The show is over. The stage door queue has finally thinned. It is past eleven and the walk to wherever home is tonight is longer than it should be, through a city that is not yours, in a street you do not know.

Matt Henry has made that walk. And he has never forgotten what it felt like.

When I speak to Matt, he is in the middle of eight shows a week playing Nigel in The Devil Wears Prada at the Dominion Theatre. But he is not here to talk about the role, or the rehearsal room, or what it is like to perform opposite some of the biggest names in West End theatre. The accolades and the curtain calls are not what is driving him right now. Something else is.

That something else began in Sunderland. It was 2004 and Matt was on tour. “We weren’t so up on mental health and safety then,” he tells me, “and you kind of were in the shut up and put up era of our lives in the industry. I thought that when I got to a point where I had a voice that people would listen to, I wanted to bring about a change.”

But it was not until years later, working as Associate Director on The Drifters Girl, that everything crystallised. Every Tuesday he would arrive and ask the touring company the same question. How are your digs? “There was always something,” he says. “There was always a negative response.” A repairman had walked in unannounced. Someone had tried to let themselves into the house. A young actor had been racially profiled in the building where they were staying simply because nobody knew they lived there. “It just correlated with what I was going through back in 2005,” he says. “And so I felt this was the turning point. Something needed to change.”

And so Matt did something about it. He used his own funds to buy a house in Bradford. A seven-bedroom house, each room with its own en suite, close to the theatre, affordable within the Equity subsistence allowance. “I wanted to create a prototype,” he says, “where actors can find community, safety, and affordability. And quality. When I say quality, I mean it feels like a home from home.”

The most surprising thing, he tells me, was that it spread entirely by word of mouth. Matthew Bourne’s company stayed during The Red Shoes. Then rebooked for The Car Man. Then for Cinderella. “They sent a message saying please, please, please,” Matt says. “We’ve told everybody. Everyone knows about this now.” He laughs. “It kind of feels very heartwarming that we’re doing something good.”

I ask Matt how he holds both lives simultaneously. Eight shows a week. A social enterprise to run. A son to look after.

“I don’t know,” he says, laughing. “I feel like there’s not enough hours in the day.” He answers emails in the interval. He grabs half an hour here, an hour there. “It’s a lot of plate spinning.” But he is not doing it alone. “I’ve started to put together a really good team of people who believe in the cause, who believe in the mission, who want to bring about change with me.” It is that team, he says, that has made the Christmas Songbook possible.

The need for it could not be more urgent. In the wake of COVID, private landlords flooded the market. Prices soared. Actors found themselves topping up their Equity subsistence allowance of between £280 and £340 a week out of their own pocket. “You couldn’t find anything less than £500 a week,” Matt says. “You were always having to use your wage.” And the subsistence itself? Eight years of negotiation to raise it by £40. “Which was crazy.”

The consequences are already being felt. Actors are refusing to go on tour. And when they do, regional theatre collapses from the inside. “The principals are being looked after,” Matt says. “But I’m talking about the young ensemble members, the swings, those working backstage. These people are the infrastructure of touring shows.”

“Just having the prototype in Bradford isn’t enough,” he says. “What we’re trying to do is expand into other towns and cities.” The model is straightforward. Find empty properties (there are many, with the government now pushing landlords to address vacant accommodation across the country), lease them, decorate them to a high standard, and make them available to touring companies at a price that sits within the allowance. “Actors should never have to touch their living wage,” he says. “It should always be within the Equity system.”

His endeavour to make this better for the acting community is largely attributed to an unpleasant and threatening experience Matt had in Sunderland.

It was late. The show had finished. He was trying to get back to his lodgings on the outskirts of the city when it started. Racial slurs. Men following him. Danger was thankfully averted.

“Thank God for the taxi driver,” he says, “who bundled me into a taxi to get me away from these guys.” He pauses. “For no apparent reason.”

He had just read an article in The Stage about the rise of racism and homophobia experienced by actors on tour. “To hear that it is still continuing,” he says quietly, “is really, really sad.”

