Matinee Radio, founded by Manchester’s Golden Cat Studios in 2015, has launched a new podcast, Backstage, covering all the latest news from the UK’s theatre stages.
In the first episode, The Show Must Go On, host Gareth Evans looks back at 2022 and celebrates the fact that, following a global pandemic, 2022 was the year we returned to the theatre, masks were no longer mandatory, and stage doors began to reopen for casts to meet their fans.
Celebrities offering their thoughts include Jason Donovan, the former Neighbours star who spent much of 2022 entertaining audiences while touring Joseph and his Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat, including lengthy 11-night runs in Leeds and Newcastle, alongside a seaside July sojourn in Blackpool. Donovan noted: “It’s been a bumpy couple of years for our sector which is basically freelance.”
Giant of stage and screen Simon Callow is also amongst the guests. He said: “What we’ve been feeling… is this terrific sense of joy at rediscovering what the theatre can be.”
Also featured are cast members from hits including Cabaret, Beauty and the Beast and We Will Rock You, as well as well-known faces from behind the scenes including composers Dave Stewart of the Eurythmics and Jay Osmond of seventies familial supergroup The Osmonds.
Backstage from Matinee is available wherever you usually access your podcasts, as well as directly on the Matinee Radio website.
