As Gloria Onitiri steps into the glamorous shoes vacated by Olivier Award nominee Heather Headley in The Bodyguard last weekend, a new video of Beverley Knight preparing to take over from Onitiri on 9 September has been released.
Giving us the chance – not for the last time, I suspect – to describe the British soul star who makes her West End debut in the hit Whitney Houston musical as Queen Of The Knight, the latest video features the Shoulda Woulda Coulda singer recording The Bodyguard’s opening number and source of our distinctly overused pun.
The multi award-winning recording artist will play Rachel Marron, the part famously played by Houston in the movie on which the musical is based, when she joins the cast this autumn. When superstar diva Marron begins to receive the unwanted attention of a stalker, former secret service operative Frank Farmer is hired to protect her. The initially icy relationship thaws as the tension builds, but one of the first rules of being a bodyguard is not to fall in love with your employer.
Knight will be joined in the cast of the show, which features hit songs including I Wanna Dance With Somebody, One Moment In Time and I Will Always Love You, by former Casualty star Tristan Gemmill and West End regular Debbie Kurup, who has played Nicki Marron since the production opened.