Take That give fans a surprise showstopper
MASSIVE CHEERS AS TRIO JOIN CAST AT END OF MUSICAL
TAKE THAT fans screamed with delight as their music idols made a surprise appearance on stage at the finale of their new musical in Manchester.
Mark Owen, Gary Barlow and Howard Donald performed some of their biggest hits as a sold-out audience at the Opera House gave the stars of their show, The Band, a standing ovation on Monday night.
The musical features the boyband Five to Five, who were found through BBC talent show Let It Shine, and tells the emotional story of a group of 16-year-old girls whose beloved boyband soundtracks their lives.
It has been previewing since Friday night in the city, winning high praise from fans and standing ovations at every show so far.
But on Monday night they got their biggest cheers yet.
The show’s cast were taking their bows after performing a medley of Take That songs, when actor Andy Williams walked on to stage to say: “Shall we do that again? I think we can do even better than that!”
Take That’s Mark Owen then wandered on to stage to sing Hold Up a Light, to the delight of gobsmacked fans, who couldn’t quite believe what they were seeing and near brought the roof off the Opera House with their screams. He was joined by the stars of the show to perform the song – before even more cheers when Howard Donald and Gary Barlow both joined him on stage. They then performed Shine and Never Forget as fans sang and danced along.
Take That are producers on the new show and told the M.E.N. last month how they had been determined to put their fans’ stories centre-stage in their new musical.
They said the chose Manchester for the world premiere run of the show because of their connections with the city where they started, and hailed it “Manchester’s musical”.
Gary Barlow said at the time: “We owe so much to this city, we spent so much time here in the start.
“We were always the band from Manchester.”
The musical is about the lives of five young girls in 1992 who all love “The Band”. When tragedy strikes their friendship is rocked - but they reunite 25 years later in a bid to finally meet their idols.
And Gary, Mark and Howard admit they “can’t stop crying” when they watch the show due to its emotional story, which is based on real-life fans of the band.
The musical plays in Manchester until September 30 before heading out on a national tour.