Meat Loaf and Jim Steinman honoured on the Eastbourne and Southampton stages

Glenn is the main protagonist in Jim Steinman’s spectacular musical Bat Out of Hell which hits the highway to Eastbourne bringing to life the legendary anthems of Meat Loaf.

It plays the Congress Theatre from May 24-28; it also tours from June 28-July 2 to the Mayflower Theatre, Southampton.

Sadly it’s all happening in the wake of all the trauma of the pandemic; it also comes shortly after the deaths of both Steinman (just over a year ago) and Meat Loaf (earlier this year).

Glenn got the role in January 2020 but with the outbreak of Covid he had to wait until August 2021 to take the stage by which time both Jim and Meat Loaf were no longer with us.

“We were on tour when Meat Loaf died. We did a special performance and an encore and we put a hundred red roses in the foyer and a red rose on every seat as a reference to the red rose of Meat Loaf. It was a very sad day but also a very special day.

“He had struggled with his back for a long time and it was the reason that he was not able to come across since we started but it was also similar with Jim. He was bedbound for quite a long time and he would watch the show every day, being Zoomed in. He watched from his bed and people said that he even watched the interval just to see the people in the theatre. This was his baby and the intention was always that the songs were going to be a musical. People just think it's a jukebox musical but it's important to remember the this was always the intention for Jim and so it's really great that he was able to see it before he died.

“I joined the show in February 2020 and we were in rehearsals for the US tour and our suitcases were already in the US and we were just about to go to New Jersey where we were opening. We were one day away and our suitcases had gone on ahead and then the Americans closed their theatres a day before us so we were in a weird kind of limbo wondering whether something in this country was going to be possible. We didn't get our suitcases bank for 18 months! It was like you'll get them in three to four weeks’ time and then again and again and it was like actually sending us our cases back would have been like finally admitting that it wasn't going to happen but we did get them back in the end!”

Just as the show finally happened in the end, and Glenn is loving it: “For me as an actor I just love the storytelling of these songs. They are eight minutes long and they tell a story. There's a real sense that they were going to be a musical. They are poetic. You never feel that you are just regurgitating some pop song. They are all there to further the story but I also just love the way the audience react. They hear the beginning of Anything For Love and and you can hear the intake of breath from 2,000 people sitting there. You can see in the front row that people will grab each other’s legs. You can just sense that palpable excitement and you can hear it from the stage. It is just fantastic!”