Anxiety breeds conviction and tenacity will create this much-needed change.

On 7th December, at the Gillian Lynne Theatre, The Actors House will host its first major fundraising event. Twelve professional West End performers. Young musicians. Students and graduates stepping onto a West End stage for the very first time. “This will be their first West End debut,” Matt says. “And I think that’s what the Songbook is about. Raising funds, but also giving the opportunity for the next generation to perform alongside the current generation.” Among the ambassadors of The Actors House are Ian McKellen and Christopher Biggins.

It is, in essence, the handing over of a legacy. The next generation performing alongside the current one. Better equipped. Better supported. Better than those who came before.

Near the end of our conversation I ask Matt about his MBE. What does it mean to him now, in the context of everything he is building? He remains thoughtful. “It signifies my commitment to theatre,” he says. “It really sat with me for a while. And I think that’s also been a driving force behind me wanting to do something more than just be a performer and win accolades for roles I’ve done. It kind of really says to me, do something. Help your industry. Continue to champion your industry.” He pauses. “My services to theatre. In my performance life. But also my services to the theatre community by trying to bring about change in regards to the accommodation crisis.”

The show is over. The stage door queue has thinned. It is past eleven and the walk to wherever home is tonight is nearer, in a city which is not yours, but the street feels somehow familiar.

Matt Henry is making these changes. One house at a time.

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Matt Henry MBE

Matt Henry MBE began his career at the back of the Adelphi Theatre, selling ice creams and watching the stars of Chicago. More than fifteen years later he stood on that same stage and won the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor in a Musical for his extraordinary portrayal of Lola in Kinky Boots. In 2017 he was awarded an MBE for his services to musical theatre. He is currently playing Nigel in The Devil Wears Prada at the Dominion Theatre, London.

Those who wish to support The Actors House | Instagram can find the details below, together with the Christmas Songbook on 7th December.

The Actors House Christmas Songbook

Date: Monday 7th December 2026, 7pm

Venue: Gillian Lynne Theatre, 166 Drury Lane, London WC2B 5PW

Line-up: Matt Henry MBE with Beverley Knight MBE, Jess Folley, Oliver Tompsett, Kerry Ellis, Divina De Campo, Carly Mercedes Dyer, Declan Bennett, Amy Di Bartolomeo, Georgie Buckland, Keelan McAuley, Tosh Wanogho-Maud and Keziah Ibe

Tickets: From £30 to £120, book here

All proceeds support The Actors House.

Interviewed by Maria Teresa Rivera-Schreiber, Editor-in-Chief, Exits & Entrances, October 2026

When I spoke to Morgan Lloyd Malcolm, I’d recently had the chance to watch her chilling new adaptation of The Turn of the Screw at the Arcola Theatre. I had also seen her Dracula at the Hammersmith Lyric last year, while Emilia was the first of her plays that I’d encountered at the Vaudeville back in 2019.

Looking back across those three productions, something struck me. Each, in a rather different way, seemed concerned with women whose voices had been overlooked, diminished or simply not believed.

In Emilia, a woman largely pushed out of the historical narrative is brought firmly into the spotlight. In Dracula, Mina moves from the margins to become the central figure in a story usually dominated by its male characters. And in The Turn of the Screw, the Governess is trying to tell us what has happened to her – even if she is met with scepticism, accusation and disbelief.

I wondered whether Morgan saw a connection between them herself. She did. As she put it when we discussed Dracula, she asks, “Can I pull out a woman in this story and give her the chance to tell it?”

It’s a question that seems to run through much of Morgan’s work. But once a woman has the chance to tell her story, another question follows: who believes her?

When we talk about Emilia, Morgan remembers the excitement surrounding its original production, which arrived during the momentum of the #MeToo movement. She recalls that it felt “really needed and wanted” at the time. And the questions it raised extended beyond the play itself: who gets to appear onstage, who works behind the scenes, and who gets to write the stories? Who gets the credit for the important things that history remembers?

