Blake Harrison plays Alfie, a man dumped at the altar by Carly (Justine Michelle Cain), who retreats to his parents’ neon-soaked B&B on the Kent coast where every room pays tribute to the 1980s. The six-part ITV comedy, written by Robert Evans and produced by Hartswood Films, traps Alfie between Camp Gary (Evans) and Bald Gary (Adrian Scarborough), the camp, married co-managers who treat the foyer as their stage, while his mother Judy (Camille Coduri) and stepfather Tandeep (Nitin Kundra) insist the place is a goldmine despite the empty off-season car park.
The real action happens in the windowless staff corridor where demobbed squaddie Ann-Marie (Laura Checkley) practices army drills, Michelle (Louisa Lytton) rehearses Whitney Houston numbers for the lounge talent night, and pensioner Nanny Mo (Marcia Warren) hoards contraband packets of Space Raiders in her knitting bag. Each 45-minute episode stretches a single farcical premise across a weekend of coach-party arrivals, from a malfunctioning Pac-Man arcade machine to a male-stripper double booking that forces Alfie into gold lamé hotpants.
Shot on location in Margate’s Dreamland amusement park and the crumbling seafront hotels, the series averaged 2.3 million viewers, won a repeat run on Thursday nights, and then vanished; ITV never recommissioned it, leaving the cliff-hanger of Alfie’s prospective emigration to Australia unresolved.
Production Details
ITV / 1 Season / 6 Episodes / 2014
Created by: Paul McKenzie, Robert Evans
Showrunner(s): Beryl Vertue
Writer(s): Robert Evans
Main Cast
Marcia Warren as Nanny Mo
Justine Michelle Cain as Carly
Robert Evans as Camp Gary
Michael Smiley as Snowy
Blake Harrison as Alfie
Camille Coduri as Judy
Adrian Scarborough as Bald Gary
Louisa Lytton as Michelle
Nitin Kundra as Tandeep
Laura Checkley as Ann-Marie
Nav Sidhu as Donkey
Raphael Sowole as Spanner
