Buy supplies at the Minute Mart! Bottle up at the Vic! Do a service wash at the launderette! Yes, prepare for cockney shouting and killer revelations because it’s EastEnders Live Week, celebrating the BBC soap’s 30th anniversary on 19 February. Here’s all you need to know – in numerical form…
23 – the number of original main cast members, including GP Dr Legg and malapropism-prone pensioner Ethel Skinner. Some 17 million viewers tuned in for the launch episode, while ratings peaked at 30.15m on Christmas Day 1986, when “Dirty” Den Watts handed divorce papers to his wife, Angie, still the highest-rated soap episode in UK TV history.
There have been 102:deaths since the show began, including four dogs: Willy, Roly, Wellard and Sugar, more missed than most of the humans.
3 of those deaths have been big whodunnits. “Who shot Phil Mitchell?” in 2001 (his ex-girlfriend Lisa Shaw), “Who killed Archie Mitchell?” in 2010 (Stacey Slater) and “Who killed Lucy Beale?”, which we’ll find out this week. Ian Beale is the only character to be a suspect in all three killings.
Speaking of Ian Beale, he shares top spot for most spouses – 4 apiece for him, Pat Butcher and Phil Mitchell, making them Albert Square’s most married characters. If Beale the Squeal’s remarriage goes ahead this week (to Jane Collins), he’ll pull ahead.
125 pairs of earrings in Pat Butcher’s collection. Fans used to send in earrings for actress Pam St Clement to wear on-screen (left).
It would take 104 days to watch every episode back to back. It would be a depressing 104 days, too.
3,000 text messages and hundreds of calls were received by a Birmingham businesswoman in 2010 after her number was inadvertently shown on Ricky Butcher’s mobile.
830 soap scenes were studied by Liverpool John Moores University, which in 2013 found that EastEnders was the unhealthiest soap in terms of smoking (mainly down to Dot Cotton). In an entire fortnight of viewing the chirpy denizens of Walford E8, the researchers also noted that nobody took even the tiniest step of exercise.
4: the chart position reached by Anyone Can Fall in Love, actress Anita Dobson’s recording of the EastEnders theme tune with added lyrics. It was produced by Queen guitarist Brian May, whom Dobson later married.
16: the number of closing scenes for Kellie Bright’s character Linda Carter last year, making her the 2014 “duff duff” champion. All-time highest is Phil Mitchell, who has led into the famous drum roll 240 times
£5: the sum for which Phil Mitchell sold half of the Queen Vic to dastardly Dan Sullivan in 1999
3 people influenced Barbara Windsor’s portrayal of Peggy Mitchell: Violet Kray (mother of Reggie and Ronnie), her own mother, and Mike Reid, who played her screen husband Frank Butcher. Windsor returns for a guest spot this week. Get outta my pub!
EastEnders Live Week comprises a fully live episode on 20 February and live inserts in every other episode.
