Michael Crawford says Andrew Lloyd Webber is hinting that he wants him to do something, and the 84-year-old is already rehearsing in case it turns into a return to performing. Crawford said a lunch with Lloyd Webber the other day left him with the sense that a new project could be in the air.
That is why Crawford is being searched now: the man who became a television star as Frank Spencer in Some Mothers Do ’Ave ’Em and later defined Phantom of the Opera for a generation is talking again about the stage, after years living quietly in New Zealand. He said he and Lloyd Webber are still great mates, and the suggestion has been enough to send him back to singing classes.
Crawford said he has already done three singing classes this week with his musical director, Nigel Lilley, because if the idea does become real, he wants to be ready. “I’ve got to keep practising like crazy for it to be acceptable,” he said, adding that he would also love to do a one-man piece looking back and drawing the audience into memories of their own early lives.
The possible reunion carries weight because Crawford and Lloyd Webber already changed British theatre once. Lloyd Webber cast him in the principal role in The Phantom of the Opera in 1986, after Crawford had won fame in Some Mothers Do ’Ave ’Em, which he was cast in 1971 and which premiered two years later. Before that, he had appeared with Steve McQueen in The War Lover in 1962 and in Hello, Dolly! in 1969, directed by Gene Kelly and starring Barbra Streisand and Walter Matthau.
But Crawford also made clear the project is far from settled. He said it may materialise, but he will not know for another few months, and the uncertainty sits alongside a body that has already forced him to rethink how and where he works. He and his wife, Natasha MacAller, a 68-year-old chef and former ballerina, moved to New Zealand in 2007 to help him recover from chronic fatigue syndrome, or ME, which he said developed while he was performing in The Woman in White in 2004.
He said the move helped within a year, and that life with MacAller is wonderful. “She’s so good for me,” he said. Yet the 20-odd-hour trip between Britain and New Zealand has become too much, and he said he is coming back to the UK now because the journey is exhausting. He still goes to New Zealand when it is warm, but he is also talking to a production company about a documentary on his life, handing over home videos and anything else that might be useful. The company has previously made films about Christopher Reeve, Paul McCartney and Bruce Springsteen, and Crawford said he hopes it will work out, though it will take time.
For now, the story is less about a confirmed comeback than a performer quietly testing whether one is still possible. Crawford has been out of the spotlight, but with Lloyd Webber hinting at something, singing lessons under way and the clock ticking on a decision, he is preparing as if the next act might still arrive.
