The Japanese version of the pop-rock phenomenon about the six ill-fated wives caused a sensation in Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya. As that production now hits the UK, we go behind the scenes (and thrones)
A singer and dancer in Japan, Marie Sugaya first heard about a musical featuring King Henry VIII’s wives through a friend on a cultural exchange in London. “She spoke of Six so highly that I thought if it were ever to come to Japan, I’d love to be involved. But it was a faraway idea, just a dream.”
Similarly, Airi Suzuki, an actor and “pop icon” famed across Japan, travelled to Britain to watch the show last year, purely as a punter. Neither Sugaya nor Suzuki imagined they would ever take to the same stage to perform the Tudor-era musical-cum-rock concert themselves. But they are part of an all-Japanese lineup of queens who are taking over Vaudeville theatre for a week-long run which producers think is the first of its kind: a West End show, translated into Japanese and performed in Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya as part of a sold-out tour, now brought back to the West End with a cast who sing in Japanese (with English captions).
