Charley Webb ‘I definitely have mum guilt - I think every mum does’
19.09.2023 - 07:59
/ ok.co.uk
Actress Charley Webb spent almost 20 years on our screens as Emmerdale’s feisty Debbie Dingle after joining the soap aged 14. Now, the Manchester-born actress is a 35-year-old mum of three, embarking on a new adventure after saying goodbye to the Dales for the final time in 2021. Speaking exclusively to OK!, she opens up about the work-life juggle, especially when it comes to suffering “mum guilt” over sons Buster, 13, Bowie, seven, and Ace, four, who she shares with her husband and former Emmerdale co-star Matthew Wolfenden.
“I do have mum guilt, definitely – I think every mum does,” she tells us. “Even if you go for a coffee with a friend, you have mum guilt – you can’t really get rid of it. It’s ingrained in us, isn’t it?”.
She continued, “And I think it’ll always be there, no matter where I’m working. If I want to work, I think I just have to get used to that feeling – it isn’t going anywhere.” And Charley does want to work - she's currently in the throes of the final rehearsals for a stage performance of Quiz, a semi-fictional dramatisation of the infamous Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? coughing scandal. It begins this week in Chichester, West Sussex, before heading off on a nationwide tour and finishing in Birmingham in December.
Charley plays Diana Ingram, the wife of Major Charles Ingram, who was denied his bumper winnings following a trial at Southwark Crown Court. Rehearsing and learning only one script is a far cry from her time working on the busy Emmerdale set, she tells us. "The work-life balance was quite difficult at times with three children, so it felt like the right time to make the jump and try other stuff," she says.