Barry Band: Blackpool Stardust Garden was quietly dropped

The Gazette’s series of Looking Back photos has included political conference platforms at the Winter Gardens.

But last Saturday’s picture from 1970 prompted memories of another kind of show.

The platform party in the Empress Ballroom were seated under an ornate header that appeared to have come from a garden centre!

Have you guessed it yet?

If you were old enough to have had a big night out in 1970, you may have seen two big name dance bands on the platform and the decor was part of the setting for Bernard Delfont’s ambitious Stardust Garden night spot.

In October that year the Labour Party Conference moved in. The garden cent frame was still in place with the addition of the slogan Britain Needs a Labour Government - just four months after the party had been dumped in a General Election.

During the summer season of the Stardust Garden show the Cyril Stapleton Showband and Bob Miller and the Millermen provided the music, the glamour was provided by the Dorris Girls from Paris and the vocals were by Blayne Barrington and Carol Elvin.

The featured act was Lonnie Donegan and that reminds me of the amazed look in his face when I turned up at the pre-season photo call.

“What are you doing here? You interviewed me in Vancouver a few weeks ago,” he said.

True, I had talked to Lonnie for a Vancouver newspaper before rejoining the Gazette.

The Stardust Garden project was based on Bernard Delfont’s Talk of the Town night spot in the old London Hippodrome and was directed by Robert Nesbitt.

The ballroom conversion, however, could be described as a tarting-up job of plastic foliage and garden furniture.

A stage apron and two walkways were built on the ballroom floor with tables and chairs all round.

A crew of lovely girls, including two former Miss Blackpools, served drinks and light meals from airline-style trollies.

But the Delfont team were not in tune with the drinking requirements of Blackpool holidaymakers. There were no pints of beer. A serious omission!

As far as typical Northern Man was concerned, bybeer in cans was no better than lemonade. There was a constant drift to the bar in the Floral Hall.

For the Stardust Garden’s second season draught Heineken was available but not draught ale. For the third year a proper bar was installed.

After the fourth season the Stardust Garden was quietly dropped.

It failed because not enough visitors wanted a smart night out.

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Another comedy great has departed. To younger generations Roy Hudd (1936-2020) was known as undertaker Archie Shuttleworth in Coronation Street.

But we older folk remember Huddy from nearly 50 years of comic acting roles in television and film and particularly for his Radio 2 satirical show, The News Huddlines, from 1975-2001.

He also wrote several books on music hall and light entertainment and was a columnist in Yours magazine. I was privileged to spend an hour with him in Blackpool in 2008 and give him a copy of All for a Laugh, an anthology of comedy careers which I wrote with Bradford writer Mick Crossley.

* Fans of comedian Freddie Davies can see his Mr Parrot face routine on the Talking Pictures channel (Freeview 81) in a 1965 Palladium show at 9pm on Sunday.