{"id":436687,"date":"2026-01-29T10:51:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T10:51:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/436687\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T10:51:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T10:51:11","slug":"breaking-baz-how-the-full-monty-alum-mark-addy-is-poised-to-become-the-west-ends-unlikeliest-musical-star-in-the-unlikely-pilgrimage-of-harold-fry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/436687\/","title":{"rendered":"Breaking Baz: How \u2018The Full Monty\u2019 Alum Mark Addy Is Poised To Become The West End\u2019s Unlikeliest Musical Star In \u2018The Unlikely Pilgrimage Of Harold Fry\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

EXCLUSIVE: Mark Addy (The Full Monty, Game of Thrones)\u00a0says that starring in a new musical was not something he\u2019d ever imagined doing \u2014 that is, until he was sent\u00a0The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry.<\/p>\n

\u201cI read it and fell in love with the story,\u201d says Addy of the show based on Rachel Joyce\u2019s adaptation of her best-selling\u00a02012 novel about Harold Fry, a 60-year-old retiree who leaves his house one day to post a letter to a dying friend, telling his wife Maureen, that he won\u2019t be long.<\/p>\n

More from Deadline<\/p>\n

He has no inkling that he\u2019s about to embark on a 600-mile trek from one end of the country to the other, interacting with the strangers he meets along the way. \u201cHarold just knows that he has to keep on walking,\u201d Addy tells Deadline following a full rehearsal in the basement of a Bloomsbury hotel of\u00a0The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, featuring music and lyrics ranging from English pastoral to a raise-the-roof ballad\u00a0by platinum-selling, singer-songwriter Passenger, though his real name Mike Rosenberg is used when we\u2019re introduced.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the penultimate runthrough in the subterranean space ahead of its first preview Thursday night at the Theatre Royal Haymarket.<\/p>\n

The last musical Addy appeared in was a 1990 production of\u00a0The Fantasticks\u00a0in Regent\u2019s Park Open Air Theatre. \u201cIt was a non-singing part and this is my first time in a proper musical role. \u2026 And with these singers and dancers,\u201d he says, gesturing to fellow castmates, \u201cthere\u2019s a bit of an imposter syndrome going on.\u201d<\/p>\n

Addy\u2019s so composed when we chat. Ten minutes before, he\u2019d been performing the final scene with Jenna Russell (Sunday in the Park With George, Into the Woods), an acclaimed actress equally comfortable in musical or dramatic productions on stage or the telly, as Maureen. Addy appeared to have been crying as he played the scene.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re real tears,\u201d observes Chris Harper, the award-winning producer who began putting the production together more than seven years ago with Nick Sidi, a producer and the musical\u2019s dramaturg.<\/p>\n

\u201cMark just buries himself into the role, and sometimes it\u2019s impossible to hold back emotion. He sobs every time,\u201d adds Harper, who produced\u00a0The Roommate\u00a0on Broadway with Mia Farrow and Patti LuPone. Other shows include\u00a0Death of a Salesman, Company\u00a0and\u00a0Angels in America\u00a0with director Marianne Elliott through their now-disbanded\u00a0Elliott & Harper Productions.<\/p>\n

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry\u00a0had its world premiere at the Chichester Festival Theatre in West Sussex last May and June, following a string of workshops orchestrated over the years by director Katy Rudd. Her production of\u00a0The Ballet Shoes, based on\u00a0Noel Streatfeild\u2019s beloved 1936 novel, is on at the National Theatre, where it returned for its second winter season.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

During\u00a0The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry\u2019s\u00a0sold-out run in Chichester, it became increasingly evident that the story resonated deeply with audiences there, and Harper and his collaborators felt emboldened to transfer it into the West End.<\/p>\n

Except,\u00a0theater availability in London\u2019s theaterland is rarer than hen\u2019s teeth. However, they were able to secure the Haymarket for a limited 11-week season through April 18.<\/p>\n

The story began originally as a\u00a0BBC Radio 4\u00a0play two decades ago. It was a three-hander with Anton Rodgers (May to December, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels\u00a0movie) and Anna Massey (Peeping Tom, Frenzy), who both since have died, playing Harold and Maureen with Niamh Cusack (Suspect: The Shooting of Jean Charles de Menzezes) performing a multitude of other roles. \u201cIt was something that I wrote because my dad was dying, so it was the sort of thing that I wrote for my dad,\u201d Joyce reveals.<\/p>\n

She had penned it with Rodgers in mind \u201cbecause at the time he was so good, as Mark is, at just being hilarious and heartbreaking at the same moment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Back then, the play was billed as\u00a0To Be a Pilgrim,\u00a0and I remember hearing its first broadcast.<\/p>\n

Subsequently, Joyce adapted the drama into a novel that was long-listed for a Booker Prize. The tome then was readapted into a feature starring Jim Broadbent and Penelope Wilton. Both the book and the picture passed me by.<\/p>\n

