INTERVIEW: Brian Conley is The Music Man at Chichester

The amiable performer, who has conquered the West End in shows like Me And My Girl and Jolson and has kept millions glued to television with such programmes as The Grimleys and Let Me Entertain You, will be starring in a major musical at Chichester Festival Theatre.

He's finally playing the role he's waited nearly 20 years to claim as his own '“ the larger-than-life character of confidence trickster "Professor" Harold Hill in a revival of Meredith Willson's 1957 Broadway hit The Music Man.

And he's hoping people will flock to see the show, attracted by the toe-tapping songs (including 76 Trombones and Till There Was You) and a very strong story with a happy ending.

"There's a lot of doom and gloom out there and I hope we will be providing a service of escapism," he told me during a press conference at the Oaklands Park venue.

"Personally, I'm not here for the money. I'm here because I know this theatre will do a top class show. I'm surrounded by the cream... choreographers, directors and so on."

The production has been designed by Robert Jones who also designed Conley's blockbuster Jolson (and the current production of The Sound of Music at the London Palladium).

And Brian says he feels very much the same about The Music Man as he did when starting his three-year stint in Jolson back in 1995.

"It was the story of the very first pop star but everyone was raving about Mack And Mabel coming into the West End," he recalls.

"Then Mack and Mabel went down , Jolson went up. It was a lovely feeling. Quite sweet. After all, we had been coming in as the underdogs. It was a very exciting time for me."

The show opened at the Victoria Palace to rave reviews and was voted best musical at the 1996 Laurence Olivier Awards. Brian stayed with it for six-month run in Canada.

With so many royal variety shows to his credit he is almost a veteran, he gets a welcome personal bonus for coming to Chichester for the season.

Because it means he can spend time with his family '“ wife Anne-Marie, whom he married in 1997, and daughters Amy, 11, and Lucy, six '“ at their recently-acquired seaside home only a mile from Worthing.

Their principal home is in Buckinghamshire but even before they knew he would be coming to Chichester, Brian and his wife saw "a little old house not far from the sea" west of Worthing.

"We fell in love with it and so we purchased it. We have been doing it up and at Easter we stayed there for the very first time. It's wonderful. It's my beach house, my expensive caravan.

"The family will be down here for the whole summer," he revealed. "By sheer luck it has worked out that at pretty much the same time I'm here at Chichester the children will be off, too.

"The wonderful bonus is that there will not be a performance every day. It's heads down the first three weeks - in fact, the rehearsal period is probably the toughest time - and then it will calm down and we will be doing odd days.

"About 56 performances altogether and I don't regard that as a lot. In pantomime you do two a day right through Christmas. Last year I was in Cinderella (as Buttons) at High Wycombe and the way Christmas fell I did 14 shows before a recovery day.

"Next time I'm in Cinderella at the Theatre Royal, Nottingham. Cinderella is great, the best pantomime, and Buttons is the best part. Singing, comedy, acting, adlibbing with children when they come up at the end. That's always a lovely moment.

"The Music Man has all those qualities, although not adlibbing obviously. but it has a riproaring, uplifting score and I think it's going to be something very special ."

He felt the 1962 film version was very dated now. "It was of an era and I think we can do better" he predicted. "We have been given permission to tweak it a bit and make it a little more understandable to a British audience.

"Harold Hill is a big character and we have to make the audience believe he is in love with Marian (the town librarian), while realising that as a consequence of what has happened (conning parents into believing their kids will form a boys' band) he could be tarred and feathered and even hanged."

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It's a part Brian has been waiting to play for nearly two decades. It all started back in 1990 when, as he puts it, he finished his turn in Me And My Girl "in London's glittering West End" at the Adelphi Theatre where he had stepped into Robert Lindsay's shoes.

He then had a meeting with Cameron Mackintosh who was planning to put Mary Poppins on the stage and wanted Brian to play the Dick Van Dyke role.

"That was 18 years ago and I suppose I did look quite similar to the man himself," he reflected. "In fact, it never came about but at that meeting Cameron said the part made for me was The Music Man.

"So he planted the seed and I bought the Robert Preston film and the CD and became aware of the songs including Till There Was You, the only musicals song covered by the Beatles.

"Then a few years ago The Music Man was done on Broadway. I went over to see it and it was on the cards I would do it there. But once again it never came about.

"Then we heard they were planning to do it at Chichester last year but they said if I was seriously interested in the part they were happy to hold it back a year. That's how it came about and I'm delighted to be doing it at last.

"I think in some ways the energy we will bring to this show is similar to Jolson. Without a doubt it will take them where I want to take them and, with any luck, to a standing ovation."

In a hugely successful career, Brian has made a few excursions into straight acting on film (including Circus, Equilibrium, Dream and Arthur's Dyke) and did well in a straight role on stage in the award-winning play Elton John 's Glasses in 1998.

But it's in live theatre and on the telly he has really made his mark. "In my heart I'm an entertainer," he declares.

"I like the importance of TV. I hosted the Paul O'Grady Show the other day when he was ill and just to know there are millions of people watching is quite a buzz.

"But I enjoy getting it right in the theatre. Having the luxury of doing it every night, tuning it up and presenting something that will make people speechless.

"When I was in Jolson and Me And My Girl people would come back very emotional and blown away by the whole experience. I enjoy taking them there.

"I enjoyed doing Jolson but it was a tough gig. A hard 26 songs.

I loved being at the Palladium in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Yes, the car was the star but I still had the number one dressing room, a wonderful treat for me.

"Playing at the Palladium was like a footballer playing at Wembley every night. Walking past the theatre and seeing a big picture of yourself outside. That's what every little boy dreams of. In this game, anyway.

"I would say Brian Conley was born to sing. I learned everything else. I have always sung. My father was a very good opera singer although he never took it up professionally.

"I wasn't very good at anything else. The first show I ever did was a school production of Yeomen Of The Guard and I played Fairfax.

"Afterwards my parents told the music teacher they didn't know what to do with me because I was so difficult to contain. But he told them he wanted to get me to my first TV series, that I had got something and should nurture it."

Which he did, and most successfully. His first series of the Brian Conley Show on TV achieved audiences of more than 12 million and three more series followed.

In 1994 he starred in the ITV sitcom Time After Time and was voted most popular comedy performer at the National TV Awards.

Other TV assignments have included hosting the national lottery show We've Got Your Number, portraying the sadistic PE teacher Dynamo Digby in The Grimleys and hosting Dirty Rotten Cheater for the BBC.

One of his greatest accolades came from comedy legend Bob Hope who saw him in Me and My Girl at the Adelphi. Bob sat with his family five rows from the stage, having bought up all the seats in front to provide a clear view.

Hope went backstage afterwards to congratulate Brian, telling him, "My boy, you've got it all." And he filmed a short tribute for inclusion on the programme when Brian was the subject of This is Your Life.

When the American star went on tour, Brian joined him as his support. And now one of his proudest possessions is a poster in the snooker room of his house which proclaims: "Bob Hope. Royal Albert Hall. Special guest, Brian Conley."

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