As the 1960s began to swing, fun seekers in Newcastle were able to spend their hard-earned money on after-dark food, drink, gambling and entertainment at a growing number of newfangled nightspots.
La Dolce Vita goes down as arguably the region’s most iconic club, a venue which at its peak saw some of the biggest names in showbusiness performing to discerning Tyneside audiences. We see it here in 1979, some years after its glamorous 1960s heyday.
Run by three brothers from Wallsend – David, Marcus and Norman Levey – the club opened at 38-42 Low Friar Street, just along from the Mayfair Ballroom, in February 1963. Its Italian name, borrowed from the title of a Federico Fellini film, translated as ‘the good life’, suggesting something suitably exotic for the vibrant new decade which was emerging.
The venue advertised itself as “the North’s most luxurious nightclub”, a place where you could “see the stars in person. La Dolce Vita has everything for that special night out”. The stage was set in the middle of the lounge and surrounded by seating for 500 people.
Showbiz stars soon flocked there. Some would be flown from America to perform at London’s Talk of the Town, and then travel up to Newcastle to do their thing at La Dolce Vita. The acts were brought into the club at affordable prices, subsidised by profits from its busy roulette and blackjack tables.
The site of the former La Dolce Vita nightclub, Low Friar Street, Newcastle, in December 2024
(Image: ChronicleLive)
Cabaret was the name of the game. The Kaye Sisters were the first to perform, followed by the likes of Alma Cogan, Matt Monro, Dickie Valentine, Billy Daniels, Mel Torme and Billy Eckstein, along with up-and-coming acts such as Helen Shapiro, Cilla Black and Manfred Mann.
Other emerging big names who paid their dues at the Low Friar Street club included Tom Jones and David Frost, plus a host of rising stars such as Tommy Cooper, Bob Monkhouse, Dick Emery, Roy Castle and Lionel Blair who would become mainstays on UK television during the 1960s and ‘70s.
As well as the performers, other well-known faces – including The Beatles, Shirley Bassey, Jackie and Joan Collins, Ella Fitzgerald and Adam Faith – chose to enjoy a night off relaxing at the venue. On a darker note, London gangsters Ronnie and Reggie Kray paid a visit when they tried to extend their criminal empire into Tyneside. The club also gained some notoriety in 1967 when it was named in a gangland killing case dubbed the ‘One-Armed Bandit Murder’.
La Dolce Vita represented the height of sophistication at the time. An early price list recalls how draught or bottled beers were on sale from 1s/6d (around 7p in today’s money), and cocktails from 3s/6d (17p). If you fancied a bite to eat, meanwhile, a grilled steak with all the trimmings would knock you back 7s/6d (37p).
The Levey brothers sold the club to the Bailey Organisation in 1967, a year before the Gaming Act came into being, which meant entertainment now had to be separated from gaming – and many clubs could no longer afford to pay the top acts.
By 1979, when our photograph was taken, La Dolce Vita had lost much of its original ‘60s showbiz sparkle and was reduced to advertising ‘the cheapest beer on Tyneside’, on sale at 29p a pint.
In 1984, the club was given a new lease of life and reborn as Walkers. In 1993, it became Planet Earth, then in 2001 The Playrooms, before it closed for good a year later, and the premises were re-built as upmarket private flats.
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