Billy Elliot’s first birthday went off without a hitch. With surprises, tears and cheers, the West End’s biggest hit of the last year celebrated its anniversary at the Victoria Palace Theatre on 12 May.
James Lomas, George Maguire, Sir Elton John
and Liam Mower at the curtain call
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Director Stephen Daldry created a one-off event for the anniversary. He staged a reunion of the Olivier Award-winning trio of boys (James Lomas, George Maguire and Liam Mower) that had originated the title role between them and shared it at separate performances. On this special night, they shared the role in alternate scenes. Speaking afterward, Daldry exclaimed, “I feel such relief! We spent far too long rehearsing it. It took a lot of energy.” He was justifiably thrilled with the result. “I can only ever speak from what I feel, but I loved it,” he said. “I thought it was great.”
Celebrated composer Elton John and partner David Furnish (who is also one of the show’s three executive producers) were seated in the middle of the stalls during the performance. Both were beaming like proud dads. “That was exhilarating,” John said after the show. “I haven’t seen it for a while because I’ve been away, but I enjoyed it as much tonight as I did when I first saw it. You notice things they’ve changed, little bits of script and dancing that have been changed. They are always trying to improve it, and I think they have. So I am delighted. I hope it runs for a few more years yet.”
The reception that the show received—with several standing ovations during the performance as well as one at the end—is in marked contrast, however, to what happened when John's latest musical, Lestat, which opened on Broadway less than three weeks ago. Co-written with his longtime pop collaborator Bernie Taupin, John said, “I’m very fond of Lestat, as well. You put so much of your creative energy into doing music. Obviously we didn’t get the reviews for Lestat that we got for this one, but it doesn’t mean to say that I’m not as proud of the music. I got some really bad reviews for the music in Lestat, and I thought that was very unfair. I thought the music I wrote was pretty fantastic, but you have to take the rough with the smooth. I came back to England and thought, ‘Am I going to sit here and sulk?’ I thought, ‘No, I’m alive, I’m well, and I’m proud of what I did, and I can’t do anything about it.’”
For the curtain call, John joined the boys onstage wearing a tiny white tutu over his trousers. “The fitting took place backstage, right before I went on,” he laughed. “I just got here an hour before time and they told me what I was going to do.”
It came as a surprise to the boys, too. “We didn’t actually know he was wearing a tutu,” said 13-year-old Mower, who is still in the show. “We wanted him to dance,” added 16-year-old Lomas, who is now in the midst of his GCSE exams. “But he wouldn’t do that,” finished 15-year-old George Maguire.
The three frequently speak in triplicate, finishing each other’s thoughts and sentences. “The adrenalin was so kicking in, like, I felt like being sick”, said Mower. “The audience felt so close,” Lomas replied, “I don’t know about being sick; I felt like it was at a Live Aid performance!” And Maguire said, “I wanted to cry. When people shouted out, ‘Go on, George!’ it just made me feel like proper emotional.” Lomas actually did visibly cry onstage at the end of the show. “Because it’s a sad scene, I cry anyway,” he explained, “but also because it was my definite last show.”
Earlier this year, the trio shared the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor in a Musical, becoming the youngest performers to receive it. How was that night?
George Maguire, Sir Elton John,
Liam Mower and James Lomas
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Maguire: “It was brilliant!” Lomas: “You can’t explain it!” Maguire: “But I knew it, didn’t I? They came out with three little medal things, actually
big medal things, and I went, ‘James, we’ve won it! There are three statues!” Lomas: “We just jumped and stood on the chairs and went, ‘Yeah!’ And started dancing on the stage”. Maguire: “I was going mental!” But Mower has found a practical use for his statue: “I use it as a doorstop”.
Now Lomas and Maguire have moved on from the show, what’s next for them? Lomas is doing his GCSEs and Maguire is hoping to attend college. “I just got a scholarship to Millennium Performing Arts School in London,” Lomas said, “and I’d like to do some more shows and films.” Maguire agreed, “Hopefully I’m going for auditions for films. My agent is a film agent.”
For Lee Hall, who wrote the book and lyrics for the show and was the original screenwriter of the film, the joy of the show is the reaction it continues to receive. “It’s quite overwhelming, really,” he said. “I’m always amazed by the warmth that people have toward the show and how it’s touched them. You can’t make that up. There’s nothing better for a writer.” He paid particular tribute to the contribution that the boys themselves have made. “It’s lovely to see all three boys, but it made me think of how fragile this show is and their talent at being the age that Billy Elliot is,” he explained. “It showed me how precious those moments are for each kid, and that’s what the show is all about. To see them come back and do that, having grown, makes me quite humbled. A lot of what we took for granted becomes obvious when it’s changed—we took a lot of their courage for granted, and their courage a year ago is very different to their confidence now. That’s the beauty of it. They’re flourishing.”
And so is the show. The next stop is New York. Daldry said that the timetable is now for it to open on Broadway in October 2008. John, meanwhile, is thinking of writing another musical already: “There is talk of Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, but that’s a long way off yet,” he said. “What we’ve got to do next is get Billy to New York and keep Lestat going and then see what else we can do.”