And with the title change, I hadn\u2019t realized that the radio play was related to\u00a0The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry until 10 minutes into the show. I\u2019m not giving away too much plot. To use Joyce\u2019s words, the show\u2019s both hilarious and heartbreaking, but the heartbreaking bit catches you unawares.<\/p>\n

Joyce says that, after the book was published, she had \u201cthis idea\u201d that\u00a0because the story \u201cis so theatrical it could be a show.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Her sister, the actress Emily Joyce, suggested that she seek out Harper, advice she actioned by sending him her book, followed by afternoon tea at Soho House. There was mention of \u201cthis brilliant director who had this massive imagination,\u201d says Joyce in reference to Rudd, who, by the way, also happens to be working with Working Title and Emma Thompson on a musical stage version of the Nanny McPhee\u00a0movie.<\/p>\n

Rosenberg, aka Passenger, was approached about the score, which the composer calls the \u201cbest\u201d and the \u201chardest\u201d composition that he\u2019s worked on. It\u2019s a different discipline composing for the theater, he explains.<\/p>\n

Similarly, it took Joyce some time before she was able to wrestle an initial draft that had a six-hour running time into a perfectly crafted book for the stage. \u201cI overwrote, basically. Then gradually I was told to take things away, bit by bit,\u201d she says with a chuckle.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou begin to realize what the theater needs and what it doesn\u2019t,\u201d the novelist adds.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Vital in structuring\u00a0The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry with Rudd and Joyce was Peter Darling, the visionary choreographer\u00a0and movement director who put his stamp on an array of musicals that include\u00a0Billy Elliot, Matilda, Our House and Groundhog Day\u00a0and plays such as Michael Grandage\u2019s thrilling production of\u00a0Edward II\u00a0with Joseph Fiennes in the titular role, and a 2000 revival of\u00a0Merrily We Roll Along\u00a0starring Daniel Evans, Julian Ovenden and Samantha Spiro at the Donmar.<\/p>\n

Darling\u2019s an artist of the first rank to have in your corner when developing a musical. I covered weeks of rehearsal for\u00a0Billy Elliot,\u00a0and my fondest memories are of observing Darling and director Stephen Daldry ripping up a scene and creating it anew with me sitting totally rapt.<\/p>\n

The trio of Rudd, Joyce and Darling spent countless hours over Zoom during the pandemic discussing how to bring the tale to life.<\/p>\n

Rudd says the conversations concerned\u00a0\u00a0\u201cWhat does this song feel like?\u201c and \u201cshould this feel like an MGM number or should this one feel like a folk song?\u201d<\/p>\n

After workshops and Chichester, those questions are answered, and now the production\u2019s ready for the West End.<\/p>\n

The cast is led by Addy, Russell and Noah Mullins, superb as The Balladeer who charts a way for us, and more.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the exceptional company: Craig Armstrong, Jenna Boyd, Daniel Crossley, Nell Martin, Nicole Nyarambi, Peter Polycarpou, Gleanne Purcell-Brown, Ashley Samuels, Maggie Service, Madeleine Worrall and Timo Tatzber with Gemma Atkins, Olivia Foster -Browne, Ediz Mahmut and Edwin Ray.<\/p>\n

Musical director Chris Poon must\u2019ve been working on this when I interviewed him during lockdown about another production. Good that we\u2019re seeing cultural benefits emerging from the pandemic.<\/p>\n

During one poignant moment in\u00a0The\u00a0Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, I looked at both Addy and Russell and wondered how they made their performances seem so effortless. How did they\u00a0become Harold and Maureen?<\/p>\n

The stage is in their bones, and I\u2019ve been privileged to have seen them break a leg on countless occasions over the years. I don\u2019t want to oversell the show. Easily, I could call it the best new musical of the year, except that it\u2019s bloody January, so I won\u2019t do that.<\/p>\n

Walk 600 miles to see it? Yeah, but in this weather?<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s settle for: Sprint, don\u2019t walk, to see\u00a0The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry\u00a0starring an unbelievably moving Mark Addy.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Best of Deadline<\/p>\n

Sign up for Deadline’s Newsletter<\/a>. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook<\/a>, Twitter<\/a>, and Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"EXCLUSIVE: Mark Addy (The Full Monty, Game of Thrones)\u00a0says that starring in a new musical was not something…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":436688,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4,450,206383,206379,451,206382,206378,206381,3,206380,452,453,206384],"class_list":["post-436687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news","tag-breakingnews","tag-emily-joyce","tag-harold-fry","tag-headlines","tag-jenna-russell","tag-mark-addy","tag-mike-rosenberg","tag-news","tag-rachel-joyce","tag-top-stories","tag-topstories","tag-wife-maureen"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/436687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=436687"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/436687\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/436688"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=436687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=436687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=436687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}