Super trouper: actress from theatre next door steps in to save Mamma Mia! show

Mamma Mia: Steph Parry on stage last night after rushing over from 42nd Street
Nigel Howard
Owen Sheppard8 June 2018

A West End performance of Mamma Mia! was rescued after the lead actress was rushed to hospital — and a replacement stepped in from a theatre down the road to save the show.

Disaster struck after one scene when Caroline Deverill, playing Donna Sheridan, was forced off stage with a calf injury in front of a full house at the Novello Theatre on The Strand.

As Ms Deverill, who shares the role made famous in the film version by Meryl Streep, made her way to casualty, stage manager Philip Effemey faced the “nightmare” of sending the 1,100-strong audience home.

But the show must go on and waiting in the wings — albeit those at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane down the road — was Steph Parry, who was working as an understudy in a production of 42nd Street. She had played the part of Donna at the Novello four years ago and reprised it last year on a cruise ship.

Within 18 minutes of the show “grinding to a halt,” Ms Parry, 35, had raced from the Theatre Royal and taken to the stage of Mamma Mia! The drama echoed 42nd Street’s plot of an understudy’s rise from showgirl to star.

Ms Parry told the Standard afterwards: “I was called at 8.15pm by my manager saying there had been an emergency at Mamma Mia! and they want you to go over there now.

“So I just left Drury Lane, got straight into costume and got on stage in a mixture of other people’s costumes.”

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Despite having since learned a completely new musical, Ms Parry said she coped well with the lyrics and script for her impromptu performance.

She added: “There were a few hairy moments but I don’t think the audience would have known. It was the choreography more than anything, because that’s not my forte, so I had to really switch my brain on.

“I feel great, I had fun. I love this show so much, so any opportunity to come back I will do it. The adrenaline was pumping. I never know when it will be the last time I get to do this show, so I just had to go and enjoy it. I just was like ‘don’t think about it, just do it’.”

Mr Effemey described the chances of Ms Parry being on hand to step in as “one in a billion”.

He said: “It was a completely unique experience for the audience. When something like that happens and it works the audience love it.

“It was a one in a billion chance that we had somebody who could play the role literally in the theatre next to ours, otherwise we would have had to abandon the show and refund everybody’s money.”

Sara Poyzer, who shares the role of Donna in Mamma Mia!, will be on stage tonight. The theatre called her last night but she was too far away to make it there in time.

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