Creatives

TIM RICE has worked in music, theatre and films since 1965 when he met Andrew Lloyd Webber, a fellow struggling songwriter. Rather than pursue Tim’s ambitions to write rock or pop songs they turned their attention to Andrew’s obsession–musical theatre. Their first collaboration was based on the life of Dr. Thomas Barnardo, the Victorian philanthropist, The Likes Of Us. Their next three works together were much more successful–Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Jesus Christ Superstar and Evita.

Tim has since worked with other distinguished popular composers such as Elton John (The Lion King, Aida), Alan Menken (Aladdin, King David, Beauty and the Beast), Bjorn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson (Chess),and Stuart Brayson (From Here To Eternity).He also written with Freddie Mercury, Burt Bacharach and Rick Wakeman among others.

He has recently written and presented 50 weekly podcast chats (entitled Get Onto My Cloud) which are mercifully short (25 mins max) reminiscing about his years in music, theatre and film–playing hits and flops, out-takes and number ones.bpn.fm/getontomycloud In 2021 he and Peter Hobbs wrote Gee Seven for the Truro Cathedral Choir to coincide with the G7 economic summit invasion of Cornwall.

Tim founded his own cricket team in 1973, which has now played over 700 matches, and was President of MCC, founded in 1789, in 2002. He was appointed President of the London Library in 2017 in succession to Sir Tom Stoppard. He is a Trustee of Sunderland FC’s Foundation of Light and a Life Vice-President of the schools/cricket charity Chance to Shine. He crops up here and there in all branches of the media drawing on his extensive knowledge of the history of popular music since Elvis was a lad. He has won several awards, mainly for the wrong thing or for simply turning up.

Andrew Lloyd Webber has composed the scores of some of the world’s most famous musicals. From Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (1968) to Cinderella (2021) his work has been consistently seen on world stages. Before the Covid pandemic hit, Lloyd Webber had shows continually running in the West End for 48 years and on Broadway for 41. When Sunset Boulevard joined School Of Rock, Cats and Phantom of the Opera he equalled Rodgers and Hammerstein’s record of four shows running simultaneously on Broadway. He is one of the select group of artists with EGOT status, having received Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony Awards.

Lloyd Webber owns seven London theatres including the iconic London Palladium and Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. Over the past three years the latter has been completely restored and renovated at a cost of over  60 million. It is one of the biggest projects ever undertaken by a private theatre owner in recent times. His mantra that every penny of profit made from his theatres is ploughed back into the buildings has meant that considerable work has been undertaken across his theatre portfolio during the pandemic, including the complete re-modelling and re-seating of the Gillian Lynne.

Lloyd Webber is passionate about the importance of musical education and diversity in the arts. The Andrew Lloyd Webber Foundation provides 30 performing arts scholarships every year for talented students with financial need and supports a range of projects such as the Music In Secondary School Trust and commissioning research into diversity in theatre.
Andrew Lloyd Webber was knighted in 1992 and created an honorary life peer in 1997. To mark his 70th birthday, his bestselling autobiography Unmasked was published by Harper Collins in March 2018.

Director: Cinderella (Gillian Lynne Theatre); Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (The London Palladium); Chess (English National Opera); Unmasked (The Other Palace); Miss Saigon (Broadway, West End, US tours, UK tours, Australia, Japan, Korea, Austria); School of Rock (Broadway, West End, US tour, UK tour, Australia, China and Korea); Les Misérables (West End, Broadway, US tours, UK tours, Australia, Japan, Korea and Spain); Jesus Christ Superstar (UK and Australian arena tour); The Phantom of the Opera (UK and US tours); Oliver! (UK tour).

He directed the 25th anniversary concert of The Phantom of the Opera at the Royal Albert Hall and the 25th anniversary concert of Les Misérables at the O2 in London, both of which were simultaneously broadcast in cinemas worldwide and subsequently released on DVD.

DVD credits: Jesus Christ Superstar (world arena tour); The Phantom of the Opera 25th anniversary concert (Royal Albert Hall) and Les Misérables (O2 Arena) and Miss Saigon (Prince Edward Theatre).

Awards: Miss Saigon on Broadway (Tony nomination for Best Revival); Miss Saigon (UK – Manchester Evening News Award for Best Touring Musical, Korea – Best New Foreign Production and Best Ensemble in a Musical, and Australia – the Green Room Award for Best Director of a Musical) and Les Misérables (UK – Best Musical at the Manchester Evening News Awards).

