Lara Denning will join the cast of the UK and Ireland tour of pop group Steps’ hit new musical Here & Now next month.
From 11 November, Denning (& Juliet, UK and Ireland tour, Sunset Boulevard, Savoy Theatre) will take over the role of Caz following the departure of original star Rebecca Lock on 9 November.
Denning will join Jacqui Dubois (Ghost The Musical, UK tour) as Vel, Blake Patrick Anderson (Emojiland, Garrick Theatre, Rent, Hope Mill Theatre) as Robbie, Rosie Singha (& Juliet, UK and Ireland tour) as Neeta, Finty Williams (The Baker’s Wife, Menier Chocolate Factory, The Ocean at the End of the Lane, National Theatre tour) as Patricia, River Medway (RuPaul’s Drag Race UK, BBC) as Jem, Chris Grahamson (NOW That’s What I Call a Musical, UK and Ireland tour) as Gareth, Edward Baker-Duly (The King and I, Broadway/West End, The Third Man, Menier Chocolate Factory) as Max, Ben Darcy (Pretty Woman, West End) as Ben, John Stacey (Kiss Me, Kate, Barbican, My Fair Lady, London Coliseum) as Lesley and Lauren Woolf (I Should Be So Lucky, UK tour) as Tracey.
The cast is completed by Georgia Christofi (professional debut), Kade Ferraiolo (I Should Be So Lucky, UK tour), Albert Green (The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, West End), Harry Jack (Les Misérables, West End), Casey Jay (Grease the Musical, Royal Caribbean), Charlie-Jay Johnson (Here & Now, Birmingham Alexandra Theatre), Rosemary Annabella Nkrumah (Mamma Mia! The Party, O2 Arena), Dean Rickards (professional debut), Markus Södergren (Here & Now, Birmingham Alexandra Theatre), Genevieve Taylor (Wicked, West End) and Jessica Vaux (Starlight Express, Troubadour Wembley Park Theatre).
Following on from a record-breaking world premiere run at The Alexandra in Birmingham, the feel-good show opened at Aylesbury’s Waterside Theatre at the end of August.
The tour is due to visit Southend, Woking, Aberdeen, Newcastle, London, Nottingham, Sheffield, Liverpool, Brighton and Stockton in 2025. In 2026 the tour will visit Southampton, Belfast, Cardiff, York, Oxford, Edinburgh, Wolverhampton, Truro, Plymouth, Milton Keynes, Blackpool, Norwich, Hull, Leicester, Leeds and Canterbury.
Produced by Steps and ROYO with record producer Pete Waterman, the musical which takes its inspiration from the songs of the chart-topping pop group features an original book by Shaun Kitchener. The production is directed by Rachel Kavanaugh, with choreography by Olivier Award winner Matt Cole and Matt Spencer-Smith as musical supervisor, orchestrator and arranger.
The production features set design by Tom Rogers, costume design by Gabriella Slade, lighting design by Howard Hudson, sound design by Adam Fisher, wigs, hair and make-up design by Sam Cox, casting by Will Burton for Grindrod Burton Casting and music technology by Phij Adams with production management by Setting Line.
The feel-good musical love story showcases Steps’ most famous hits including ‘Tragedy’, ‘Stomp’, ‘One For Sorrow’, ‘Better Best Forgotten’, ‘5,6,7,8’, ‘Last Thing On My Mind’, ‘Love’s Got a Hold of My Heart’ and ‘Chain Reaction’.
The UK’s most successful mixed-sex pop group, Steps (Claire Richards, Faye Tozer, Ian ‘H’ Watkins’, Lee Latchford-Evans and Lisa Scott-Lee) have 14 top five singles, four number one albums, 22 million record sales, 500 million streams and 11 sold-out national arena tours to their credit.
Steps’ 2017 comeback tour sold out all 300,000 tickets, making it one of the biggest pop tours of that year. The band has continued to release new music including two further iTunes number one singles – the Sia-penned ‘What the Future Holds’ in 2020 and the Michelle Visage duet ‘Heartbreak in This City’ in 2022. In 2022 Steps celebrated their 25th anniversary with a headline summer tour and released the number one album Platinum Collection joining ABBA, the Rolling Stones and the Stereophonics as one of the only groups in UK history to score number one albums in four consecutive decades.
Angela Thomas
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