Thanks to Jodie Prenger's indisposition, Sarah Lark had a chance to play Nancy in Oliver! this week, 10 months after Prenger smacked her down into seventh place in the reality TV show I'd Do Anything. Sure, the buxom Blackpool lass garnered the most public votes – as well as the backing of John Barrowman and Denise Van Outen – but her defeated rivals have managed to get themselves some pretty interesting work. Possibly even better than the prize Andrew Lloyd Webber and Cameron Mackintosh offered. Here, for your delectation, are the best reality show losers.
I'd Do Anything
The beautiful Samantha Barks has arguably done the best of the wannabe Nancys. She coped admirably with being treated as the totty factor and put into an array of revealing outfits, making the eyes of
Lloyd Webber and Barry Humphries pop out on stalks. That would have been enough to put off many a budding starlet. Now she's touring as the divinely decadent Sally Bowles in Cabaret.
Runner-up Jessie Buckley took time to regroup and focus after the final, and didn't take her first professional engagement until the end of last year. It was a wise move; as the naive young wife Anne in Stephen Sondheim's A Little Night Music, Buckley had the chance to hone her once-wobbly acting and movement in a smaller character part.
Nancy Sullivan shone in the early stages – heck, she was clearly born to play the role with a name like that. When John Barrowman didn't tap her on the shoulder and send her through to the live shows, the internet fan forums were outraged. But instead of 19th-century London squalor and one big tear-jerking ballad, she chose 19th-century Parisian squalor and one big tear-jerking ballad in the plum role of Eponine in Les Misérables – and all without subjecting herself to the vagaries of the voting public.
How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?
While Connie Fisher mewled her way through Rodgers and Hammerstein's finest musical for eight shows a week and wrecked her voice, fourth-placed Aoife Mulholland was playing Roxie Hart in Chicago until March 2007, when Andrew Lloyd Webber asked her to cross town quick-smart to play Maria Von Trapp for two shows a week after Fisher was advised to reduce her workload.
Runner-up Helena Blackman's work hasn't been quite so high-profile, but it's been a fascinatingly broad portfolio: Gypsy, The Wizard of Oz, South Pacific, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, and now Saturday Night at the Jermyn theatre. And what is Fisher doing now that The Sound of Music can no longer be heard in the West End? Why, she's touring. In The Sound of Music, naturally.
Any Dream Will Do
You might think Lee Mead has done reasonably well so far – he made a polite exit from Joseph in January, and it's promptly posted closing notices. Yet while he's been smiling and looking pretty in a loincloth, most of those young men who weren't deemed amazing or Technicolor enough for Lloyd Webber's exacting standards have got their teeth into more exciting roles. While Ben James-Ellis wows them as the teenage crooner Link Larkin in Hairspray, and Chris Barton is part of the teen sensation Spring Awakening, it's sixth-placed Daniel Boys who has garnered the most critical and public acclaim, recently picking up a Whatsonstage.com award for best takeover in a role for Avenue Q.
So listen up all musical theatre wannabes: taking a chance on a casting show is a good bet. Whether the public vote you through or not, you'll get your name known in the industry and make some of the requisite contacts. And remember – don't be disheartened if Andrew Lloyd Webber tears you to pieces, if Denise Van Outen doesn't want to marry you, or if you can't fake a convincing kiss with John Barrowman. Some of our newest, rising West End stars have been there before you.