Joann M. Hunter (Director/Choreographer) with 20 Broadway shows to her credit as a Creator and Performer.

Choreographer: Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cinderella (West End), Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (London

Palladium) Broadway: Love Life (City Center Encores), School Of Rock (Bdway, US Nat’t Tour and West End, Australia, Asia), Disaster, On A Clear Day You Can See Forever, Broadway Bound with David Cromer National Tour/Regional/World Premieres:

World Premiers: UnMasked, The Music of Andrew Lloyd Webber– Dir/Chor (PMP), August Rush with John Doyle, Beatsville by Glenn Slater, A Sign Of The Times by Bruce Vilanch, The Nutty Professor with Marvin Hamlisch and Rupert Holmes’ directed by Jerry Lewis.Ever After (Alliance Theatre), Harmony (Alliance/ Ahmanson Theatre) by Barry Manilow and Bruce Sussman, Annie, Pump Boys and Dinettes, Grease, Oliver, & Curtains all at (PMP), Nat’l tour of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. She has directed and choreographed Debra Monk in her one woman show with special guest Ron Rifkin, Andrea Martin, Victor Garber, and David Hyde Pierce.

Upcoming Dir/Chor: SuperYou. In development, Rock and Roll Refugee. The story of Genya Ravan Assoc Broadway Choreographer – Spring Awakening, Curtains, The Wedding Singer, All Shook Up.

West End credits include Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (London Palladium. Nominated for Olivier Award for Best Musical Revival); Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (Novello Theatre); The Last Tango (Phoenix Theatre/UK Tour); Forbidden Broadway

(Vaudeville Theatre/Menier Chocolate Factory); Midnight Tango (Phoenix Theatre/ Aldwych Theatre/UK Tours); Dance ‘til Dawn(Aldwych Theatre/UK Tour); Ruthless! (Arts Theatre); Flashdance (Shaftesbury Theatre); Sign of the Times (Duchess Theatre)

andFootloose (Playhouse Theatre/Novello Theatre/UK Tour/South Africa).

London credits include: Sister Act and The Christmasaurus (Eventim Apollo); Guys and Dolls (Royal Albert Hall); Violet, The Woman in White and Death Takes a Holiday (Set Design, Charing Cross Theatre) and Spamilton (Menier Chocolate Factory/US Tour).

Other credits include: Fatal Attraction (ATG); I Think We Are Alone (Frantic Assembly); The Enemy of the People, Wonderland and Beauty and the Beast (Nottingham Playhouse); Othello and Lives in Art (Sheffield Crucible); Our New Girl (Bush Theatre); The Lady Vanishes and Rain Man (Bill Kenwright Ltd); Top Hat (Set Design) and Thoroughly Modern Millie (Kilworth House); George’s Marvellous Medicine (Leicester Curve/UK Tour); Deathtrap (Salisbury Playhouse/UK Tour); Room on the Broom (Lyric Theatre/Garrick Theatre/World Tour) and UK tours of Rock of Ages, Fame!, Love Me Tender and Tango Moderno.

International credits include: She Loves You (Tivoli Theatre, Copenhagen/Musikhuset Aarhus); Tell Me on a Sunday (Set Design, Majestic Theatre, Shanghai/RUG) and The Life of the Party (TheatreWorks, California/ Menier Chocolate Factory).

Awards include: UK Theatre Award for Best Design for Wonderland and Olivier Award for Best Revival of a Play for Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.

Ben is an Associate Artist of Curve in Leicester. He trained at Rose Bruford College of Speech and Drama in London where he was honoured to be awarded a Fellowship in 2021.

West End includes: The Drifters Girl (Garrick); Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (London Palladium); Heathers (Theatre Royal Haymarket); Young Frankenstein (Garrick); Inala (Peacock Theatre); Annie (Piccadilly); Pantoland at The Palladium, Goldilocks and the Three Bears, Snow White, Dick Whittington and Cinderella (London Palladium); Breakfast at Tiffanys (Theatre Royal Haymarket); All the Fun of the Fair (Garrick); Visiting Mr Green (Trafalgar Studios); Dancing in the Streets(Cambridge) and African Snow (Trafalgar Studios).

