Pictures Of The UK & European (& German) Tours, 2006-2009

Click on the thumbnails to view the complete pictures. The details about each tour and its cast changes are given to the side of each gallery, including details regarding press appearances and emergency replacement cast members. Dates are given as precisely as possible. All of these pictures belong to their respective photographers & have been drawn from press releases, local newspaper articles, screen captures from promotional videos, my own photographs & those of friends & of course the official Cats souvenir brochures/promotional materials released by Live Nation/Really Useful Group. All scanned images from the colour brochures do, however, belong to me & I would ask if you could kindly let me know if you take any pictures for use on your own websites or for publishing anywhere else online.
The pictures in this gallery are arranged according to where the song being performed falls within the show. Several promotional photographs from outside the Frankfurt Alte Oper are also included at the end of this selection of photographs. Some of the photographs included in this selection are crops of larger photographs - in those cases, both the crop and the original of the photograph have been placed side by side.
Starting in 2006, this tour was promoted at the 25th Anniversary Tour of the show, although the production continued touring the UK until 2008 & toured Germany into 2009, with several members of the original 2006 cast remaining for the entire three years. Over the course of the tour, the production played at multiple venues in both Portugal (2006) and Italy (2008), with the Italian leg of the tour marking both a cast change & a substantial leg of the 2008 tour. The last of the Italian venues was also largely considered the 'official' end of the tour's run, however, due to the number of cast members who remained for the German tour & the re-use of the existing NAP16 set, the exact cut-off between the two productions was unclear & so the German tour was largely seen as an extension of the already existing production. The Anniversary Tour saw several cast changes over the course of its tour, the most significant ones coming in early 2007 & late 2008.

Pictures Of The UK & European Tours & London Palladium Cast 2013 - 2015

Click on the thumbnails to view the complete pictures & to read more details about the cast, song & year relating to that image. All of these pictures belong to their respective photographers & have been drawn from press releases, local newspaper articles, screen captures from promotional videos, my own photographs & those of friends & of course the official Cats souvenir brochures/promotional materials released by Live Nation/Really Useful Group. All scanned images from the colour brochures do, however, belong to me & I would ask if you could kindly let me know if you take any pictures for use on your own websites or for publishing anywhere else online.
The pictures in this gallery are arranged according to where the song being performed falls within the show. Several photographs taken during the promotion of the London Palladium run & screencaptures of the cast's appearance on Sunday Night At The Palladium  & at the Paris Cats launch are also included at the end of this selection of photographs.
Starting in 2013, this tour's cast change came in two phases in early-to-mid 2014, with some cast members from the original 2013 cast leaving & then returning due to illness and injury amongst the new cast members who joined the show in 2014. Although the 2014 promotional photographs feature Jack Allen as Carbucketty, Allen was forced to leave the tour in June 2014 (after only one month with the show) due to an injury sustained during a performance when he was playing Quaxo/Mistoffelees in Llandudno's Venue Cymru. Following this, the two swings designated to understudy Carbucketty for 2014 - Ryan Gover (also the 2014 dance captain) & Dane Quixall - took over the role on a shared basis. This arrangement continued until Allen was eventually replaced permanently by 2013's original Carbucketty, Joel Morris, who returned to the tour in August 2014 during the show's run at the Princess Theatre in Torquay. Similarly, Francesca Wiffin - a 2013 swing - was recalled to the tour in August 2014 to take over the role of Jennyanydots due to Abigail Jaye falling ill. 2013's original Mungojerrie - Barnaby Thompson - also returned on a temporary basis in August 2014 in order to fill in for 2014 Mungojerrie Benjamin Yates, who was absent from the tour for several weeks due to a broken foot. Yates returned in September 2014 during the final UK venue of the tour, the Birmingham Hippodrome. During the tour's time in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, the cast were part of a performance of Memory/The Naming Of Cats/The Invitation To The Jellicle Ball/The Jellicle Ball & a photocall (featuring the company's swings) at the London Palladium. This formed a portion of the official launch and press conference featuring the original Cats creative team for the announced London Revival production to open in December 2014. At this launch, Andrew Lloyd Webber announced that the revival production would feature changes to songs, characters and choreography, specifically mentioning The Rum Tum Tugger and Growltiger as numbers which he wished to change. During this performance, Dane Quixall played the role of Carbucketty, participating in the main cast's performance rather than the swings' photocall. No casting announcements were made on the day of the launch, however all of the 2014 tour cast members - with the exceptions of Abigail Jaye, Filippo Strocchi  (The Rum Tum Tugger) & Francesca Whiffin - remained as part of the show when it transferred to the London Palladium for the Cats revival of December 2014 - April 2015. Stevie Hutchinson, Antoine Murray-Straughan and Laurie Scarth were added for the West End transfer with Murray-Straughan & Scarth taking over in the roles of The Rum Tum Tugger & Jennyanydots & Hutchinson taking on the newly added role of Pouncival (a role seemingly based on the original West End production character of George rather than the Broadway character known as Pouncival or the variation of Carbucketty shown in the Ultimate Edition production who went by the name Pouncival.) The cast performed on Sunday Night At The London Palladium as part of the casting announcement for the London revival, a performance recorded the day after their final shows at the Birmingham Hippodrome (featuring Adam Lake as the as-yet-un-casted Rum Tum Tugger, Ryan Gover in his place as Alonzo & Dane Quixall as Bill Bailey due to an injury to Adam Salter.) They performed a combination of Jellicle Songs For Jellicle Cats and The Jellicle Ball and the show was broadcast on ITV the following week when the official casting announcements were also finally released. Nicole Schierzinger also joined the cast for the first part of the London run, taking on the role of Grizabella for most performances but leaving before the run ended. Sophia Ragavelas, who had been playing Grizabella for 2014 tour, was made Alternate Grizabella for the duration of Scherzinger's time with the show. When Scherzinger left the show, Sophia Ragavelas initially resumed her place as the principal Grizabella for the remainder of the initially scheduled run. The production was initially scheduled to run until late February, however an extension to this was announced with a new closing date of April 25th. Along with the announcement of the extended West End run, the casting of Kerry Ellis to take over the role of Grizabella for the majority of the end of the run was also announced.  Unlike Scherzinger before her, Kerry Ellis appeared in the show's opening number (Prologue: Jellicle Songs For Jellicle Cats) in the role known as 'Baby Griz', performing the number with the rest of the company as past Grizabellas traditionally did also. The production took a two week break at the beginning of March, during which time Zizi Strallen left the role of Demeter and the 2013-2014 UK & Europe Tour's Demeter - Lily Frazer - stepped in to play the role for the remainder of the show's stay in London. Sophia Ragavelas also left the production but returned for the final shows from April 23rd to April 25th to play Grizabella for all the remaining performances before the show finally closed. The week after the show closed in London, some members of the cast helped launch the Paris revival of the show, performing a medley including The Invitation To The Jellicle Ball and The Jellicle Ball for the press.

