Drew Anthony Creative presents Footloose at Planet Royale with Humphrey Bower as Reverend Shaw

Perth acting stalwart Humphrey Bower is proving it is never too late to try something new.

After years of treading the boards across Australian stages, including homegrown productions Mary Stuart and a cavalcade of Black Swan State Theatre Company works, the 61-year-old actor signed up for his first musical, starring as Reverend Shaw in Drew Anthony Creative’s latest season, Footloose.

Bower, who is also a sessional teacher at WA Academy of Performing Arts, admits he never anticipated adding musical theatre to his acting credits, but was approached by Drew Anthony after the director/producer saw him in Black Swan Theatre’s 2023 play Things I Know To Be True.

It was a performance Bower would go on to be honoured with a Performing Arts WA Award for Outstanding Performer in a Leading Role.

“He approached me then and asked if I was interested in being in a production that he was planning to do,” South Fremantle-based Bower recounts.

“I was intrigued by the possibility of being in a musical, so it was a ‘yes’ in principle. Then that production got postponed but it stayed in the back of my mind, and maybe in his (Drew’s) mind too.

“When Drew announced his shows for this year, I was on his email list, and one of the productions was Footloose. I thought that I could make a fair fist of being the Reverend. It was an interesting character for an actor, and I felt like I could handle the songs, and I thought there probably wouldn’t be too much dancing.”

Based on the 1980s movie-musical starring Kevin Bacon, Footloose is set in a small rural town where dancing and other forms of fun have been banned in the wake of a car crash, which killed five teenagers under the influence of alcohol and drugs after a night of dancing.

Bower refers to it as the classic fish-out-of-water scenario, where three years later, dance-loving main character Ren McCormack — played in this production by Ethan Churchill — arrives in town with his mum following his parents’ separation and falls in love with Reverend Shaw’s rebel daughter Ariel (Sienna Mackay).

“I like to think of Reverend Shaw as not being the villain but being the antagonist in the story because he’s really the leader of the town elders and the town council,” Bower explains.

“His own son was killed in this car crash, so he has a personal stake in this law which Ren wants to change. The minister’s story really is the story of a man who has not dealt with his grief. I mean, the whole town hasn’t really dealt with the grief properly.

“They’ve just tried to stop something like this from ever happening again and it’s a battle of wills between him and Ren as to whether or not the town is going to change and accept what’s happened and move on.”

The musical not only examines grief but is also a timely look at conservatism and generational clashes.

“The original movie was set in the 80s, so it was in Reagan’s America, which was a time of conservative reaction and culture wars,” Bower says.

“Drew has set this production now and I think we are living through a time again, especially in America, but globally of culture wars, polarisation and the clash between progressive and conservative values between the younger and older generations.

“Even about evangelical Christianity. I don’t think the musical is necessarily critical of evangelical Christianity per se, but I think it is looking at how that gets emotionally charged and mobilised.”

Celebrating the power of rebellion, friendship and finding your voice, the rollicking rock’n’roll musical features iconic songs including Holding Out For A Hero, Let’s Hear It For The Boy and title number, Footloose.

While Bower can not remember ever having sung on stage before, let alone being in a full-blown musical, he admits it is the small amount of dancing required of him in the closing mega mix that has given him the most anxiety.

“Thankfully I’m pretty well in the back row of a big cast at the end for the closing number,” he says.

“The whole form of the musical is not one that I’m used to, so it’s a challenge, but a really enjoyable one. It’s a good test, switching between singing and speaking. I’m using my brain in a different way.

“And the role has its challenges . . . he’s basically a decent guy, but, like all of us, he’s fallible and he has to learn his lesson. We’re living in an era when seeing an older, white, straight man learn his lesson, and admit that he doesn’t know all the answers, is a good thing to witness.”

Footloose is at Planet Royale, Northbridge until June 8. Tickets at ticketmaster.com.au.