It’s strange to think that Jimmy Muscato fell into musical theater.
“I never wanted to do that,” the British actor says of performing his songs on stage in front of a live audience. “I already knew from the age of 10 that I preferred the acting side, and I was kind of embarrassed and scared about the singing side…[But] It turns out I can sing pretty well.
We made our way to the Kerridge Bar, located at the back of the 5-star Corinthia Hotel in London. Its low-lit, leather-filled décor is a welcome break from the sticky city heat, though the iced tea on the table in front of us also does its bit. Random location it’s not – Moscato, the son of a plumber and a schoolteacher who has been reluctant to hone his voice, is scheduled to warm up across the road at the Kit Kat Club in just over an hour.
Although the 10-year-old may not have suspected it, the now 36-year-old has steadily risen through the ranks to become one of the West End’s most bankable stars, an industry-recognized talent who has been nominated for an Olivier Award, and whose latest role, as John Kander’s legendary program director, was a quirky one. nightclubIt challenged him more than any character he had played before.
For those of you outside the UK, Moscato may be best known as J.D. in the musical Heathers. His magnetic rendition of “Meaning for You” went viral on TikTok in 2022. “My phone just started blowing up,” he recalls. “I went on TikTok and I was just scrolling and [I’d] Have them all. It was great. “I’m not sure I’d like it to happen very often,” he adds, before recalling: “Billie Eilish I did one!
His next stop is transfer One day: the musical to the British capital’s famous theater scene, and Muscato — whose professional acclaim has come, interestingly, exclusively through theater and not in film or television — is crossing his fingers that this will finally be his ticket to Broadway. Ask anyone in the West End, and they’ll all tell you the same thing: for Jimmy Muscato, it’s about time.
Moscato grew up in Brighton and came to terms with his talent for singing, and began getting lead roles in local amateur theater productions, even finding himself nominated for an award. Harry Potter Along with hundreds of other young boys (and eventual winner Daniel Radcliffe). At the age of fifteen, his mother encouraged him to enter a singing competition. The prize? tickets for evil — a prospect that interested her more than it did her teenage son — and, unsurprisingly, he won. One of the judges of that competition, Pippa Ailion, casting director for eviltook his details, and Moscato soon found himself auditioning for the original London production of Spring awakening. “It’s about young people finding their sexuality, and they were looking for young people to play those roles, so I was in the right place at the right time, doing the right thing in front of the right person,” he says.
Moscato was only 17 years old when he booked Spring awakening The job, and he was 18 when he moved to London for it. It was a baptism of fire, as he moved in with a crowd of young fellow actors on the show, a period of his life he describes as “incredibly intense. It was chaos and carnage in the most amazing way,” says the theater star. “It’s kind of how I see my college experience, or my drama school experience. It’s not glamorous, it’s a lot of work, a lot of hours, but there’s nothing else quite like it.”
The mentioned Heathers Firestorm has been years in the making. “I did a workshop with [director of the L.A., Off-Broadway and London shows] Moscato explains Andy Fickman and the book two years before he moved here. “I thought I did well enough that they wanted me to continue, but I had no idea.” [it] It will be the job that changes things, because I had never seen the film before I did the workshop. “It’s a potential school bomber,” he continues, speaking of Jason “JD” Dean, “and it doesn’t really have any of the hallmarks of a show that’s going to travel or have a life. And it’s still going. It’s amazing, because a lot of the stuff they’re doing now is stuff we just created in the room. I see a lot of my work and the work of my colleagues is still there, but many years later. That was in 2017, and although he had already counted what he described as ‘bits and pieces’ in the likes of Wretched 25th Anniversary Tour, Fight violentlyand Big fish Unlike Kelsey Grammer, who “covers really good people, learns and steals all their techniques,” he Heathers That Moscato is his big break.
