Helena Bonham Carter has been confirmed to star in a new three-part ITV series penned by Russell T. Davies about Crossroads icon Noele Gordon.

Entitled Nolly, the actress. 55, will play the titular character as the action follows the soap star’s rise to fame and her fall from grace after being axed from the show with no warning.

Crossroads fan from 1964 until 1983. It centered around Gordon’s character Meg, who was a mother of two, struggling to run the family home after the death of her husband.

After finding her husband’s insurance money, she used it to turn her large Georgian house into a motel.

Speaking about her casting in a press statement, Bonham Carter said: “Noele Gordon was a fascinating, complex, brilliant and gutsy woman - none of which I knew before I read Russell T Davies’ script.

“I’m so thrilled to help tell Nolly’s long overdue and largely forgotten story. Russell’s screenplay is a work of brilliance and I hope I’ll do him and Nolly justice. I can’t wait to start.”

ITV’s head of drama, Polly Hill, said of the upcoming project: “Russell’s scripts are magnificent and a great tribute to Noele Gordon, but also to our national love of soaps and a celebration of the incredible women they create.

“Helena Bonham Carter is going to be amazing as Nolly and we can’t wait for her to step into those shoes.”