But then came the pandemic. Morgan feels that, although the conversations about representation continued, the financial pressures facing theatres when they reopened meant that much of the practical work towards change was pushed aside. The immediate priority became getting productions back onstage and keeping theatres alive.

She acknowledges how difficult things have been for people running venues on very little money, and she does recognise some progress, particularly in the language and awareness surrounding bullying and sexual misconduct. But she remains concerned that the mechanisms needed to protect people and bring about lasting change haven’t kept pace.

As she puts it, “the promise of progress, or the promise of some change, was coming to us, and then it all just stopped.”

Finding another way into a familiar story.

Morgan has written several adaptations in recent years – partly because familiar titles have become attractive to theatres looking for productions with an existing audience. But recognising the commercial appeal of a classic novel is only the beginning.

When she’s considering adapting something, she asks herself two questions. Does she actually enjoy the story? And what can she in particular bring to it that makes putting it onstage again worthwhile?

“It’s always that question of why is this a theatre show? Why does this need to be on a stage when we could just literally sit down and read the book?”

It’s a good question. An adaptation has to offer something beyond a shortened retelling of the original.

With Dracula, Morgan found her way into the story through Mina. In Bram Stoker’s novel, Mina is far more instrumental in defeating Dracula than many adaptations would suggest. She identifies the nature of the threat and, through her connection with Dracula, helps the others track him down. Yet she is frequently reduced to a helpless woman in need of rescue.

Morgan saw an opportunity to change the emphasis: what if Mina was the hero? What if this became her telling of the story?

It’s not about inventing a different character, but looking more closely at the one who was there all along. Suddenly, a familiar story begins to look rather different.

The woman nobody believes.

With The Turn of the Screw, Morgan was drawn to the ambiguity at the heart of Henry James’s novella. Are the ghosts real? Or is the Governess imagining them?

Rather than choosing between those familiar interpretations, she wondered whether the two could coexist. What if the ghosts were real, but the Governess still had to endure the experience of trying to convince other people that what she had witnessed was true?

For Morgan, this opened up a different way of looking at the story. She drew a parallel with the questioning women can face when reporting sexual assault: the pressure to repeat an account, prove every detail, and persuade people that what they’ve experienced really did happen.

The isolated house in James’s story interested her too: a place with its own restrictions and secrets, where disturbing things might happen without the outside world knowing or believing. It’s a much more unsettling possibility than simply asking whether a ghost exists.

What interests Morgan isn’t only the supernatural threat. It’s what happens when somebody tells the truth – or believes they’re telling the truth – and cannot persuade anyone else to hear it. That question feels particularly resonant in her work because Morgan has spent much of her career writing women who are attempting, in one way or another, to make themselves heard.

What happens when the story reaches the stage?

Of course, identifying an interesting perspective is only part of the job. Morgan writes for the theatre, and she’s interested in what theatre can do that another medium cannot.

She often sees elements of a production in her head as she’s writing. With Emilia, originally created for Shakespeare’s Globe, she spent time sitting in the theatre, thinking about its architecture and what the space might make possible.

Despite that, she doesn’t expect the finished production to reproduce exactly what she imagined. Indeed, I hadn’t anticipated hearing quite how much Morgan enjoys the moment when other people start getting their hands on her work. It’s one of her favourite parts of the process. She loves seeing what actors, directors, designers, movement specialists, lighting and sound teams, and others can bring to it. A designer may take something she imagined and make it considerably better.

And rehearsals aren’t simply a matter of putting a finished script on its feet. Morgan describes the first draft brought into a rehearsal room as the beginning of another stage of writing. If something isn’t working, that doesn’t automatically mean the script is wrong. The question becomes what everyone is trying to achieve in that moment – and whether the answer lies in the text, the staging, or somewhere else.

Sometimes she rewrites. Sometimes moving an actor or changing the staging solves the problem. Occasionally, something she’s written proves impossible within the production’s budget, and everyone has to find another way. That doesn’t particularly trouble her. She sees it as part of making theatre. It’s a refreshingly collaborative attitude, especially from a writer whose exceptional plays can demand so much theatrical invention!

Making space for women’s stories.

