The original West End cast of SIX the Musical LIVE! on the shows pro-shoot coming to cinemas
Watch the full interview below!
The six wives of Henry VIII have spent centuries being defined largely through their relationship to one man until the stage musical SIX turned that framing on its head, handing Catherine of Aragon, Anne Boleyn, Jane Seymour, Anna of Cleves, Katherine Howard and Catherine Parr microphones and inviting each of them to reclaim the narrative.
For SIX The Musical Live!, members of the musical’s original UK company bring that same energy to the screen: Jarnéia Richard-Noel as Catherine of Aragon, Laura Dawn Pyatt from the touring cast as Anne Boleyn, Natalie Paris as Jane Seymour, Alexia McIntosh as Anna of Cleves, Aimie Atkinson as Katherine Howard and Maiya Quansah-Breed as Catherine Parr.
The six performers reflected on building their individual queens, the deeply personal connections they discovered within characters who lived centuries ago, and the sisterhood at the heart of a show that ultimately rejects the idea that one woman must diminish herself for another to shine.
Jarnéia Richard-Noel on the Resilience of Catherine of Aragon
For Richard-Noel, Catherine of Aragon’s strength comes not from being impervious to pain, but from her ability to experience vulnerability and still find the determination to move forward. Looking at Catherine’s history including the responsibilities she carried during her lengthy marriage to Henry VIII Richard-Noel found a resilience she could connect to personally.
“There’s so many things I’ve been through in life that I would continuously think, ‘Well, got to keep going, got to keep going,’” she explained. “And that’s how I seen it with her.”
That understanding became particularly important in the shifting emotions of “No Way.” While much of the number allows Catherine to stand defiantly in her power, its quieter middle section reveals a woman pleading to understand what more she could possibly have done.
For Richard-Noel, allowing Catherine to experience that pain only makes her subsequent defiance more powerful. “Yes, I’ll cry it out and yes, I’ll have my feels,” she said, describing the song as a chance to tap into the many contradictory emotions existing within the character.
Laura Dawn Pyatt on Finding Anne Boleyn’s Chaotic Energy
Playing Anne Boleyn meant embracing unpredictability for Pyatt, who pointed to the legacy of the performers who helped establish the character while also bringing her own musical inspirations into the role.
Pyatt cited Avril Lavigne and Paramore’s Hayley Williams among her influences, drawing on their energy to create an Anne Boleyn who feels as though the audience can never be entirely certain what she will do next.
“Just like chaos energy on stage,” Pyatt said. “You don’t really know what she’s going to do next.”
That spontaneity is essential to a character whose humor and vivaciousness can coexist with the hurt underneath. Pyatt also reflected on the challenge of translating that electricity from a live theatrical environment into a filmed performance, where the smallest details suddenly become visible in a new way. The achievement of the pro-shot, she noted, is that the energy audiences experience inside the theater remains palpable through the screen.
Natalie Paris on the Quiet Strength of Jane Seymour
Jane Seymour represents a distinctly different form of power within SIX, and Paris found her way into the character by grounding the performance in emotional truth.
“What was so amazing about these women, not only the literal queens and the pop inspirations is we get to bring an element of ourselves to these characters,” Paris said.
Although the performers cannot directly share the experiences of women who lived hundreds of years earlier, Paris believes the emotions within their stories remain deeply recognizable. Finding her own point of connection allowed her to uncover the quiet but unwavering strength at the center of “Heart of Stone.”
“I never ever tired of singing that song,” she said. “It felt so empowering singing it.”
The complexity was precisely what made Seymour so rewarding to play. Within a single number, Paris could move through sadness, humor, strength and vulnerability rather than reducing the queen to one defining characteristic.
“There’s so many elements to these women,” Paris explained. “Being able to bring a part of ourselves to that, I think that’s what makes it so special.”
Alexia McIntosh on Letting Anna of Cleves Have Fun
While many of the stories explored in SIX are devastating, McIntosh relished the opportunity to bring a completely different energy to Anna of Cleves.
“Anna of Cleves is a party girl,” she said.
Rather than allowing Henry VIII’s rejection to determine her worth, this version of Cleves recognizes the opportunity in front of her. McIntosh approaches her as a woman smart enough to negotiate her circumstances, secure her independence and enjoy the life she has built.
“I’m going to get that money. I’m going to have my entourage, live my best life and have fun,” McIntosh joked of the character’s attitude.
