The 2007 West End Revival of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat is a classical family musical reborn. Under the direction of Andrew Lloyd Webber and with lyrics by Tim Rice, the ‘coat of many colours’ is in the hands of a young dynamic company headlined by one of Britain’s brightest talents – Lee Mead.

Previously an understudy for the part of Raoul in the Phantom of the Opera, Lee famously won the right to star as ‘Joseph’ on the British TV talent show Any Dream Will Do. He now takes up the lead role on stage at the Adelphi Theatre. Bookings for tickets are already being taken through to mid-2008.

Joseph’s Journey

Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat revels in an illustrious past. It is one of the original musicals to come out of the Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice collaboration, and was first conceived as a 15-minute cantata, presented as a school choir pop composition, in 1968.

Between then and its stage debut on Broadway in 1982 it underwent several metamorphisms. The show reached London’s West End in 1991 with the lead role taken by a face familiar to millions at the time – Jason Donovan of Neighbours fame. The London production, hosted at the Palladium, was a major success. It ran for two and a half years, in which time Phillip Schofield and Darren Day also appeared in the lead role of Joseph.

Gareth Gates stars as ‘Joseph’ in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, at the Adelphi Theatre from 9 Feb 2009.

“I saw Gareth on Tuesday…He makes an AMAZING Joseph!!! He got a standing ovation (which he deserved) I also spoke to him after the show and got a picture with him.”

The 2007 Joseph Revival

Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat is based on the biblical portrayal of Joseph in the book of Genesis. It revolves around Joseph’s coat of many colours – a coat given to Joseph by his father, Jacob. Joseph’s brothers are jealous of him and his coat, and give Joseph to the Ishmaelite as a slave, who then take him to Egypt.

There Joseph is slave to Potiphar, a wealthy Egyptian. He works hard and rises to run the house. But trouble brews when Potiphar jumps to conclusions over a meeting between Joseph and Potiphar’s wife. He imprisons Joseph with two others, both of whom are servants for the Egyptian Pharaoh. Joseph sings the classic ‘Close Every Door’.

During imprisonment Joseph’s fellow inmates discover that Joseph can read and interpret their dreams. It transpires that the meaning of one of the prisoners’ dreams will see that prisoner return to serve the Pharaoh. Some time later this does indeed come to pass, and Joseph is employed as a dream interpreter to the Pharaoh himself.

From the Pharaoh’s dreams Joseph sees seven years of plenitude for Egypt followed by seven years of famine. For this Joseph is rewarded and becomes one of the most powerful men in Egypt.

Hearing of Egypt’s plentiful resources, Joseph’s brothers venture to Egypt in search of food. Joseph in disguise tricks them and makes his brother Benjamin out to be a thief. The other brothers beg for mercy to set Benjamin free. Moved by their pleas Joseph reveals himself as their brother, paving the way for Joseph to be reunited with his father. A reprise of ‘Any dream Will Do’ brings the curtain down on the 2007 performance.

“I was only young when I went to see Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and I could not take my eyes of the show.”