A STING IN THE MUSICAL TALE
Star goes back to his roots – but where’s his pal Jimmy?
IT IS a show which details how a community’s “self-esteem” is torn away amid a struggling shipbuilding industry – and it has already been raising eyebrows. After pop star Sting’s musical
The Last Ship premiered in Chicago in summer 2014 before a five-month stint on Broadway in New York and then elsewhere, a “more political” version with a British cast begins in the UK next month.
But Auf Wiedersehen, Pet star and long-time friend of Sting Jimmy Nail has been replaced in the cast after his offer of employment was “withdrawn”, according to the producer Karl Sydow.
Following the announcement, Sting appeared at Leeds’s City Varieties Music Hall yesterday for the show’s launch ahead of its run at sister venue Leeds Grand Theatre in April, and then on to York Theatre Royal in June.
The Last Ship is based on the closure of a Swan Hunter shipyard, telling the story of sailor Gideon Fletcher (played by Richard Fleeshman) returning home after 17 years at sea amid the tensions of industrial decline.
Sting, who topped the charts with The Police in the 1970s and 80s, writing hits such as
Every Breath You Take, said he remembers the ships being built “right next door”to his childhood home – a way of life he originally rejected. The star, born Gordon Matthew Sumner on October 2, 1951 in Wallsend, said: “Some of the biggest ships ever built on planet earth were built at the end of the street.
“There was little else in town in the way of work.
“I imagined that was the future for me and it was the last thing I wanted. The shipyard for me was a dark, frightening place.”
But when a closure occurred, “skillsets that were built up over generations were thrown on the scrapheap”, said Sting.
He felt the stories of those caught up in the struggle – men and women – ought to be known and sought the blessings of former workers to create the musical.
“It’s incredibly personal to me because I knew those people and I was brought up with those people and their story has not really been told,” he said.
“I thought I was in an ideal position as a songwriter.”
Speaking to The Yorkshire Post after his appearance, he added: “I was brought up in this really industrial environment that I took for granted. In hindsight it was an extraordinary place of symbolism. Ships going out and returning – it sort of became a symbol for my own life.”
The show tackles themes of how a community’s “self-esteem” is taken away when its major industry falls, and the UK version touches more on 1980s politics.
Speaking about industrial decline, Sting said: “It destroys communities for reasons that are abstract.
“The business of economics is community – if you forget community, I’m not sure what economics means.”
After his replacement was announced, Newcastle-born Nail said: “I was very much looking forward to appearing in Sting’s
The Last Ship, particularly here in my home city. Sadly that’s not to be.”
Joe McGann replaces Nail in the role of Jackie White, and other new cast appearing will include Wallsend -born Charlie Hardwick, who played Val Pollard in Emmerdale, as Peggy White; Richard Fleeshman and Frances McNamee as Meg Dawson. The UK and Ireland run of The
Last Ship starts in Newcastle on Monday, March 12, and heads to Leeds Grand Theatre between Monday, April 30 and Saturday, May 5. It is due to run at York Theatre Royal between Monday, June 25 and Saturday, June 30.
It’s incredibly personal to me because I knew those people. Sting, speaking to The Yorkshire Post about his musical The Last Ship.