Luke lands dream star musical role
AFTER watching a professional production of Footloose, 15-year-old Luke Ratcliffe was hooked on the stage, and now he has landed his dream role in his favourite musical.
At Whitworth Community High School he first took to the stage in Year 7 as Mr Brownlow in Oliver! then was a dame in Robin Hood and played primary school teacher Miss Trunchbull
in the Roald Dahl classic Matilda.
Last year, he starred in Little Women in the summer with Whitworth Amateur Musical and Dramatic Society and then with Heykids he performed in High School
Musical in December.
Head Boy at Whitworth Luke said: “I had heard that they were doing Les Miserables locally and I thought it was interesting but my English teacher Mrs Knightley said they had already cast it.
“Then a few months after, someone posted on the Heykids Facebook page that they were still looking for a Marius and Jean Valjean.
“Marius is part of the group called The Students and he has a more interesting role than the other students and he is the love interest of Cosette and he is the only student who doesn’t die on the barricade.
“I immediately messaged them and picked one of the songs ‘Empty Chairs at Empty Tables’ to sing.
“I auditioned on December 10 and got told on the same day I had the part and also attended my first rehearsal.”
Prestwich Amateur Dramatic and Operatic Society youth group will be staging Les Miserables at Bury Met from March 20-23.
Luke said: “It is going to be incredible. You can just tell from the ethic of the cast that it is going to be a great show.
“There is a switch and where as there are usually lots of boys, girls are taking on their roles; for girls to be playing the male parts is different and I don’t think any show has done that before, so it is going to be unique.”
He is rehearsing every Wednesday and Sunday, as well as working towards his GCSES, of which Drama is obviously one.
As all the lines are sung in Les Miserables, so Luke has found learning the lyrics easy, and he gets help from his mum Su Jones when he has lines to master for a production.
When his dad Mark and stepmum Becky took him to see Footloose, Luke said he knew instantly that he wanted to be on the stage. He said: “I was mesmerised; it was absolutely incredible. Watching people do what they do – I knew it was what I
wanted to do. On stage there is a real buzz.
Although with the stage lights the audience is mostly blacked out, you can tell when they are enjoying it by how enthusiastic the clapping is and the audience do drive the cast on to do better performances.”
Luke, from Whitworth, has applied for a place at Pendleton Performing Arts, part of Salford City College to further his career plans. He added: “I would love to step on to a West End stage, but I think it is quite important to enjoy what I am doing now.”
Luke’s sister is Morgan Harper-jones, from Rochdale, a musician and singer whose work was selected for the film soundtrack of critically acclaimed Netflix romantic comedy ‘Love at First Sight’, streamed last year.