LACEY TURNER ATTRIBUTES EASTENDERS SET ENCOUNTER TO WENDY RICHARD'S GHOST

Lacey Turner says she felt a sudden blow on her backside while working on the EastEnders set and believes it came from Wendy Richard’s ghost. Turner said she was standing by a back door, deciding whether to take a cigarette break, when she felt a “great big whack”. She turned round expecting to see a runner, but saw nobody nearby. Turner said she thought Richard was prompting her to join the cigarette break they used to share.

Turner said she, Richard and Laila Morse regularly smoked together when they worked on EastEnders. She recalled standing in the studio where the Fowler family filmed when she felt the blow. Barbara Windsor was there that day, Turner said, but Windsor was at the other end of the studio. Richard played Pauline Fowler from the soap’s first episode until the character’s death in 2006. Richard died from breast cancer in February 2009.

Turner has played Stacey Slater on and off since 2004 and is a contestant on Strictly Come Dancing with professional partner Vito Coppola. She said Morse still believes the unexplained touch “got to have been Wendy”. In 2021, Morse said Richard had urged her to see a doctor after she found a breast lump; Morse received a breast cancer diagnosis in 2000. Morse said she did not initially follow Richard’s advice.