When I asked Morgan what she was trying to say now that she couldn’t have said at the beginning of her career, she took me back to a very practical decision: “I set out to create jobs for women.”

She had female actor friends who weren’t getting enough work, partly because there weren’t enough roles available to them. Writing plays with more opportunities for women was something she could actually do about it. That decision led her towards women’s stories and women’s voices, although her relationship with the work has changed as she’s grown older.

“I think as I’ve gotten older, I’ve gotten bolder with what I’m saying.” She laughs at the thought of where this might eventually lead: “It feels like I’m just gonna get to the point where I’m just screaming on stage.”

It’s a brilliant image - but there’s a serious point beneath the joke.

Morgan understands the commercial pressures of theatre and the temptation to make choices based on what might please producers or advance a career. She also knows that being an established playwright doesn’t mean being financially secure.

Increasingly, though, she’s conscious that there are only so many plays she will write, and only so many opportunities to have them produced. She wants to use those opportunities to say what matters to her – particularly about what it means to live in the world as a woman.

Perhaps it’s that awareness of how precious those opportunities are that has made her less willing to spend them trying to please the industry. As she succinctly puts it:

“I think I give less of a shit about that.”

And that seems a rather good place to leave a conversation with a playwright who has spent so much of her career making space for women to tell their stories – and asking whether the rest of us are prepared to listen.

_{Want to know how to get started in writing for the theatre? In our accompanying Resources article, How Do I Begin…as a Playwright?, Morgan shares her practical advice on finding your people, making your own opportunities and building a career without waiting for permission. Coming Wednesday, 21st October 2026.}

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Morgan Lloyd Malcolm

Morgan Lloyd Malcolm is an Olivier Award-winning playwright and screenwriter. Her play Emilia, commissioned by Shakespeare’s Globe, transferred to the West End in 2019 and won three Olivier Awards including Best Entertainment or Comedy Play. Her other stage work includes The Wasp and Belongings (both Hampstead Theatre), Dracula (Lyric Hammersmith Theatre, 2025) and Mum (Theatre Royal Plymouth and Soho Theatre). For screen, her adaptation of The Wasp was released in cinemas in 2024, and her adaptation of Josephine Hart’s Damage was released on Netflix as Obsession in 2023. She co-founded Terrifying Women, a company producing new horror plays written by women.

Production details & Tour dates:

Written by: Morgan Lloyd Malcolm, based on the novella by Henry James
Directed by: Nicky Allpress
Produced by: Blackeyed Theatre and Arcola Theatre
Running time: Approximately 130 minutes including interval
Tour: October 2026 - June 2027
Tickets and Venues

Written by Emma King-Farlow, Founder and Editorial Director, Exits & Entrances | September 2026

For Fed Zanni, touring with the musical Jersey Boys across the UK, being constantly on the road, is not a sacrifice. It is a conscious, passionate choice. There is no precise word for it. Only a deliberate understanding of what this kind of work demands. And here, he lets that weight speak for itself.

The tour is mid-run. The cast have settled into their rhythm.

“I’m noticing a flow now that wasn’t there at the beginning. I think it must be a combination of me knowing the show better and better, and the harmony that we’ve all found as a cast. It feels like there’s no break now between our life on and off stage. The show is just a continuation of the energy we share outside the theatre.”

Bonds are formed during rehearsals and strengthened on the road. But there is a life beyond the stage and its contagious energy. In musical theatre, to be a cover is perhaps the most selfless discipline, because it requires total preparation for a character you may never have the privilege of playing. You memorise every word, every note for a debut reliant on fate. But what happens if you’re on the wrong side of fate?

It came when he was in the West End production of Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge at the Haymarket. He was understudy to Dominic West’s Eddie Carbone. That long-awaited moment never arrived. He did make it on though. Cover run. Not a consolation prize as 150 people attended. Fed was prepared either way. This is consistency. Discipline.

