EastEnders Wiki

NOTE: Please do not add spoilers as this is a spoiler-free Wiki and it is intrusive to our readers who may not have seen the episodes released early on IPlayer or do not read spoilers. Repeated intentional offences of this rule could lead to a ban, Many thanks the EastEnders Wiki admin team.

READ MORE

EastEnders Wiki
EastEnders Wiki
833full-kathryn-apanowicz

Kathryn Apanowicz (born 3 June 1960, Bradford, West Riding of Yorkshire; died 3 March 2025), the daughter of a Polish RAF Pilot from the Second World war, is a British actress. Apanowicz grew up in Horsforth, Leeds with a brother, Stephen. She first became involved with television at the age of eight when she presented a junior-aimed programme on ITV, before joining Calendar and then turning to act.

Apanowicz is best known for her 1980s television appearances in the BBC soap operas, Angels, where she played Nurse Rose Butchins, and EastEnders, where she played the caterer Mags Czajkowski. She has also had minor roles in Emmerdale and Coronation Street, and as a child appeared in the film, Bugsy Malone. Before being cast in these shows, Apanowicz had worked in children's programmes for Yorkshire Television with Mark Curry.

In the early 1990s, she presented talk-based magazine programme Afternoon Live for cable channel Wire TV. In 2000, she enjoyed a regular stint as one of the presenters of ITV1's daytime magazine show for women, Live Talk. She is currently both a presenter for BBC Radio Leeds and a guest presenter for BBC Radio York.

From 1994 to 2005, Apanowicz was the partner of Countdown host Richard Whiteley. After his death, she published a biography of Whiteley titled Richard by Kathryn. Apanowicz donated three pairs of Whiteley's spectacles to optical charity Vision Aid Overseas (VAO), who sent them with a team of optical professionals to Ethiopia, where they were fitted to three locals with the same prescription. The BBC followed this story on their Inside Out programme which was broadcast on 19 September 2007.

Apanowicz became friends with Whiteley's Countdown co-host Carol Vorderman. In July 2008 Apanowicz made numerous appearances in the British media lambasting Channel 4 bosses for their refusal to negotiate an acceptable pay deal with Vorderman, which had resulted in her departure from the show.