Regional and UK tours include: Beautiful, What the Butler Saw (Curve/Theatre Royal Bath); Sunset Boulevard & The Color Purple At Home (Streamed from Curve), The Cher Show, The Addams Family, The Osmonds, Priscilla Queen of the Desert, Rough Crossing, Dracula, Rock of Ages, La Cage Aux Folles (UK Tours); Love on the Links & Before the Party (Salisbury Playhouse);

My Beautiful Laundrette, An Officer and a Gentleman, Sunset Boulevard, Beautiful Thing(Curve/UK tour); The Importance of

Being Ernest (Birmingham Rep/Curve); Kiss Me Kate (WNO/Opera North), Saturday Night Fever (Theatre Royal, Bath/UK tour); The

Tempest, Othello, Much Ado About Nothing and As You Like It (Stafford Shakespeare Festival); The Memory of Water (New Vic,

Stoke); Our House (New Wolsey, Ipswich/UK tour); Sherlock Holmes, Angus Thongs and Even more Snogging (West Yorkshire

Playhouse); Merrily We Roll Along (Theatre Clwyd).

International Includes: Chess (Tokyo & Osaka); La Clemenza di Tito (Opéra de Lausanne / Bilbao Opera); Romeo und Julia

(Theater Trier); Annie and Chess (Toronto); The Picture of Dorian Grey, The Life, Strangers On A Train, Sweet Charity and Tommy (English Theatre, Frankfurt); Legally Blonde (South Korea); Inala (Sadlers Wells/International tour); Faust, 1984 (Altes Schauspielhaus, Stuttgart); Dracula (Singapore/Bangkok) and Voices of The Amazon.

Television includes: Quadrophenia, The Prince’s Trust Awards (Theatre Royal Drury Lane); The Classic Brit Awards (Royal Albert

Hall); The Olivier Awards 2011-2022 (2014 & 2019 Knight of Illumination Award for Best Lighting) (Royal Opera House and Royal Albert Hall); The Kinshasa Symphony Orchestra (Royal Festival Hall) and Il Divo (Coliseum).

Sound Design Award highlights: Oliver Award, Outer Critics Circle Award, Broadway World Award, Green Room Award, Dora Award, Craig Noel Award, and the WhatsOnStage Award for Come From Away; Olivier Award for Memphis, Olivier Award for Merrily We Roll Along, Tony nomination for A Little Night Music, Tony nomination for End Of The Rainbow, Olivier nomination for Bat Out Of Hell, Olivier nomination for Top Hat, Olivier nomination for End Of The Rainbow, and the Pro Sound Award for Sound Engineer Of The Year.

West End Musical Design highlights: Back To The Future, Alws Cinderella, Prince Of Egypt, & Juliet, Come From Away, Bat Out Of Hell, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Strictly Ballroom, 42nd Street, Young Frankenstein, Wind In The Willows, Mrs Henderson Presents, Memphis, I Can’t Sing, In The Heights, Top Hat, Merrily We Roll Along, and End Of The Rainbow.

International Design highlights: MJ (Broadway), Diana (Broadway), Mamma Mia! The Party (Worldwide), Summer (Broadway), Come From Away (Broadway), Bronx Tale (Broadway), Disney’s Hunchback Of Notre Dame (Worldwide), Spring Awakening (Broadway), Disney’s Little Mermaid (Worldwide), End Of The Rainbow (Broadway), Disney’s Beauty & The Beast (Worldwide), A Little Night Music (Broadway), Secret Garden (New York), Clueless (New York), Sister Act (Worldwide), and Starlight

Express (Bochum, Germany).

Michael Harrison’s West End musicals include: THE DRIFTERS GIRL at the Garrick, two seasons of JOSEPH AND THE AMAZING TECHNICOLOR DREAMCOAT at the London Palladium, MEL BROOKS’ YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN at the Garrick, ANNIE at the Piccadilly, MRS HENDERSON PRESENTS at the Noel Coward, GYPSY at the Savoy and THE BODYGUARD at both the Adelphi and Dominion Theatres.

Michael’s current UK Touring productions include: Disney’s BEDKNOBS & BROOMSTICKS, JOSEPH AND THE AMAZING TECHNICOLOR DREAMCOAT and SINGIN’ IN THE RAIN.

Michael’s London Palladium pantomimes: CINDERELLA, DICK WHITTINGTON, SNOW WHITE, GOLDILOCKS AND THE THREE BEARS and PANTOLAND have proved to be huge popular hits with DICK WHITTINGTON winning the Olivier Award for Best Entertainment and Family.

He is Chief Executive of Crossroads Pantomimes responsible for many of the major number one pantomimes across the UK.

Michael was awarded a companionship to the Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts by Sir Paul McCartney and the Freedom of the City of Newcastle upon Tyne in recognition of his services to theatre in the region.