Document Conwy Photographs of The 2014 Tour Cast Backstage & Onstage During the Show's Run At Llandudno's Venue Cymru in June

Document Conwy were allowed backstage at Cats during the 2014 UK Tour's stay at Llandudno's Venue Cymru theatre. The shots taken depicted the life of the show from when it first arrives at a venue to when the set is dismantled at the end of its run there & shows the 2014 tour cast backstage prepping, onstage for rehearsals and performances & sitting in the wig master's chair. The photographs are arranged in the order they were originally shown in on both the Document Conwy & official Cats websites. Click on the thumbnails to view the full versions of all the photographs featured.
The complete 2014 tour cast were present for the beginning of the Venue Cymru run & therefore the majority of the photographs featured in this gallery depict the full cast, as listed following the cast change the previous May - in particular the photographs of the onstage rehearsal. However, several of the photographs in this gallery do feature 2014 swing Dane Quixall in the role of Mungojerrie, although Benjamin Yates is present as Mungojerrie in others. For all pictures of Mungojerrie featured in this gallery, I have captioned the photographs with the name of which Mungojerrie is featured. As well as the main cast of the 2014 tour, the swings are featured in several of the photographs, in the under-stage soundbooth & the show's wig master, wardrobe mistresses & assistants, musical director, orchestra & many technical staff are also featured.

Rehearsal Photographs From Both Of The 2014 UK Tour Cast Changes

These photographs were taken from the Cats official website & they feature the new cast members from both of the 2014 UK & Europe Tour's cast changes being rehearsed in before joining the tour for real. The first pictures are taken from the first cast change and feature the incoming cast members & swings rehearsing The Jellicle Ball ahead of joining up with the tour in Europe. The second set of pictures were taken during a rehearsals of The Awful Battle Of The Pekes And The Pollicles at Pineapple Studios & they show both the existing cast members & the incoming cast members being rehearsed together ahead of the cast change that took place in Wimbledon in May 2014.

Rehearsals For Cats At The London Palladium 2014-2015

These photographs were taken during rehearsals for Cats' London Revival ahead of the the cast moving into London Palladium for the show's December 6th opening in 2014. These rehearsals do not include either of the productions Grizabellas (Sophia Ragavelas & Nicole Scherzinger) & in these photographs, swing Dane Quixall is filling in for Stevie Hutchinson as Pouncival. A rehearsal photograph from the 2014 UK Tour Cast's participation in the London press launch for the Palladium run is also featured in this gallery.