Stephen Gately
by Alison Kirkman
Stephen Gately was thrilled to be offered the role of the Childcatcher in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. He is the youngest person ever to play the part. “I went to the audition and there were all these people there that I recognised from the TV and I just thought, ‘I’m never going to get it’ but I just turned on the accent – I love doing character voices anyway – and was evil and I got through!”
Stephen is most famous for his part in the Irish five-piece, Boyzone, one of the biggest boy bands of the mid-90s.
He has always been passionate about entertaining. He trained at the Gaiety School of Acting in his home town Dublin, Ireland, alongside other now well-known actors such as Colin Farrell. “I just wanted to be in the entertainment industry. I wanted to entertain people.”
He also loves to dance and, at the age of 15, was named All Ireland Disco Dancing Champion. “I loved to be able to move and disco dance. I just loved music and picked dancing up really quickly. I taught it for a while too, just the kids around different areas of Dublin which was fun because then they would enter competitions which was great. I even choreographed a few fashion shows.”
So, when, after 14 consecutive top-three hits, Boyzone decided to split in 2000, Stephen chose to pursue a career in musical theatre saying, “It combines my two passions - music and singing.”
His first role was the lead in Joseph and His Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat in 2002 for which he received fantastic reviews. Now in Chitty, he’s really enjoying playing an evil character. “It’s a good laugh and shows I can do something other than just being the cute one in Boyzone which I was for so long! It’s an easy show for me to do – I’ve just got one song and a couple of scenes but it’s also an important character to the story which is great.”
In his spare time he runs a television company with his partner Andrew and is also writing new material to relaunch his solo singing career.
Stephen is scheduled to play the Childcatcher in Chitty until January 19th and after that is quite happy to wait and see what else comes his way. “I’d love to do Lord of the Rings – The Musical. I could be a hobbit! The bottom line is I want to be on the stage and singing – that is what my whole life is about. It’s in my blood, I could never give it up.”
