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After the Queen +
Paul Rodgers live concert in Wembley Pavillion, 11th May 2005,
Mark and myself were standing at the back entry of the Pavillion,
where the afterparty was held. Hannah J. Fox who plays
Scaramouche in the WWRY musical happened to be there too and
when she came outside she spotted us and gave us a warm welcome.
She told us in confidence that she would play Scaramouche on
29th October for the last time. Of course we promised to be
there. Back home I ordered tickets for the musical for that date
and also for October the 28th.
For months this date was mentioned on Hannah's site and we
expected Brian May to be there also. After all, Hannah was
Scaramouche since the premiere of the musical. We knew Queen +
Paul Rodgers would be touring Japan around that date, but for
months there was this gap in the sequence of Japanese dates so
we started to believe Brian would make a quick return to England
to be present. Shortly before October 29th Hannah made clear on
her website that her departure from the musical was delayed
until January 2006 and at the same time October 29th was added
as a concert date for Queen and Paul Rodgers in Japan...
Well... seeing the musical is great fun everytime so it was no
problem to us that this wasn't Hannah's final performance.
During our visits to the musical we made contact with more
members of the cast and of the band, such as Tony Bourke, the
drummer. For quite some time he had promised us to have a couple
of beers after the show and this time he had sent us an email in
which he promised us that this time it was going to happen! We
met Tony after the show on Friday 28th October and he confirmed
his promise.
That Friday after the show Hannah came to us at the backstage
door (we were about the only three waiting there) and she
reminded us of our meeting at Wembley Pavillion and asked us how
many Queen + Paul Rodgers concerts we had seen. In return I
reminded her of her statement that she would be leaving the 29th
but immediately added that it was great that she had decided to
stay on a little longer! She understood we had travelled to
London especially for her, to wave her goodbye, but I made clear
that the WWRY musical itself is reason enough to come to London
and we were not "let down" by her.
On Saturday 29th we talked to some die-hard WWRY musicalfans we
had met many times before. Both evenings were great but we
noticed that many Hannah fans were present on the 29th October.
It's amazing how Hannah still gets most of the laughs from the
audience. She sure will be missed when she has left the cast.
After the show we talked with Peter Johansson, the latest
Galileo, a very nice chap. On both nights we saw two different
guys play the role of Khashoggi, the new Pop is very funny too
and so is the new Britney. The show keeps changing and that
keeps it fresh for the cast and for the returning fans.
We also spoke with Neil Murray and of course Tony Bourke. He
showed us the bar he would be waiting for us, beers and wine
would be there for us and he gave us some time to wait for
members of the cast before we would join him in that bar. What a
nice guy Tony is. After the many times we've met and had some
contact through mail we (my friends, Tony and me) became friends.
We had some drinks with Tony and we promised to come back again.
We also met some other Queen fans, one of them had seen Queen
live as support act to Mott The Hoople! In that bar we also
spoke with the musical e as support act to Mott The Hoople! In that bar we also
spoke with the musical director and the stage director of the
musical.
Again this was a great weekend in London.
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