West End Wicked producer is thrilled to be back in Sussex

He is delighted with the move – a return to a tolerant, friendly, cultured city which is simply a great place to be.

“I have been back a couple of years now and it was quite a homecoming.

"It was 2019.

"I was renting temporarily and then put down roots fully about a year ago.

“I did lockdown in Brighton and I loved my walks along the sea front when the government allowed!

“I was physically born in Brighton and then I was whizzed off to West Sussex and spent the first ten years of my life in Ashurst and then moved back to Brighton when I was ten.

“So I'd say that my formative years were all in Brighton and then I went to London when I was 18. It was all about starting my career.

“I had wanted to follow theatre design as a vocation but I couldn't get a grant and it was the no that spurred me on. I was in London for 30 years.

"But I think you just reach a point in your life when the past and what shaped you and all of that is suddenly much more important, when it becomes the thing that really matters.

“I had always had reasons to come back to Brighton but it was a trip down there that suddenly gave me the sudden incredible desire to be back there properly and living by the sea.

"It's very easy to get to Wicked at the Apollo Theatre in London, and the whole thing just worked.

“Moving has been amazing.

"I pledged that I would never take the sea for granted.

"It's very special. And there is also such a sense of community and spirit in Brighton and that has never really changed even though the city itself has changed a lot.

“It is a very different place to the place I grew up in.

"When I used to come back here it always felt like it was someone else's city but now since coming back properly I do feel that it is my city as much as it is anybody else's city.

“And it is just a better quality of life.

"But I also love the ethos of the city. I've always loved its positivity. There is an incredible community but there is also a huge sense of respect for people's privacy. It is not a gossipy or nosy city.

“And I've always found it an incredibly welcoming city.

"I think it's a very tolerant city.

" It's got one of the biggest Prides here, and the city has been so incredibly welcoming of refugees and supportive of the Ukraine.

“But having had ten years in Ashurst at the beginning of my life I do feel that I got the best of both worlds growing up.

"At first I was growing up surrounded by farms and fields and then I came to Brighton and that's when I started going to drama clubs. It's been a great combination.”