Reflecting on this particular experience, he recalls,

“For me it was a constant push and pull of ‘yes, let’s do this, I’m ready’ and ‘dear god, what am I going to do if I’m on tonight?’ You almost have to consciously jump from one to the other. Cover rehearsals stopped with a good chunk of performances still to go, so a lot of the work had to be done by ourselves, for ourselves. It pushed me to create structure when there was none. It’s good to know that you can do that, in any situation.”

The industry has its own specific guidelines and advice which appear at the outset, foolproof. Work hard. Stay focused. Be ready. Your moment will come. Fed believed in the dogma. Until he didn’t.

“I believed it fully when I started. Now not so much. Hard work and preparation certainly help, but I never fully understood how big a part luck plays in it. When it comes to external recognition, hard work beats talent, whatever that may be. But luck beats both.”

But in practice it’s not so easy.

“I wish I were able to go into every audition with a sense of ‘whatever the outcome, it was meant to be, ’ rather than ‘what do you mean I’m not right for the job?? You’re all wrong!’ But I still can’t, especially if I particularly love a show or a character. I feel I can only ‘trust the process’ retroactively, when I eventually get another job. Rejection would be much easier if I could find that trust to start with.”

This life is uncharted waters. He keeps pushing ahead. He finds a connection in Diana Nyad — the American swimmer who at 64 became the first to cross unaided from Cuba to Florida.

“When it comes to personal growth and your understanding of the world around you and yourself, hard work is still the key. It’s not about reaching your goal, it’s not even about the journey. It’s about the person you become through it. It’s just very hard to remember that.”

He has realised that mistakes on stage are not failures but lessons. If he cannot forgive himself, he cannot grow.

“I try to be as analytical as possible with regards to my performance, in terms of curiosity and accuracy. But freedom of exploration means that you can get things wrong. Maybe that’s the whole point. I’m learning how to let go of that and forgive myself more efficiently, otherwise I get stuck, especially in a show as quick as Jersey Boys, and I can’t be as open and receptive to my fellow actors. And that can be much more detrimental to the show than getting something wrong. Perhaps there’s a point where self-analysis becomes self-indulgence. I’m learning how to feel where that line is.”

He also writes. Currently he is working on two projects. For him, the page offers something the stage cannot provide alone.

“I feel like writing allows me to infuse the worlds I create with meaning, which is not something I can do as easily when it comes to the real world and also to the world of the characters I may experience as an actor. Perhaps acting gives me personal freedom up to a point, whereas the freedom I sometimes experience with writing is universal.”

For Fed, writing and acting complement one another. Complete expressions of the same creative drive.

However, touring is chosen, as he shares, and he fully embraces it. These brief interludes in different cities offer a particular kind of escapism. Occasionally they feel like home.

“I think it still feels like I’m suspended in a wonderful limbo. A couple of weeks ago we were in Llandudno and, because of the weather being cooler, the holiday vibe of the town and the fact that my beautiful digs smelled like cinnamon and spice, I felt like it was Christmas. When you love what you do as much as I do, the holiday is the work.”

He continues.

“It can still be tiring and draining. Even kids get tired and drained when they play all day. I’m trying to go back to London as much as possible in between venues, and that helps me remember that my personal life is not the same as my professional one. For me, that’s very important.”

It is a boundary he actively maintains.

Beyond the touring, beyond what this life exposes and demands, there is a far more definitive question that can only be answered personally: what would it look like if it were truly his to shape?

Fed and his wife Kat were walking past the Rose Theatre in Kingston when something on a poster stopped him.

“What struck me immediately was the fact that there was no mention of the actors appearing in it. Just the title. I thought it was quite refreshing, as nowadays it often feels like ‘who’ is more important than ‘what.’ That’s not to say seeing your name or picture on a poster is not thrilling. It definitely is. My massive ego loves that. But it was just nice to notice something different this time.”

🎭

Artist: Fed Zanni
Production: Jersey Boys — UK Tour 2026
Tickets and tour dates
Instagram
Disclosure: Maria Teresa Rivera-Schreiber previously interviewed Fed Zanni for neun Magazine in May 2026. Fed Zanni has previously worked with Shadow Road Productions Artistic Director and Founder, Emma King-Farlow.

