INTRO

 

LIAM: They’ve seen some right sights, these gardens over the years.

SELWYN: We know where the best bits are.

LIAM: So come on. We’ll show you.

SELWYN: Feel free to wander.

LIAM: Or pick your favourite bench and have a rest.

SELWYN: Come off the beaten track.

LIAM: Sit there and lend us your ears.

SELWYN: South Cliff gardens. Where everything is calm and chill.

LIAM: Come with us, we’ll be your guides.

SELWYN: We are Cupid’s best scallywags.

LIAM: We’ll give you the low down of the place, South Cliff.

SELWYN: Tell you where the best Scarborough loves stories are hid.

LIAM: Where to start?

 

1. RUSTY AND RON

 

SELWYN: Rusty and Ron.

LIAM: Rusty and Ron! They fell in love when they were 16 years old. 

SELWYN: Both born in Scarbs.

LIAM: On the very same day. Friday 20 December 1940. Sound of war planes up above.

RUSTY: I’m Rusty and this is Ron.

RON: Very nice to meet you. How do you do?

RUSTY: We were just teenagers when we fell in love.

RON: We walked a lot.

RUSTY: We talked a lot. 

RON: We danced a lot.

RUSTY: We had nights out at the Olympia and the spa. We loved the rock and roll.

RON: And we courted in South Cliff gardens.

RUSTY: It was a long walk up.

RON: We cuddled up in the shelter. Enjoying the soft silence. Just the two of us.

RUSTY: And do you remember that time we got caught, when a face just popped up at the window? We nearly jumped out of our skin.

RON: We made a quick mad dash to the top. Clutching tight to each other's hands.

RUSTY: We parted ways in our 20s, lived our own full life journeys.

RON: But I always kept a lock of her rust coloured hair.

RUSTY: And I always kept the brown leather shoes that I wore on that Youth hostelling trip we took to Snowdonia.

SELWYN: Well they say true love prevails.

LIAM: Because they met up decades later, did Rusty and Ron.

SELWYN: Yep. By chance, at the Nag’s head, at the start of the Scalby Walk.

RON: I went down for a drink with my brother and there she was my Rusty.

RUSTY: I’ll never forget - it was fancy dress, I was dressed as a cheer leader!

RON: Still as beautiful as the day I saw her last.

SELWYN: Rusty and Ron, reunited and both single once more.

LIAM: They got married in 2019.

RON: On our birthday.

RUSTY: On our birthday.

RON: And we still visit that shelter from time to time.

RUSTY: We do.

RON: Loved you then

RUSTY: Love you still

RON: Always have

RUSTY: Always will 

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2. ALL SORTS

 

LIAM: These gardens. Feel frozen in time. Life moves through them.

SELWYN: I come here when everything wants a piece of me, and I need to switch off, get away, stop scrolling, stop using my eyes for a bit and just be me, in the green.

LIAM: Get a lot of rough sleepers in here, I’ve noticed that.

SELWYN: Yeah, and there was that guy, who just kept acquiring more things. A mattress, a children’s trike, and then this keyboard! And every now and then you’d hear keyboard music floating up through the Italian Gardens. We had some good chats me and him.

LIAM: And what about that time you nearly blew yoursen up, messing about with a lighter near that gas valve?

SELWYN: Yeah, well, we don’t talk about that. Not my best moment.

 

3. CASTLES AND MARS BAR WRAPPERS 

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LIAM: It’s the 1980s!

SELWYN: A time of turmoil.

LIAM: This is David.

DAVID: Back then, I was a mixed up young man.

BEV: And then you met me.

DAVID: Came to Scarbs on one of our very first days out.

DAVID: We came on good old British Rail, we won our tickets on Mars Bar Wrappers. My Nan saved up the coupons and you could swap them for free train tickets.

BEV: Bless her, she was lovely Dave's Nan. Anyway, we stayed in a little guest house, up near the castle and I wore a fake wedding ring. I don’t know why, nobody bothered about stuff like that, even back then. Still, I was a bit nervous.

DAVID: I told her the landlady knew it was fake.

BEV: And when I asked him how he said… 

DAVID: …because your finger was turning green! 

BEV: He likes to crack jokes, some of them are even funny. I think that’s why I liked you. Well, let's be honest, it wasn’t for your looks was it? 

DAVID: I remember we walked down to the south cliff and looked out from the Italian gardens, over the bay towards the lighthouse.