Although the prep work was difficult for the school bomber — Moscato remembers reading actual data from those types to better understand JD — his performance racked up millions of views on TikTok and, more importantly, earned him more auditions. Did wider recognition matter to him? “On a very crude level, it helps you get jobs. But I’m more interested in doing a good job, and then whatever comes along…like, [British theater director] Marianne Elliott came to see the show. And Quentin Tarantino, I know he’s doing a workshop for a show. I want them to think, “Oh, he’s good,” instead of…” The actor doesn’t finish the sentence, but it’s implied that he’d rather win roles based on his acting chops than his Instagram following.
Just as life seemed to be reaching a good point, the coronavirus shut down the entire world, and live theater became one of its deadliest victims. At this time, Moscato changed agents after seeking advice from an old childhood friend turned PR professional, and credits Gavin Denton-Erickson with turning his career around after the pandemic. His first project was Enjolras in Wretched concert on stage – though, to avoid cross-contamination, the actors had to awkwardly face each other – and at the same time came a role in Danny Boyle’s Sex Pistols series pistol.
We pause to focus on the stage here to consider Moscato’s on-screen roles, of which there are actually quite a few: 2014 Sila2019 The trial of Christine Keelerand a multicyclic role in Undeclared war Next to Simon Pegg (“Dream”). Unlike his peers, a sea of 30-something British actors who balance high-profile TV shows and films with an annual or biennial theater stint (such as Jonathan Bailey, James Norton or Jack Lowden), Moscato has remained very loyal to theatre. “It just kind of happened that way,” he explains. “And one of the difficult things about doing theater is that you’re booked – you don’t have time to go and shoot something… I always think it’s easier in America for directors to accept that people on stage can also work in television or film. There’s a lot more crossover with Broadway actors in television than there is here.” Why does he think so? “I don’t know,” Moscato answers. “I think it’s a bit of an old-school mentality.”
One cannot deny that we are British, especially those who think we are TRUE Actors, and dramatists, still hold the West End in the highest esteem, even over film and television. “It’s addictive,” Moscato says of what draws A-list stars to Soho’s oldest and coolest spots. “It’s a shared experience, like when you go to the cinema, there’s maybe 10 other people with you, unless it’s very popular, but you have a whole row of people around you who are experiencing this with you. It’s rare that we have these spaces these days. To be the person creating that experience for these people is addictive. And it’s a huge privilege, too.”
However, he is keen to add more D From working in front of the camera to his portfolio: “I want to work when I’m 80. I can’t do it on stage. I need a broad foundation of experience, and that’s honestly all I want to do. Just keep working.” He says THR He would love to do more films, in particular.
Before we get to what he hopes nightclub and One day: the musical What he can do in his career, we should touch on the titular role he played last year The Great Gatsby At the London Coliseum. That one of the West End’s most limited musicals, which contained, he says, a very large sum of money, being tapped to play Jay Gatsby, was undoubtedly the industry’s biggest vote of confidence in Moscato’s leading abilities to date.
“I was a little cautious about that Gatsby“Because it was a production machine,” he admitted while taking the last few sips of his iced tea. I [worried] I have to be the little cog that gets it to where it needs to be. Fortunately, this was not the case. I liked it more than I thought I would.” Moscato enjoyed adding his own little physical conclusions to F. Scott Fitzgerald’s tragic character. He wasn’t bothered by the show being too American and too commercial – “It’s hard to say why.” Gatsby “A lot of my fears kind of diminished,” he laughs, but the huge resources behind it were balanced with a massive effort to hire the right people as well, including cast members Frances Miley McCann and Corbin Bleu. And no, he didn’t watch Blue’s famous role High school musical. “It was one of the last things we talked about,” Moscato laughed. “Because he gets it all the time from every angle. And Corbin is so much more than that. One of the most beautiful, amazing men I’ve ever worked with.”
His style of performance made it a no-brainer for the producers nightclub to pass the reins to Moscato earlier this year. Kander’s Berlin-set show, which combines the camp euphoria of the Jazz Age with the ominous rise of the Nazis in the 1930s, continues to pack theatre. As the Emcee, a creepy, twisted figure who represents the slow blackness of the city’s soul, Moscato draws from a prestigious group of talent that includes Eddie Redmayne, Billy Porter and Matt Willis. He gives a dazzling performance, uncomfortably hypnotizing his audience – and Moscato is having the time of his life.
