Cabaret for IDA’s Jessie, Connie Faces Music Again???

Niamh Perry isn’t the only I’d Do Anything finalist getting job offers (See Today’s News). In fact, runner-up Jessie Buckley may be positively spoilt for choice. Apparently, Oliver! producer Cameron Mackintosh – who made it clear on the BBC One programme that Buckley was his choice over Jodie Prenger, who pipped her to the post in the live final – wants Buckley as an alternate Nancy, performing in Prenger’s stead for two performances a week.

However, he could be in a tug-of-war with fellow impresario Bill Kenwright – a judge on last year’s reality TV competition, Any Dream Will Do – who, we hear, is keen to cast Buckley as Sally Bowles in his upcoming tour of Cabaret, which launches from Birmingham Rep at the end of August, directed (as in the West End) by Rufus Norris and starring Wayne Sleep as the Emcee (See News, 5 Jun 2008). “Maybe This Time” for Jessie?

Meanwhile, the original BBC musical theatre reality TV star, Connie Fisher, who found fame two years ago on How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?, may be returning to Jeremy Sams’ Whatsonstage.com Award-winning production of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s The Sound of Music at the London Palladium, where she made her West End debut in November 2006. After a few extensions, Fisher was succeeded this past February by Summer Strallen as nun-turned nanny Maria (See News, 4 Jan 2008). Strallen’s contract finishes on 23 August, but the production is continuing to book through to 28 February 2009 (See News, 6 Jun 2008).