Written by: Maria Teresa Rivera-Schreiber | Editor-in-Chief | Exits & Entrances

Interview date: August 2026

The Phoenix Arts Club, in London’s West End, is not a theatre. There is no set, no costume, no role waiting in the wings. This is where George Crawford stood up for his first mic night. He only agreed to it because someone asked him.

“I thought it was going to be mostly family and friends coming to support me: my mum, my stepdad and a couple of people from Legally Blonde. Everyone else were people who had paid to come and see me, and it sold out. It was really special.”

Currently he is playing the part of Emmett Forrest in Legally Blonde, on its UK and Ireland tour. The musical is inspired by the 2001 film: Elle Woods, a fashion-loving sorority girl, follows her ex-boyfriend to Harvard Law School and proves everyone wrong. Emmett is the kind, hard-working law student who believes in her before anyone else does.

George trained at ArtsEd in London. He has performed in Waitress and in The Great Gatsby at the London Coliseum. But it was Newsies that gave him the role he loves most: Jack Kelly, the lead, which he played as the alternate. Jack’s song, ‘Santa Fe,’ has become an integral part of who he is as a performer.

A mic night is different from a show. People go to a production for the whole experience.

“When you’re on stage, you’re a character. People aren’t expecting George. They’re expecting Emmett. I think people love mic nights because they let you peep behind the curtain and see who a performer really is, rather than a character.”

Songs are associated with roles. Yet they do exist as singular musical expressions.

“If the character doesn’t know they’re singing, there shouldn’t be any awareness of singing. You’re speaking, and the words aren’t enough anymore. You can’t get the emotion out, so it leads into a song. And when you can’t sing anymore, it leads into dance. I think it’s really important to always lead with the acting. Otherwise it becomes a self-indulgent kind of performance, instead of one that’s for the audience.”

The Phoenix did not ask for his stage persona. It asked for the man.

“Personally, I’d find it a bit strange if I went to a gig and someone gave a full-out performance of songs from shows they’d been in. So you have to find a level playing field. I’m George, with a hint of the character.”

There was one exception.

“There was only one song where I fell into a kind of performance, and that’s ‘Santa Fe,’ every time I sing it. It was a dream role, and I got to play it on Thursdays. Everything just goes quiet. I love it.”

He sang a duet with his wife, Aimée Fisher, who is a performer herself.

“We sang ‘Lucky,’ by Jason Mraz. It’s never going to be in a show, and it will probably never be sung again, but people got to hear something they wouldn’t have heard otherwise. What was nice about a night like that was being able to be myself, be a bit silly and sing some songs, with people there for me, not for a show I’m in.”

His mum was in the audience that night. Though long before, she had been on stage herself.

“My family were heavily involved in amateur dramatics. It was a real family affair. My mum and dad would play the romantic leads, my dad’s mum, my nana, would choreograph, and my mum’s dad would direct. So I was born into it, and it was completely normal to me. It’s all I’ve ever known. I was so surrounded by art, music and performance that it felt natural for it to become my career. And it’s very nice to have such a supportive circle, people who said: ‘If this is what you want to do, we absolutely support you.’”

The family moved from Manchester to Yorkshire when he was six. At school, he put it to one side.

“My high school specialised in sport, science and maths. GCSE Drama sometimes felt like a babysitting lesson, where some people saw it as the one hour they could just mess around. So I put performing on the back shelf for a while.”

College changed that.

“I went to a performing arts college and saw so many people who really wanted to be there. You were never laughed at for having an idea or for wanting to be creative. It completely re-sparked my love for theatre.”

Three years at ArtsEd, in London, sealed it.

But training is one thing; the real lessons live outside it.

“Every step of my training only allows you to get so far. It doesn’t have all the answers. A lot of those teachers have techniques and ideas that worked in the industry when they were at their peak. When you actually get into the industry, you realise how much more learning you have to do.”

What he has gathered since is reflected in his work.

