Oliver Nicholas is making his West End debut as George McFly in Back To The Future The Musical at the Adelphi Theatre, the award-winning Best New Musical has been a huge hit in London, and has just announced plans to open on Broadway in 2023.
Oliver took over the role of George McFly a year into the production’s run, but he’s known from an early age that he wanted to work in theatre, “my mum always takes credit for starting me off in the acting industry, because she says that when I was younger, I had a really good rendition of Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,” laughs Oliver, “she thought, that’s amazing, and sent me off to Saturday classes from three years old.”
It wasn’t until he was a teenager that Oliver considered the possibility of performing as a job, “I was always a maths and physics guy, so I always assumed I would go to university to study those subjects, but when I was around fifteen, I thought maybe I could be an actor instead.”
Oliver got a scholarship to study the acting course at Tring Park School for the Performing Arts, “I had the best two years of my life there,” says Oliver, “then I took a year out to try working in the industry, but it’s a hard industry and the only job I got was working as an elf for Christmas, I’m over 6 feet so I was definitely the tallest elf there!”
After one more year of study, Oliver found himself working a day job while fitting in auditions. One of those auditions was for Back To The Future, “I was so excited,” says Oliver, “I guess I’ve always been a huge fan of science fiction stuff from a young age, and I’m massively into Doctor Who and Star Wars.”
“In fact, this is really nerdy, after my audition, I got my text from my agent telling me I got a recall whilst I was in the middle of playing a Star Wars version of Dungeons and Dragons.”
The next call Oliver got from his agent was the one that he’d been waiting for, “I was working as a receptionist in a very corporate London building, and my agent told me I could go and hand in my notice because I’d got the part. I was running around this very impressive building, filled with important looking business people, just screaming with happiness.”
Oliver ran from his work to the theatre, taking selfies outside and buying a ticket to watch that night’s performance, “I remember sitting there the whole time and being like, this is a spectacle, this is massive!”
After the excitement died down, Oliver realised the gravitas of what was happening to him, “It was daunting, to be honest. It was my first job and I was straight into an award-winning West End show. Everyone loves the show, everyone adores George and I thought I have to do it justice, and if I don’t, people are probably going to be angry. It was intimidating, but massively exciting.”
Oliver would take over the role from Hugh Coles, who will now play George in the Broadway production, “as the announcement was made, Hugh sent me the loveliest message on Twitter, being like, hey, man, it’s your first job, it’s so exciting. It’s such a great role. If you need any help, please don’t hesitate to drop me a message, I’m here. I’ve met him a few times since, he’s incredibly talented and it’s really great to carry on his legacy in the role.”
As is often the case, Oliver joined alongside a number of new cast members, including Ben Joyce playing Marty McFly, “we got to rehearse with just the new guys for a fair few weeks and we all got to know each other really well, and it was interesting because obviously none of us had any preconceptions of the show, so we all brought a different pair of eyes to it. Then when we started working with the original cast, they were really interested in the way we were doing things differently.”
Oliver has found a mentor figure in the form of Roger Bart, who plays Doc. “Roger is the sweetest man, someone who has such a big name and is so talented, but he’s so lovely and obviously, we both have quite comedy centric roles in the show, and he’s so patient when it comes to talking through things.”
Long before Oliver landed the role, friends who had seen the show were telling him he was ideal for the role of George, “I couldn’t understand why people kept saying this,” laughs Oliver, “but now I get it, because I really love George, he is the emotional heart of the show, he has the emotional change that drives the ending. I just love playing such a sweet, lovely guy.”
But Oliver felt a lot of pressure to get the character right, “as soon as I went into the rehearsal room with John Rando, who is a great director, and I love him, one of the first things he said was, I don’t want you to imitate Hugh, and I don’t want you to imitate the film. The reason that we hired you is because we like you.”
“So I had to let go of this obsession that I had that it needed to be done exactly like the films, obviously I’ve taken inspiration from them, but I think I’ve found the right balance now.”
Oliver says that rehearsals were a lot of fun, and one of his favourite memories was working with fight trainers who had previously worked on Marvel and James Bond films, “George doesn’t do a lot of fighting but he does do a lot of getting beat up, so I had to practice how to take hits and be in control. That was a lot of fun because you have to be safe, but you have to look like you don’t know what you’re doing, which is very interesting.”
“Also there’s a point where George falls out of a tree, the first few times were nerve wracking because you can’t look back at where you’re falling. In the beginning I’d just be trying to psyche myself up to fall while everyone else was hanging around waiting for it to happen, now I do it every night without even thinking about it.”
Another highlight for Oliver was working with so many of the original Back To The Future creative team, “Bob Gale was in a fair bit of our rehearsal process, and he was there for the first week of shows. He loves Back To The Future so much. It’s amazing to see someone who has created something that they are so passionate about, even after all these years.”
“He is so lovely and so talented, I sent him an email, and asked if he could give me any snippets about George that weren’t publicly available, he sent back a very detailed list all about all of George’s life, which was so useful.”
“Then we have Glenn Ballard and Alan Silverstri, and it was amazing to me that these giants of the music industry were there, and having to sing for them was nerve wracking at the start, but they were, again, so lovely and so helpful.”
Oliver admits he’s in no rush to go back to the 9-5 office job, “I was such a fanboy of the films and sci-fi in general, so to then find myself right in the middle of it all was just incredible, and even now, when I’m sat at home, I can’t wait to be back at the theatre, because I just love this job and this show.”
Back To The Future The Musical, starring Oliver Nicholas as George McFly, is currently playing at the Adelphi Theatre.
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