BEV: It was beautiful and I knew I wanted to live near the sea, you know the sort of thing, in a little cottage overlooking the bay with roses round the door and a picket-fenced garden full of kids, only he wasn’t so keen on the kids part back then.

DAVID: And here we are forty years later, living just down the road in a house by the sea, and we have four grandchildren.

BEV: We're still happily married too, but his jokes aren’t any better.

 

4. PASSION

LIAM: And there’s all sorts of ways to fall in love, you know.

MATTHEW: Wide shot. Jump shot. Close up. Edit.

SELWYN: Not all just kissing and cuddling.

LIAM: This is Matthew. From Barrowcliff.

SELWYN: Who fell in love with film making in these gardens.

MATTHEW: A summer course it was, at Beeforth’s Hive. We made a film about zombies. But now I want to make documentaries. About me and my mum and all the other kids where I live.

Just me and my camera

Retelling others stories

A passion reborn

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5. GRANDMOTHERS & PIGGY BACKS

LIAM: And what about Oliwia and her grandma? They used to come here loads didn’t they, on walks through the roses after school.

SELWYN: Yeah. That’s a special kind of outing, is that. Everyone needs a Nan.

OLIWIA: Me and my grandmother

Talking about my bad day

She made me feel loved

LIAM: And my beautiful Jess. When she walks among the flowers, I know she remembers hers too.

JESSICA: The roses transport me 

As if she were here

I miss her so I feel her now

Walking beside me

SELWYN: How did you and your Jess meet anyway?

LIAM: At uni. Came here for one of our first dates.

SELWYN: Kept that one quiet didn’t you!

LIAM: We went for a walk along South Cliff, walking along the beach and up the hill to look out over the cliffs.

JESSICA: It was a beautiful day, sunny and warm.

LIAM: On our way to the beach we walked across the star map.

JESSICA: We didn't realise the time but the tide had started coming in, and getting back onto sand was quite a big drop, well for me anyway. But he came over and offered me a piggyback ride. I was so nervous being so close to him but I felt safe and it just felt right. 

LIAM: We’ve had some hardships along the way, but everything worked out for the best didn’t it?

JESSICA: I’m so happy and proud to call you my best friend.

LIAM: Me too.

SELWYN: Aaaw. You guys.

 

6. MAGIC

SELWYN: And there’s magic in these gardens too.

LIAM: Definitely. They used to come here for miles, believing it were in the very waters. The magic waters of the spa.

SELWYN: And if you do believe, I know where the fairies live. Down near the Rose Garden, if you look up right close, there’s a little tiny door in a tree. And my friend Aggie, she nearly saw one once.

AGGIE: I sat there in the garden for ages. I were waiting for the fairy to come out, but it never did.

SELWYN: Keep waiting Aggie.

 

7. STAR MAP / SCARS

LIAM: Have you been down to the star map, where you can find true north?

SELWYN: And the big dipper.

LIAM: Good to have a map when times get tough.

SELWYN: The course of true love never did run smooth.

ELAINE: I think it’s sad, really. When you think about what this town used to be. And when I see the star map, where south bay pool was before, I think of it as a scar. Not the only scar in Scarborough, there’s been lots of broken promises along the way. I sometimes feel that everything that had been promised for the people in this town has been lost in progress plans. I have such happy memories of here but I see scars. Scars crying. Hopefully waiting to be filled by the joys of the future.

 

8. LOVE LIVES HERE

SELWYN: Them views those. You gotta love ‘em.

LIAM: The red brown cliffs against the blue sky.

SELWYN: When the world’s on yer neck.

LIAM: Telling you to toughen up.

SELWYN: Get on with it.

LIAM: Be a man.

SELWYN: You can come up here and rise above it.

LIAM: Watch the waves curving into each other.

SELWYN: Watch the surfers out on the sea, falling off their boards. Sit here on your own all night and wait for the dawn.

LIAM: I came here with my mates one night and we saw a big blood moon, hung in the sky, like the top of a can of San Pellegrino. All of us, just sat there in a row, silenced, staring at the moon. Big and red.

SONG: When the world’s 

on your neck 

and you can’t think straight. X 2

My place to walk, a place to talk. 

Lose yourself, find yourself, be yourself.

Love lives here. Love lives here. Love lives here.

ALL: Love lives here. Love lives here. Love lives here.

RUSTY: Always has.

RON: Always will.