That sense of joy was particularly meaningful because it allowed Cleves’ story to exist alongside the more heartbreaking experiences of the other queens without following the same trajectory.
“It was just such an honor to be able to do that for Anna of Cleves, to give her a voice and for it to be fun,” McIntosh said. “To be able to bring that element and that lightheartedness was a pleasure.”
Aimie Atkinson on the Devastating Arc of Katherine Howard
Few moments in SIX demonstrate the musical’s ability to radically shift an audience’s perspective as powerfully as “All You Wanna Do.”
Atkinson described the song as a “gift” for an actor because of the journey it asks both performer and audience to undertake. What initially appears playful and packed with innuendo gradually reveals something much darker, forcing audiences to reconsider what they were laughing at only moments earlier.
Atkinson was particularly interested in Howard as a young woman attempting to understand herself and her sexuality while navigating a world dominated by men.
“As a woman, we’ve all had to probably do this in our life, especially with our own sort of sexuality,” she said. “You’re finding yourself, aren’t you, as you’re growing up and you’re trying to navigate going through life.”
For Howard, those questions unfold under circumstances in which her sexuality repeatedly becomes something that others exploit. Atkinson described her as “this young woman thrust into this predominantly male world,” with the performance exploring her continual attempts to understand how she is expected to behave within it.
“That was an amazing thing to research about her, but also to portray in the song,” Atkinson said. “I feel incredibly lucky that I got to do that as an actor.”
Maiya Quansah-Breed on Catherine Parr Reclaiming Her Own Legacy
As the sixth queen, Catherine Parr provides the perspective that ultimately transforms the premise of SIX. Rather than continuing to compete over who suffered most at Henry VIII’s hands, Parr questions why their lives should be defined through him at all. For Quansah-Breed, that shift begins by acknowledging just how much Parr accomplished independently of her marriage.
“Catherine Parr really lived a life up until the point before she married Henry, and I don’t think that is spoke about enough,” she said.
“I Don’t Need Your Love” becomes an opportunity to reclaim those accomplishments and challenge the way history has reduced Parr to her marital status.
“Look at all these amazing and incredible things that I did and you’re deducing me to the marriage that I was in,” Quansah-Breed said of the song’s perspective.
She pointed particularly to Parr becoming the first woman in England to publish an original work under her own name and to the risks involved in championing ideas that were radical for her time. For Quansah-Breed, bringing that history to the stage makes the role feel both empowering and humbling.
“She had the courage, the strength, the tenacity to do that,” she said.
Perhaps most strikingly, Parr’s experiences do not feel entirely distant despite the centuries separating her world from the present.
“We are all, at some point, able to]understand the journey that they have been on,” Quansah-Breed reflected. “Which just shows you how much hasn’t changed, but how much has changed.”
The continued universality of those experiences is part of what makes performing SIX so meaningful. “I genuinely, genuinely do hope that these women are proud of what we’ve done with them,” she added.
Six Queens Shining at the Same Time
For all its individual showstoppers, SIX ultimately becomes a story about what happens when the queens stop competing. The performers’ character work continues even when they are not at the center of the stage, with each queen listening and responding as the others tell their stories. By the time they reach the finale, those individual journeys have created a collective understanding.
“We’ve all been through something and we can all relate to each other in maybe different ways, but we’ve all got something to say,” Richard-Noel explained.
The competition that initially pits the women against each other begins to feel increasingly hollow as they recognize what they share. “The world puts each other against each other, women against each other,” she said. “But I think that’s why this story is so important to show that women can come together and can tell their stories and can be friends and sisterhood.”
“You get to see, which you don’t get to see often, six women all individually owning it at the same time,” Atkinson said. “All standing out in their own right, shining just as brightly as one another.”
For Atkinson, that image captures the message at the center of SIX: “You don’t need to dim your queen’s light next to you. You can all shine brightly at the same time.”
That sisterhood extends far beyond the characters. Having shared the journey of SIX as it grew into an international phenomenon, the six performers speak about one another not simply as castmates, but as family.
“This is a sisterhood. I love these women,” McIntosh said. “To be on this journey with your best friends and to see how this has grown, it’s just blowing my mind.”
Now, with SIX The Musical Live!, the performances they created together can reach audiences far beyond the walls of the theater!
Watch the full conversation below:
