Cherie Lunghi’s shock at Whitley Bay decline

Sep 21 2008 by Pauline Holt, Sunday Sun

STRICTLY COME DANCING star Cherie Lunghi says she is heartbroken at the decline of a North seaside resort.

In a BBC North East and Cumbria programme to be screened this week, the actress — who also played a football club boss in the TV series The Manageress — gives Whitley Bay in North Tyneside the red card.

Cherie was invited by the BBC Inside Out production team to revisit the place she spent happy childhood holidays and give the audience her verdict.

It was her first trip back in five decades and she was shocked to find a seafront full of run-down, boarded-up properties . . . a far cry from the bustling town she remembered.

She said: “This is my first time back to Whitley Bay for around 50 years. I remember it as an incredibly exciting, bustling seaside resort.

“Now I see it, and I’m so saddened by the neglect and the fact it doesn’t seem to know what it is anymore.”

Cherie, 56, used to travel to Whitley Bay from London on holiday with her mum to visit her aunt and cousins, and she has fond memories of the Spanish City and her time spent riding on the helter skelter.

The programme shows archive footage of Whitley Bay in the 1950s, with its packed beach and crowds of people arriving at the station.

Cherie added: “My memories of this place are really happy. It’s heartbreaking to see the way Whitley Bay looks now. It’s really worse than I expected. Looks are important, and Whitley Bay has really let herself go.

“Whitley Bay was my first experience of the seaside. I’d buy my bucket and spade, and beach ball, and all the shops were teeming with toys. I used to spend hours on the shuggy boats. It’s nothing like I remember. It’s as though that never existed and I might have dreamt it.”

But Andrew Kerr, chief executive of North Tyneside Council, says that the long-awaited regeneration of Whitley Bay is underway, with an investment package of £60m. He said: “I don’t think Whitley Bay is that different to many other seaside towns that are trying to find their place in life now.

“We’re going to spend £60m on it immediately, on a new theatre, a new park, a new Spanish City, the dome, a new leisure centre and a new skate park.

“It’s all aimed at making this attractive, probably for weekend visitors and for people who want to use this as a nice place to live.”

At the end of her visit, Cherie tells viewers she is hopeful for the future: “Whitley Bay is on the cusp. Parts of it look appalling, but big bucks and big characters could change all that.

“I’ve met people who have ideas and vision and who love the place. And that’s given me hope.”

Cherie Lunghi has appeared in many popular drama series, from Casualty and Cutting It to Secret Diary of a Callgirl.

:: See Cherie on Inside Out (North East and Cumbria) on BBC1 at 7.30pm on Wednesday, September 24.