"We bill it as the best pub gig you will ever go to"

Matt has been in the show since 2018 – and is delighted that bookings are now being taken through to May 28 for a night billed as “the best pub in the world”.

Brimming with hits from artists such as Queen, Luther Vandross, Sia, Paul Simon, Adele, Guns & Roses, Avicii and Katy Perry, the show promises “a pub like no other (as) a wildly talented group of incredible instrumentalists, world-class wordsmiths, and sensational singers serve it all live” in an “uplifting celebration of community and friendship with something for everyone.”

“I was born in Cuckfield and I grew up in Burgess Hill,” Matt says, “and really I started acting there. My parents were both heavily into the creative side of things. My mum did a lot of amdram and singing and my dad was a singing teacher to various well-known people so that was just all part and parcel of my upbringing. In my teenage years though I dropped the whole thing because it wasn't particularly cool. I did sports for the longest time but then I ended up doing West Side Story because my girlfriend at the time was in it. And then I ended up doing lots of stuff at The Hawth. I rediscovered the joy of showing off! That's what it is really. I think that's what's built into me. I got back into lots of amateur stuff. I did the student Les Mis and I ended up joining West Sussex Youth Theatre.”

And that was the turning point. The inspirational director Jonathan Goodwin urged him take it up professionally.: “And I ended up at Central in London following my dream. There are hundreds of people that would give testimonial to that man. He is a unique and very special human being.

“I graduated from central in 2012 and it's quite an experience being an actor. It is something you have to really, really want. You have to really have a thick skin too. For the first year out of drama school I didn't work at all. I came out of it with lots of promise and then there was nothing happening. It was like green light, green light, green light, and then then stuck at the crossroads with the red light. I booked a musical after the first year and I did my first job for literally no money but I met some interesting people and then for my second ever job I was on a film scene with Jonathan Pryce for a Netflix film and then since then I've intermittently been quite lucky. I've made various short films and I did a huge version of Titanic The Musical in Toronto. I've done some lovely work but have had some huge gaps in between when I thought that I would never work again and then The Choir Of Man happened literally out of nowhere. I had not been auditioning very much and then I got the call.”

Matt started in the show in 2018

“And the reason I have stuck with it is because it is really a show about joy and individuality. It is set in a pub. We have a working bar and it's like a jukebox basically where we sing some really brilliant songs and everybody gets a chance to shine. We’re singing nine-part harmony for 17 songs but everyone gets to show off. We bill it as the best pub gig you will ever go to and it's got a really nice message. We talk about mental health. We talk about how whatever your background, wherever you from, you belong.”

And that's what pubs represent, a chance to come together and to talk and to share: “It's a dying thing. We talk to each other less and less because of social media but we want to give people a chance to come along, be in the pub, experience joy and come away from it having felt something. It is about talking to each other.”