We sat down with Sherrie Hewson, actress, comedian, one of the original Loose Women panelists and a beloved face of British television for over five decades to talk about Benidorm’s enduring appeal, what the early days of Loose Women were really like, why she feels sad for where the show is now, and the road trip series she thinks she and Amanda Barry could make brilliantly.
The Fan Who Had “Never Watched” Benidorm But Knew Every Line
Rumours about Benidorm returning have been swirling for some time. Sherrie is honest about being in the dark just like the rest of us.
“I wish I could tell you it was coming back, but actors are always the last to know. They don’t tell us anything, they only tell the people making it. I genuinely have no idea, but I think it would be a shame if it didn’t return because it’s still on twice a day and the ratings are as high as ever.
“Wherever I go, that’s what people want to talk to me about.”
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The warmth Benidorm still generates is something she witnesses constantly and often in the most surprising ways.
“I had a lady come up to me the other day who said, ‘I’ve never seen Benidorm.’ I said, ‘Oh, that’s fine.’ She said, ‘It’s not really my thing. Especially the one where you had the Botox.’ I said, ‘That one wasn’t…’ She went on: ‘And when you knocked Keller’s teeth out — I didn’t like that at all.’ I said, ‘But you’ve never watched it?’ She said, ‘No, no — I’ve never seen it.’ And then she proceeded to quote every scene and every episode.
“She knew every line, every storyline, including when I was married to John Challis on Peacock Island. But she’d ‘never watched it.’ I thought, that’s the strangest thing anyone’s ever said to me.”
Soap Actors Deserve Far More Credit
With a career spanning soaps, sitcoms, theatre and television, Sherrie has strong views on the craft and a clear frustration at how those who work in certain formats are perceived.
“I hate soaps being called ‘soap operas’ and I hate the idea of ‘soap actors,’ because they’re not. They’re actors, brilliant in their own right, who happen to work in that format.
“On a soap, you go home with five episodes in your hand, sit up all night learning them, go in at six in the morning, and do it all over again. No time to rehearse, no time to sit down and discuss the scene. You get maybe two takes, and you have to be right on that second one, because it’s ‘move on.’ It’s terrifying, but what a learning curve.”
She draws a direct line back to the Carry On films, where she learned by watching rather than by being told.
“I remember doing the Carry Ons when I was very young, and I had the sense to just watch. Kenneth Connor, Kenneth Williams, Joan Sims, Sid James – I watched how they worked the camera, how they used the lighting. They were clever, clever actors who I don’t think were appreciated enough at the time. The same goes for soap actors today. Give them the credit they deserve.”
Why She Feels Sad for The Early Days of Loose Women Now
As one of the original Loose Women panellists, Sherrie’s memories of the show’s earliest days are vivid and the contrast with what it has become is not lost on her.
“We started in Norwich and genuinely didn’t think anyone was watching. And I don’t think anyone was! We had nobody controlling us, no solicitors coming down saying ‘be careful what you say about that person.’
“We just had proper rows, said whatever we wanted, and came off set and went, ‘Oh, shut up, it didn’t mean anything.’”
The guests in those early years were extraordinary and the memories have stayed with her.
“Oprah Winfrey came on with barely an entourage — just two people — and she was brilliant. Bette Midler. Alan Alda from M*A*S*H, which I’d watched all my life. I was so star-struck when he sat down that I completely froze on air. Andrea had to step in and cover for me. He was the sweetest man, he took my hand and kissed it, as if to say ‘I know, it’s okay.’
“And George Michael, who would never come into the studio, but rang in every week for ten minutes just to chat and share his gossip. I mean, how mad is that?”
The show’s current form, she says, is a different matter entirely.
“The last time I went on as a guest, they took me aside beforehand and said, ‘Be very careful what you say, Sherry.’ I said, ‘Wrong person. If you were worried about that, you shouldn’t have asked me on.’
“What I feel sad about is that they’ve lost the audience and the guests. That rapport with a live audience was everything. The audience would heckle! They were electric. Without that energy in the room, it’s lost something that was at the very heart of what made Loose Women work.”
Strictly, Bake Off, and the Road Trip Show Nobody Has Given Women Yet
Sherrie is far from done with television and has a clear list of what she’d still love to do, alongside an observation about what women are conspicuously never offered.
“I’d love to do Strictly, actually. My mother and father were ballroom dancers, so it’s in the blood. I don’t know if I’m too old now but I’d do it. I’d probably do Celebrity Bake Off too, I do like cooking.”
She also has a connection to Dancing on Ice that predates the show by several decades, training at Nottingham Ice Rink as a young woman where a certain pair of future champions were also on the ice.
“That’s my claim to fame, that I used to dance around Torvill and Dean on a Saturday morning.”
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But it’s the celebrity road trip format that really gets her going and not in a good way.
“Whenever you see these celebrity road trip shows, it’s always two men.
“Bradley Walsh and his son, Martin Kemp and his son. There’s another one just going out now.
“No two women are ever offered those road trips. Why is that? I genuinely don’t understand it. Amanda Barry and I are best friends, and we could do a brilliant road trip around Britain together. We could go to all the great old theatres, so many that are locked up now, forgotten, that people have never been inside. Discovering British theatre. I’ll think of a title.”
>> Read more: Beverley Callard who talks about life on the cobbles and how her fitness DVD knocked Al Pacino off the number one spot.
Make Sure You Can Always Pay Your Bills
Few people are better placed to offer perspective on a career in television than Sherrie Hewson, who left RADA in the early seventies and has barely stopped working since. Her advice to the next generation is practical, clear-eyed, and tinged with an affection for the craft.
“My first piece of advice is always the same: get a job so you can earn money. Don’t rely on acting to pay your bills while you’re waiting for the break. I came from an era where there was work fifty-two weeks a year, films, theatre, television, sitcoms, dramas, we never stopped. Those days are gone. Now you have to be versatile.
Don’t rely on being just a dancer or just a singer. You have to be able to do everything.”
She is also a firm believer in making your own opportunities — a lesson she takes from an unlikely source.
“When Spielberg was young and not wealthy, his dad bought him a little camera. He’d get his mates, write a script, and just go and film something. That’s still valid. Everybody’s got a story — write it, get a camera, get your mates, and make something. Show it to someone. You never know.”
Her own entry into the profession was, by today’s standards, almost incomprehensibly difficult. Getting an Equity card was a genuine battle, one that led to a memorably absurd early experience.
“My agent got me a commercial for a chocolate bar, but he said I couldn’t be seen in it or I’d be blacklisted. So I spent the whole shoot hiding behind desks and doors, popping up and saying ‘oh, sorry!’ every time the camera panned near me. Somehow I got away with it.”
The harder route, she argues, produced something that cannot be taught.
“It was hard, and it was supposed to be hard because you fought for it, and that gave you a different mindset entirely. Now anybody can call themselves an actor. Which means you have to think even harder about what makes you stand out.”
“I love Bingo!”
When it comes to bingo, Sherrie is a huge fan and cites her father as an influence.
“I always used to play with my dad, and I still play now and the younger ones today seem to have grasped onto it.
“You can’t beat the buzz of a bingo hall or playing down at the seaside, it’s something that all the family can enjoy, and goodness knows I have played plenty of games and have happy memories of doing so.”
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