Dean Elliott and Hayley Berkley in Buddy

The West End production of Buddy - The Buddy Holly Story will play its final performance at the Duchess Theatre on February 7, 2009.

Co-written by Alan Janes and Rob Bettison, Buddy tells the story of Holly’s meteoric rise to stardom. He sang his way from a Nashville recording studio to global success, only to die at age 22 in a plane crash just two years later, alongside 17-year-old Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper. The show sets the story to a live soundtrack of over 20 of Holly’s greatest hits.


Buddy first premiered in the West End in 1989 at the Victoria Palace Theatre before moving to the Strand Theatre where it ran until 2002. The current production returned to the West End in August 2007.

A tour of Buddy, coinciding with the 50th anniversary of Buddy Holly’s death, began on September 20, 2008 and is set to run through June 2009.