Actress Sue Cleaver will leave Coronation Street after 25 years, but is keeping the “door open” to make a return to the soap.
The star, 61, has played the outspoken and uncomplicated Eileen Grimshaw in the ITV show since 2000.
Cleaver said: “I’ve had 25 privileged years of working on Coronation Street.
“The door is still firmly open, but as I reached my 60th year I decided it was time to embrace change, look for new adventures and live fearlessly.”
It is understood that Cleaver made the decision in the summer, after her appearance in the Sister Act musical tour. She returned to the stage for the first time in about three decades.
She will have an exit storyline which will air in the spring.
Producer Kate Brooks said: “We’re sad to bid farewell to the wonderful Sue Cleaver.
“Over the past 25 years, Eileen Grimshaw has been at the heart of some of the most memorable and iconic Corrie storylines, and her onscreen rivalry with Gail Platt will undoubtedly go down in Corrie folklore.
“There’s certainly no-one quite like Eileen, and her character will be hugely missed on the cobbles. We wish Sue all the very best as she embarks on her next exciting chapter.”
At Christmas, Helen Worth said farewell to the cobbles after 50 years.
In her exit storyline Gail Rodwell (Worth) swapped Weatherfield for a new life in France, after she finally got her happy ending by marrying Jesse Chadwick, played by John Thomson.
Eileen entered the soap to work at the local taxi firm, StreetCars, to provide for her two tearaway teenage children, Jason (Ryan Thomas) and Todd (Bruno Langley).
She soon became friends with her boss Steve McDonald (Simon Gregson) and came into conflict with Gail.
Their feud began following relationship issues between Gail’s daughter Sarah (Tina O’Brien) and Eileen’s son Todd, and culminated in the two mothers fighting on the cobbles.
The pair rolled on the ground, pulled one another’s hair and hurled abuse until they were dragged apart in a big TV moment.
It was the culmination of a storyline in which Todd struggles with coming to terms with his sexuality, has a relationship with nurse Karl Foster, and comes out as gay.
Similar to Gail, Eileen has been unlucky in relationships, and had flings with Dennis Stringer (Charles Dale), Ed Jackson (Chris Walker), Michael Rodwell (Les Dennis) and Jerry Morton (Michael Starke) along with marrying the criminal Pat Phelan (Connor McIntyre).
Cleaver won best soap actress gongs at the TV Choice Awards in 2007 and the British Soap Awards in 2006.
She took part in I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! in 2022, where she opened up about reconciling with her birth mother, and was eliminated third.
Cleaver also said her family is “bizarrely interconnected” to other Coronation Street stars, including Worth who is godmother to one of her half-sisters, and the other half-sister’s husband, John Bowe, appeared on the cobbles as Duggie Ferguson.
In 2024, she released the book A Work In Progress in which she discusses how she still feels she is not past her prime, and she has appeared as a panellist in recent years on ITV chat show Loose Women.
