Wayne Sleep delights audience with stories from stage and screen

Perhaps, ‘versatile’ is an understatement when it refers to Wayne Sleep’s career. He is a jolly 77-year-old with a sense of humour that clearly came across at his book launch appearance during one of the festival’s presentations at the John Mackintosh Hall.

We can blame his mum – if blame is the word – for his future and life career in dance.

At a very early age he entered a dance school where his dream was to be a British version of his idols, Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire.

However, ballet came first and we were treated to many clips of his very early years in his chosen vocation. His mum noticed, ‘there was something in him,’ which would lead him to the stage, obviously not realising at the time, it would be to much more on that stage, than just ballet.

He would traverse every corner of it, and not just to dance on it.

At just 5ft 2ins (157 cms), there were not many roles he could be offered. He happened to be the shortest male dancer admitted into the Royal Ballet School, and many roles were tailor made for him by some notable choreographers including Rudolf Nureyev.

Consequently, many of his roles were character roles as opposed to lead roles because of his size, but this didn’t harm his progress in any way as later, he began to diversify. It wasn’t long before he would move on to musicals working with none other than Andrew Lloyd Webber who was gracious enough it seems for Wayne to create a role in one of the many highly successful Webber musicals, Cats.

Moving on into acting, they weren’t just cameo roles Mr Sleep was offered. He appeared in a number of television roles on Television as well as in films.

He acted opposite Sean Connery, better known as James Bond, but not in one of those iconic films.
Yes, he appeared in a number of films and series on television also.

Also on his CV is working with the British Shakespeare Company – Yes, versatile certainly is the word when describing this talented show biz individual’s career.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Twelfth Night are two of Shakespeare’s plays he toured with across the UK.

But there’s so much more: musicals, pantomime, and a number of reality TV shows also. The list goes on.

He has appeared in television dance shows as a judge and game shows as well. Oh, and radio programmes too.

Wayne Sleep has done it all.

It’s been a metamorphosis career involving almost everything show biz has challenged him with.

He is also the subject of a painting exhibited in London’s Tate Gallery, no less.

There is no denying he’s done the lot. If there’s a stage, a camera or a microphone somewhere, he has probably had close contact with it.

He danced with a princess, probably the most famous one of all – Princess Diana, with whom he had a very close relationship for a number of years.

He danced with her at a Christmas event as a present for her husband King Charles. Danced with a princess, acted with Sean Connery and shared a stage with Freddie Mercury and so much more, despite the fact he is only 5ft 2... As if that mattered.

But time, as they say, waits for no one and as is the case with footballers, no matter how good you are, your legs tell you, ‘that’s enough’.

Wayne continued his long career as a choreographer and now runs workshops for young children and always has an open-door policy giving advice to future choreographers. He also has the Wayne Sleep Foundation helping students of the performing arts.

The evening’s presentation, of course, ended with the signing of his book, ‘Just Different’, but wait, not before the septuagenarian gave us a little sing song before he abandoned his second home – the stage.