into writing and acting in the first place. Denizens of Emmerdale, EastEnders, Coronation Street, Holby City, Casualty, Two Pints of Lager, Heartbeat produce two hours that are polished, poignant and provocative.

Playing Simon Doyle in the 1978 film version of Agatha Christie's Death On The Nile opened the door for Simon MacCorkindale to join a spate of British actors who found fame on American television in the early 1980s.

Admiration for a star who spared us her tale of taking on cancer

In the 1980s, the Gold Blend couple kept viewers hanging on, in serialised ads that made sales soar. Nestlé may want to reheat the idea, but times have changed, says Claire Beale

Unrealistic expectations of what medical care can achieve are fostered by television series such as Holby City, leading patients to seek legal redress when miracles do not happen, it was claimed yesterday.

As safe as houses

Redheads are having a moment. Not on the catwalk or indeed in the newly unveiled autumn/winter 2009 advertising campaigns – redheads are far too rare and risky a business in the current climate when the order of the day is to keep things as safe as the proverbial houses. I'm thinking instead of the single redeeming feature in the appropriately desperate 'Desperate Romantics' – the burnished locks of muse Lizzie Siddal played by Amy Manson who verily has the most gorgeous hair known to television. Then of course, there's the star of the forthcoming American 'Vogue' documentary, 'The September Issue', Grace Coddington, to consider, whose mane of red hair establishes her as the agent provocateur of the piece where for the most part, once again, appealing to the many rather than the few is the driving force.

Sir Michael Lyons, the chairman of the BBC Trust, claimed £251.80 on a taxi to take him home from the London final of Strictly Come Dancing.

Hit the road, Jack

Michael Berkeley and Ian McEwan's new music drama is nasty, ghoulish and yet ineffectual

Mention casual gaming to Peter Molyneux, founder of game developers Lionhead, and the expression that passes across his face could barely look less casual. "There's a lot more people jumping on boards and waving sticks and doing casual games, and an awful lot of publishers now are literally going out and trying to create games for those people", he responds. You can't help but get the impression that this might well vex him a little. "Only the games that are excruciatingly casual", he adds, "are making casual gamers feel good".

Those who assist in circumstances like Daniel James's cannot be criminals