TakeThat in town to support The Band
THEY are Britain’s most successful boyband of all time.
And Take That’s three remaining members – Gary Barlow, Mark Owen and Howard Donald – were in Cardiff last night to welcome their new musical The Band onto the Wales Millennium Centre stage.
The show features a whole host of their songs, including Never Forget, Back for Good, A Million Love Songs, Greatest Day, The Flood, Relight My Fire, Shine and Rule the World.
It stars AJ Bentley, Nick Carsberg, Curtis T Johns, Yazdan Qafouri and Sario Solomon who are Five To Five, the winners of the BBC’s Let it Shine talent show.
And with a live band, a cast of 16 and a production created by the team behind Take That’s live concerts, the group were excited to unleash the show – which is now the fastest selling music theatre tour of all time – onto the Cardiff audience.
Speaking before the show, Gary said: “We are here tonight because Wales misses out sometimes with our concerts as it’s in the middle of the venues although we did manage to squeeze in Swansea last year. We thought it was important to come here.”
Howard said they’ve been to a few of the shows – about three or four.
He added: “The cast have had a break and now they are back so we wanted to come too.”
Mark said: “We are so proud of this production. It took about two years and we are so proud of it. The cast and all the people behind it are brilliant.”
Gary said the songs “chose themselves.”
He explained: “It felt very natural and it all just felt right. Like it was written in the stars. We waited so long for it to happen and the stars aligned and here we are.”
And they said they are huge fans of Welsh music. Mark is a fan of the Manic Street Preachers and Cerys Matthews and Gary of course loves Tom Jones.
Welsh actress Alison Fitzjohn, from Penarth, plays one of the five friends in the show.
She said: “For me it was all about Take That. Having met them now it seems surreal, but I was 16 and I absolutely adored them. I had the sticker book and some limited edition photo cards.”
The Band is on at Wales Millennium Centre until January 20. To find out more, contact the box office on 029 2063 6464.