Lloyd Webber’s son Nicholas dies of gastric cancer aged 43

ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER said he was “totally bereft” that his eldest son, Nicholas, had died, last night.

The Oscar-winning composer, 75, said the 43-year-old lost his battle with gastric cancer after he said on Thursday he had been taken into a hospice. Nicholas had been ill for 18 months. Andrew tweeted: “I am shattered to have to announce that my beloved elder son Nick died a few hours ago in Basingstoke Hospital. His family is gathered together and we are all totally bereft.”

Nicholas, also a composer, had hits including The Little Prince and produced his father’s Symphonic Suites at London’s Theatre Royal in Drury Lane. He was nominated for a Grammy for the best musical theatre album alongside his father, Greg Wells and David Zippel for Lord Lloyd-Webber’s Cinderella.

Nicholas also scored the 2021 feature film The Last Bus, which starred Timothy Spall and Phyllis Logan and was directed by Gillies McKinnon. He married viola player Polly Wiltshire in 2018.

The news follows a video posted to Lord Lloyd-Webber’s Instagram on Thursday, in which the composer said his son was “over the worst of this first bout of pneumonia” which he caught as a result of his “ghastly” cancer.

Lord Lloyd-Webber – who wrote the music for Cats, The Phantom Of The Opera and Jesus Christ Superstar, said on Instagram: “We’re all here and the family has gathered around and it was the right place for us all to be I think.”

In the video he also thanked the people of Ukraine who sent him a Cats T-shirt following the announcement that his son was “critically ill”.

He said: “They’ve been performing Cats there in a bunker, a makeshift production. It’s incredibly moving … everything they’re going through they have been so incredibly thoughtful about dearest Nick. I’m going to go and see Nick in a minute, and I’m going to pass on all of the fantastic wishes that I’ve had for him all the way from everywhere all around the world.”

Lord Lloyd-Webber also sent his best wishes “to the other families I have around the world in theatre” on the opening night of his new show Bad Cinderella in New York. He said: “I’m absolutely gutted not to be able to be there but my place is really here in England at the moment.”

Lord Lloyd-Webber’s first wife, Sarah Hugill, is the mother of Nicholas. They also share a daughter, Imogen.