Welsh actor SEAN JONES has been running around in short trousers playing young Mickey in Willy Russell’s Blood Brothers in the West End and on national tours for more than two decades. He has announced that the current nine-month, 15-venue marathon which started at Windsor in January and runs through to Salford in late October will be the last in this iconic role.
Here he tells Musical Theatre Review contributor Jeremy Chapman what the part has meant to him, recalls how he met his actress-wife Tracy through the show and the day he fell off the stage and reveals why he has decided to move on…
We read the current tour of Blood Brothers as Mickey will be your last in a key role you have played off and on since 1999. Why have you decided to stop now?
I left the show a couple of years ago fairly abruptly due to my parents’ failing health so never felt I got the chance to say a proper goodbye to this fabulous show. So coming back was an easy choice but age-wise it’s a hefty part that requires energy so I think it’ll be a good time to go before I get noticeably too old!
When and where was the first time you saw the show, how old were you and who played the two main parts?
I first saw the show as a drama student in about 1992, mainly as some of my colleagues saw the show and remarked it’d be a good part for me so I was intrigued. Sadly I missed seeing the iconic Con O’Neill (Olivier Award-winning Mickey in the first 1987 UK tour/West End revival) but I did see Russell Boulter who was a wonderful Mickey and I became immediately obsessed with the part and the show. Other parts were played by Mark Hutchinson, who became my Eddie on many occasions, and Stephanie Lawrence was Mrs Johnstone.
Did you fall in love with the show and the character immediately?
I realise I’ve partly answered this… but, yes, it was a light-bulb moment when I realised I had the right attributes for this show and character.
Sean Jones (Mickey) and Niki Evans (Mrs Johnstone) in the Blood Brothers UK 2022 tour. Picture: Jack Merriman
You have been involved with the show and the part for well over 20 years. Have you a ballpark figure of how many times you have played Mickey?
I genuinely have no idea!
Have you come across audiences who can’t understand why a grown man is playing a boy from the age of seven right through to his troubled teenage years?
No, I think the nature of theatre is that audiences understand storytelling and when Mickey delivers his poem (‘I wish I was our Sammy’) they immediately understand and buy into it. Very clever writing.
At this stage of your career do you think the next actor who assumes the role should be as young as, or younger than, you were when you first got the part? Or could you see yourself ever coming back to it?
Well, never say never obviously. I think as long as you have the energy and physicality the age kinda becomes irrelevant.
How many of the last 22 years have you NOT been on the road with Blood Brothers… and what have you got planned when you finally hang up Mickey’s baggy jumper?
About eight of those years I think. Also the way Blood Brothers tours work means we usually have summer and Christmas off so we often get the chance to do other work. I’m a regular panto face (most recently in New Brighton) but have also notched up regular additional credits over the years so BB has never felt an albatross around my neck. I would just like to continue being a jobbing actor. Especially after the last couple of years.
There must have plenty of tears and plenty of funny stories down the years. Give the one most memorable example of each and has anything ever gone spectacularly wrong like the gun not going off or scenes played in the wrong order?
So many things go wrong from lines fluffing, sets not working, guns misfiring, but I think my favourite was falling off the back of the stage (about a foot and a half drop). I remember the audience particularly enjoying that!
What’s it like to be connected with one role for half your working life? Are you calling it a day because it has become too familiar and you need a new challenge?
No, work is work. Actors act and when Bill [Kenwright] asked me to reprise the role it didn’t take any soul searching. It’s my job and a pleasure to do it.
Sean Jones (Mickey) & Joel Benedict (Eddie) in the Blood Brothers UK 2022 tour. Picture: Jack Merriman
Your wife Tracy used to go on tour with you, playing Mrs Lyons. Does she do any acting now? [Sean met Tracy Spencer at a Blood Brothers production in 1999, they were understudying the roles they later took on and got married in Cardiff in 2004 on the morning of a two-show day. Baby daughter Eleanor, born in 2009, used to tour with them!]
Yes she still performs a lot and runs a very successful charity providing arts-based solutions for companies and schools while also running a fabulous youth theatre.
Your tour stop at Wimbledon was the fourteenth time I’ve seen Blood Brothers, starting with Barbara Dickson in its London premiere back in the 1983. It’s the most times I’ve seen any musical yet I still get a real fright when those gunshots go off even though I know they are coming. Do you still get the same frisson of excitement from doing the show that the audience gets every time from watching it?
Yup, I never take for granted how electric this show is and it’s been fantastic getting that buzz again.
It will obviously leave a big hole in your life as it was clearly a role you always wanted to play. If you hadn’t done Mickey, what part in what other show have you most wished you had done?
Sad to say, THIS was it. It was my dream role and my main ambition from the point I first saw it so I always have to pinch myself that I got to realise that goal. The fact that so many people responded to my interpretation is mind-blowing. I’ll always feel lucky!
- The UK tour of Blood Brothers continues until 22 October 2022.
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