“It’s unlike any other character I’ve done before, and yet there are fragments of a lot of different characters I’ve played throughout the film,” he says ahead of this week’s Number One of Eight screening. On whether playing the Emcee feels like another landmark moment in his blossoming stage career, he replied: “I never look forward to playing roles or wish I could play them. I know a lot of people have dream roles; [but] I never did that. Emcee was one I never thought I would have the opportunity to do. I didn’t think anyone would look at me and say, “Oh, what a great fit.” But get a chance to play [him] This has been one of my career highlights, because I get to be stupid, silly, eccentric, foolish, etc., and then turn it around and be the embodiment of Nazi Germany. “It’s full spectrum.”
It helps that he has a great co-star, American singer and actress Joy Woods, who plays Sally Bowles, although the two rarely rehearse together. An experienced artist like Moscato prioritizes that relationship: “I [have] To do my best to enhance what I can do to make the relationship good with everyone, because you spend a lot of time there. Everyone should feel valued and that they come to work in a safe, fun and exciting place.” It’s rare that he says that’s not the case, although he’s experienced it.
The Emcee will likely be quite the opposite from his role as Dexter in David Nicholls’ stage adaptation One dayany THR Exclusive reports will be transferred to the West End following Moscato and co-star Sharon Rose’s performance in Edinburgh. It follows the enduring bond between Dex and Emma, from their first meeting on 15 July 1988 – St Swithin’s Day – through the life-changing moments that unfold on the same date every year.
When production began, he had only watched one episode of the recently adapted Netflix TV series with Leo Woodall and Ambika Mod. Moscato met with director Max Webster and revealed a show unlike anything he had dealt with before. “I read the book, and there was a lot I realized,” he says. “I could see where my life was going and I felt such a blessing in the role that I could follow this person from his young, stupid, eager, arrogant days to his days… well, the opposite, over the course of two hours. It’s a very rare thing to be able to do, because not a lot of stories get told that way. I knew I had to do it.” It was a relief to escape London for a while, even if the show was heartbreaking. “if nightclub “It’s physically demanding,” Moscato laughs, “and it’s very mentally demanding, because you spend the last 20 minutes crying.”
One day It may also be his first real opportunity to move to Broadway, which he says has, for various temporal reasons, eluded him until now. “It’s a very unique piece,” he explains why he has a particularly positive interest in this show. “The music is by a husband-and-wife band called Abner and Amanda Ramirez from Gunswim. She’s Donna Summer’s daughter. He’s an amazing guitar player, and they work together so seamlessly and create these beautiful melodies.” Although he’s not very interested in the product, Moscato would hazard a guess that the production needs a certain amount of financial and artistic success to convince Broadway producers to commit their time and money. It will be a long-awaited breakthrough for this West End hero.
One last question that might be upsetting for Jimmy Muscato: Does he feel like a celebrity? “Not at all,” is his quick answer. “I think maybe in seven or eight streets in London, at certain times, people recognize me, but once I get out of that tiny little area where all the theaters are… it’s [anonymity]He doesn’t mind that, although he admits there are groups of fans who will wait for him at the door of each theatre. “People tell me this is the 15th or 20th time they’ve seen the show, and they’ve been able to create communities around it too, which I find amazing. This lady was telling me a while ago how there were people coming from abroad to come see one of my shows, and they had booked an apartment together on Airbnb,” he said with a smile.
Its popularity is growing – the West End is healthier than ever, with 17.64 million attendances recorded in 2025, surpassing Broadway by nearly three million. And Muscato who says THR His free time includes a trip to a wine bar near his home in Haggerston, and a session at the gym (“just because I know I have to take my shirt off in One day“), and planning well, afternightclub The holiday could be a real beacon of hope that these statistics will rise.
He puts it more modestly: “It’s one of the first times I’ve felt comfortable, and that’s a very rare thing for an actor to feel. Touch wood, it might last.”