“The first thing I do is read the script like a book, without any association to my part, so I can see how it flows as a piece of writing. After that, I read it from my character’s perspective, and I look at each scene I’m in and ask: what is he trying to achieve here?”

It’s not just about your role. It’s about how you fit into the narrative, and that demands complete immersion.

“If I just got a script and thought: where are my lines? Okay, here they are, that’s all I have to do, fine. Then I wouldn’t get a full understanding of the piece as a whole.”

However, to know from the start how events will unfold is a risk in itself.

“In my first scene, I don’t know what’s going to happen by the bows. So I try to be as present as I can in each scene, instead of thinking: well, I already know I’m going to end up in a good relationship with Elle. That’s not being truthful.”

True discoveries thrive in rehearsal rooms.

“My favourite part is getting on my feet and starting to play. That’s when I’m at my most creative and the best ideas happen. There’s only so much you can do at home.”

His current director in Legally Blonde, Nikolai Foster, is known for giving his cast that freedom.

“It felt like we had six weeks of rehearsals because of the space he gave us. You’d say: ‘I was thinking I might try that.’ And he’d say: ‘Just try it and see what happens. If it lands, we keep it. If it doesn’t, it doesn’t matter.’ That is the best kind of room you can ever be in. It’s how I felt when I was younger, aspiring to be in this industry: the uninhibited, creative, inquisitive child comes out to play, and the director says: ‘Keep that.’”

Rushing has no place before each and every performance. His first part taught him this. He was Ogie, a comic supporting role in Waitress, a musical set in a small-town American diner.

“He’s not on stage for the first 45 minutes. At the first performance of Waitress, the show had just started and I was already changed, mic on, costume on, sitting there ready to go. By the time I got on, my adrenaline was so high I felt like: what’s going on?”

This needed to change. And then came advice from Sir Trevor Nunn, co-director of Les Misérables, passed on to him by Matt Cole, his director on Newsies.

“Trevor Nunn said that if you just say your first line, the one you say as you walk on stage, and leave it at that, everything else will naturally follow. So I go to the side of the stage, get my things ready, say my first line, and that’s it. If I start overthinking what comes next, I’m not present. I’m already thinking about something that’s going to happen an hour from now.”

In spite of all that dedication, he approaches the work lightly. When he is asked what he brings to the stage, he laughs.

“A bit of cheekiness. And reminding ourselves, even while we’re doing a show, that it’s just a show. It doesn’t matter. It’s really fun. We get to engage, communicate, work opposite someone and be creative. And when things get tricky or go wrong on stage, having a glint in your eye that says: ‘Don’t worry, it really doesn’t matter.’”

It is the ability to take it all in your stride that keeps the energy alive.

“When you’re doing the same show day in, day out, you have to find ways to keep it engaging for the audience, but also for yourselves, without the audience ever knowing anything is different. Someone’s wig is on a bit funny, or something’s happened with their shoe. I love it when something goes wrong. And now we’ve got dogs on stage (in Legally Blonde), and they’re so unpredictable.”

But there is a fine line between keeping it light and turning it into a joke, which mustn’t be crossed.

“There’s nothing worse than watching a show where you can see people messing around. There is an art to being a bit cheeky and having a laugh without the audience knowing. And if you can’t do it, you shouldn’t do it.”

The balance is crucial.

“While we still have fun and have a laugh, it’s really important that we tell stories with conviction and truth. Legally Blonde is a really good example. It’s all fun, high energy, very pink, very loud. Then there’s one moment where everything comes down. It’s very truthful, and very difficult to watch. A man in the show takes advantage of Elle, and because she doesn’t act on it, he says: ‘Well, I’m going to fire you then.’ I think that’s very relatable, in the performing industry and the arts, but also in many workplaces around the world.”

Many plays and musicals abound in these complex and delicate themes.

“In Waitress, the lead character is in an abusive relationship, more verbal and gaslighting than physical. People have shared their own experiences with us: ‘I came to watch the show, and it made me realise what kind of relationship I was in. Something I probably knew, but was too scared to let myself think about. It allowed me to get out of that relationship, and I’m now in a very happy, stable place.’ That is why a lot of us perform. It’s our job, but for so many people it’s so much more than that.”

For the audience, it’s a reckoning with their own lives.

“To be able to say we played a small part in helping someone, potentially changing a life, is very special. But I don’t want to make a statement that we’re changing lives because we’re doing a show.”

No show is ever made alone. Watching others is an education in itself. In doing so, he has discovered what kind of cast member he wishes to be.

“Honestly, I think you learn the most from the people who get it wrong. The ones who are a bit rude, inappropriate or impolite. You think: that’s everything I don’t want to be as a performer. I find those lessons more useful.”

Others showed him how it should be done. On the Waitress tour, it was his co-star David Hunter, now starring in Beetlejuice in the West End.

“Something happened on stage; it was nearly a bad accident. He brought everyone into the green room together and said: ‘Tonight’s show isn’t going to go ahead until the right steps have been put in place to make sure everyone feels safe.’ He wasn’t giving attitude. He wasn’t being rude. He simply said it was really important that, as a company, everyone felt safe. I remember taking a mental picture and putting it in my back pocket. If there’s ever a situation where someone needs to step up, that’s exactly how you do it.”

Top billing brings its own unspoken duty.

“When you have the opportunity to be the leading man or the leading lady, you’re also the leading member of a company, making sure people feel there’s a voice that can speak for everyone. That’s not written in any contract.”

Everyone deserves respect. Whatever your job.

“It doesn’t matter what size your role is. Crew, ensemble, musical director: we’re all human beings, here putting on a show. It’s so important to lead from kindness, whether you’re the lead, a dresser or a cleaner.”

Even the biggest names on the poster are ordinary people deep down. In The Great Gatsby, Aimée, his wife, found herself working alongside one of the West End’s best-loved leading ladies.

“Aimée had looked up to Rachel Tucker for most of her performing life. And then we became best mates with Rachel. Because she’s not Rachel Tucker. She’s just Rachel. People say: ‘Oh my god, you’re in a show with that person! What are they like?’ And they’re fine. They’re normal.”

But having a name doesn’t guarantee stardom. An actor’s life doesn’t come with perks. The day before Legally Blonde was due to start at the Edinburgh Playhouse, George was on the move.

“I was lugging my suitcase from Chiswick on the Tube to King’s Cross, onto the train to Edinburgh, then up a hill and four flights of stairs to my digs. That’s the reality of being a performer sometimes. I think people imagine there’s a lot more glamour to what we do.”

The spotlight is ephemeral.

“I’m actually not that stagey. I love what I do. I love doing theatre, and I love watching and supporting my friends. But I don’t come home and put on a new musical soundtrack. I love being able to leave work at work, come home and talk about absolutely anything other than theatre. It’s really important not to let it become your whole life.”

George and Aimée married recently, and he has thought long and hard about what matters. He even said it out loud, in front of family and friends, at a very important moment.

“Weirdly, I actually spoke about this in my wedding speech. Being a performer isn’t my purpose. It’s something I really enjoy and I’m okay at, but I want to be a really good husband and a really good dad. That is my thing.”

🎭

George Crawford

George Crawford was born in Manchester and grew up in Yorkshire. He trained at ArtsEd in London, graduating in 2019 with a BA (Hons) in Musical Theatre.

He made his professional debut in the original UK and Ireland tour of The Book of Mormon, understudying both Elder Price and Elder Cunningham. He went on to play Ogie in the original UK and Ireland tour of Waitress, and joined the original London cast of Newsies at Troubadour Wembley Park, playing Morris Delancey and alternate Jack Kelly. At the London Coliseum, he played Mr McKee in the original London cast of The Great Gatsby, covering the roles of Nick and Gatsby.

He is currently playing Emmett Forrest in Legally Blonde The Musical on its UK and Ireland tour, directed by Nikolai Foster and produced by Curve and ROYO.

Tickets and tour dates:

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Written by: Maria Teresa Rivera-Schreiber | Editor-in-Chief | Exits & Entrances

Interview date: September 2026