Carmen becomes The Car Man in Matthew Bourne classic - Southampton

It’s been a fabulous response, with standing ovations all the way, says Will Bozier who plays the lead role of Luca in Matthew Bourne's The Car Man

The show plays The Mayflower Theatre, Southampton from September 16-19 and the Congress Theatre, Eastbourne from November 18-21.

Loosely based on Bizet’s opera Carmen, The Car Man promises one of the most thrilling and instantly recognisable scores in New Adventures’ repertoire – but set in a greasy 1950’s garage-diner in the American Mid-West where the dreams and passions of a small town are shattered by the arrival of a handsome and enigmatic stranger.

Fuelled by heat and desire, the inhabitants are driven into an unstoppable spiral of greed, lust, betrayal and revenge. It comes promised as a dance thriller like no other.

“I am playing Luca who is a bit of a nomad,” Will says. “He comes to this small town called Harmony and he throws a spanner in the works. There is a character called Lana that he meets when he first enters the town and they have this strange connection between them and it just develops from there....

“He is a drifter when you meet him. He is this confident person, very sure of himself, a very arrogant person but in a good way but as the show progresses things happen that make him go in on himself and start drinking then start to become a shadow of himself…”

Part of the pleasure of it all is that Matthew Bourne is directing: “He comes in every week even though we have been open for a couple of months. He gives us notes. It is great to work with him. He gave us a lot of research. He is a very intelligent man. You can talk to him about anything and he always likes to have new ideas to progress when he comes back to something.”

Will has been with his company since 2014, splitting his time between New Adventures and musical theatre. With this, he is relishing the challenge to tell the story without words.

“You don't really think about the dancing. I've been doing this so long. I know the steps and I know my body and I know how I act and you just do it, but the great thing is that especially with Matt's work it is very story-driven. We don't talk but you just do it all through your body and through the reactions. There's quite a skill to portray a story with no words.”

And the response has been fantastic: “We have had great audiences and with Matt's work it's never like it's just a love story or something that's funny. It's a combination of things. There is a lot of laughter and there is a lot of shock, and I think it allows people to react. We've had a really great response.”

After opening in Plymouth in May 2000, The Car Man played London’s historic Old Vic Theatre for an extended 19-week run and was subsequently the winner of the Evening Standard Theatre Award for Outstanding Musical Event. A UK and international tour followed in 2001/02 and included Lisbon, Amsterdam, Tel Aviv (2 weeks), Saint Paul, MI (2 weeks), Los Angeles, CA (8 weeks), Berkeley, CA, and Tokyo Otsu Osaka Kobe.

Dubbed an auto-erotic thriller, the production was filmed in 2001 at Pinewood Studios (still available on DVD).