Breaking Baz: Daniel Mays Talks On-Set Sing-Alongs With Michael Douglas, ‘Guys & Dolls’ Olivier Nom & “Horrendous” Treatment Of ‘Romeo & Juliet’ Star Francesca Amewudah-Rivers
deadline.comDaniel Mays remembers Michael Douglas and Timothy Van Patten, the respectively star and director of new Apple TV drama Franklin, bursting into song whenever he appeared on set.
It came about because during the Franklin shoot in Paris, director Nicholas Hytner asked Mays to star at London’s Bridge Theatre as good old reliable Nathan Detroit in an immersive production of the classic Broadway fable Guys & Dolls by Frank Loesser, Abe Burrows and Jo Swerling.
Upon hearing this news, Douglas insisted, ”You’re doing it, Danny — no question about it.” The adaption of Damon Runyon’s tales was Van Patten’s father’s favorite musical, “so then within the hour, more like a whole bloody second, every time I came on set, they kept playing ‘The Oldest Established [Permanent Floating Crap Game in New York], and Michael and Noah Jupe would join in.” Even the French crew got in the swing of it.
In French or English? I wondered. “No, English. And then Eddie Marsan turned up, and he started singing it,” Mays sighed. He spent a year crooning and kicking up his heels alongside Marisha Wallace playing Miss Adelaide Nathan’s long-suffering fiancée and the lead performer at the Hot Box; Andrew Richardson as Sky Masterson; Celinde Schoenmaker as Sarah Brown; and Cedric Neal as Nicely-Nicely Johnson, earning himself a best actor in a musical Olivier Award.
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